Peace force to enter Liberia on Monday

WEST AFRICAN leaders yesterday pledged to have the first peace troops in warring Liberia by Monday and said indicted war-crimes suspect President Charles Taylor would go into exile within days.

The commitment came at a summit of West African heads of state in Accra, the Ghanaian capital, as pressure grew on regional leaders to speed up a peace force promised almost since rebels opened two months of bloody siege on Liberia’s capital in early June.

A vanguard force, expected to be two Nigerian battalions with about 1,500 men in total, would be deployed by Monday, said Mohamed Ibn Chambas, executive secretary of the West African leaders’ bloc.