Probably the most frustrating argument to come from the neo-cons before the Iraq war was that Saddam had links to al Qaeda and 9/11. There simply wasn't the evidence to back those statements up. However, there was a world leader who did have close ties to al Qaeda, and President Bush let him get away in August 2003. Unfortunately, it looks like today Bush will let him get away again.
There is evidence that Charles Taylor, the former strongman of Liberia, used the diamond trade to assist al Qaeda and Hezbollah. The diamond trade was an easy way for terrorist and criminal networks to create liquid assets once the US began taking real measures to freeze their finances.
Since August 2003, Taylor has taken asylum in Nigeria and is using his relatively safe location to continue to cause trouble throughout northwest Africa. For 15 years, Taylor sponsored wars in the countries throughout the region, and by all accounts encouraged the use of child soldiers. Douglas Farah (who has done great research on the subject) notes that Taylor is still financing violence and pulling strings behind the scenes. An editorial in the Washington Post and an op-ed in the NYT call on Bush to push for Taylor's arrest, mostly due to his crimes still occurring in Africa.
It's not easy to watch someone like Taylor get away. This is a world leader worth arresting and trying, both for his regional crimes and his links to international terror. This is also a region important to fighting terrorism that deserves far more attention and resources than we currently give.
UPDATE: Well... Bush and Obasanjo did discuss the issue of bringing Taylor to justice, but we can only hope their private statements were a bit stronger than the ones they gave in public.
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