An ex-presidential guard and a militiaman who fought for jailed former Liberia President Charles Taylor, have testified before the Finnish court that commander and a spokesperson for the notorious Sierra Leone rebel group, the Revolutionary United Front, Gibril Massaquoi, ordered the killing of former Sierra Leonean leader Johnny Paul Koroma.

The death of Koroma, the military head of state of Sierra Leone from May 1997 to February 1998, remains a mystery as his body was not found. He was declared murdered in Liberia on 1st June 2003, a month after he was indicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone. 

During the ongoing war crimes trial of Massaquoi, the witnesses, in separate accounts told the court that the accused ordered Koroma’s murder while he was fighting for Charles Taylor in Lofa County between 2001 and 2002.

Deborah Amuwo reports.