Livery. Accused of gruesome acts. Prince Johnson is dead

Senator, former warlord during two civil wars in Liberia, 72-year-old Prince Johnson, has died – the management of the Hope For Women Hospital in Paynesville near Monrovia in central Liberia announced on Thursday. The death was confirmed by Johnson's family spokesman, Wilfred Bangura.

In Liberia, there were immediate suspicions that the death was not accidental. Work is currently underway in the country to establish a tribunal to try war criminals after many years of impunity, and Johnson, as one of the main candidates to take the bench, was not only against its establishment, but also repeatedly threatened that such a tribunal could trigger another civil war .

In the wars that claimed the lives of at least 250,000 people and devastated the country between 1989 and 2003, Johnson played a decisive role. He was an ally of the criminal Charles Taylor of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), sentenced to 50 years in prison, when he started the first civil war, overthrowing President Samuel Doe.

The president died at the hands of henchmen from troops loyal to Johnson while he was allegedly watching the torture, humiliation and cutting off of the former president's ears.

After the end of hostilities, Johnson was elected to the Senate in elections in 2005, 2014 and 2023. He treated Nimba County as his own principality. He was a two-time candidate for the presidency of Liberia and one of the richest men in the country.

– My people think I'm a hero, while others think I'm a devil – he liked to repeat in interviews.

When President Joseph Boakai, elected a year ago, pushed through the establishment of a tribunal that would try former criminals accused of crimes against humanity, Johnson persistently opposed this initiative, citing the amnesty law that granted freedom to former warlords – forced by the threat of continuing the war.

“Go and get Johnson, you won't even be able to get close to me,” he boasted publicly in Monrovia. – The resistance you will encounter from the young boys will be uncontrollable and uncontrollable – he threatened.

Johnson threatened to mobilize young men from Nimba County to take up arms and join him in the forests to resist the court if he were to be summoned to his presence. Ultimately, he signed the act establishing the tribunal, but publicly declared that it would never be established.