Coup Attempt Foiled

MONROVIA (Reuters) - Liberia's President Charles Taylor said on Thursday a coup attempt sponsored by foreign powers had been foiled, just after the former warlord had been indicted for war crimes while attending peace talks in Ghana.

"While the conference was going on in Accra certain actions were being perpetrated in Liberia...the attempt was foiled because the general of the army refused," Taylor told state radio after returning to Liberia's capital Monrovia.

"Contacts were made by certain embassies near the capital to senior Armed Forces of Liberia personnel but they did not accept their proposition," Taylor said. "As in every organization, there are weaklings. Some succumbed to that process."

Taylor is a former rebel who started a brutal civil war in Liberia, which cost 200,000 lives in the 1990s, to end years of dictatorship. He won elections in 1997 but his former enemies launched a revolt in 2000.

The Ghana talks are aimed at pushing Taylor and the rebel Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) and Movement for Democracy in Liberia (Model) to strike a truce, paving the way for a government of transition.

But it was Taylor's links with rebels in Sierra Leone's civil war in the 1990s that caught up with him on Wednesday. A U.N.-backed court indicted him for alleged war crimes during the war, in which he supplied weapons in return for diamonds.

VICE-PRESIDENT DETAINED

After the indictment was served, there were rumors in Monrovia that Taylor had been arrested and panic gripped the capital. Civilians raced to their homes, shops and banks closed and soldiers spilled onto the streets.

Military sources in Monrovia said that the U.S. embassy had contacted vice-president Moses Blah and told him to take over, because Taylor would not be returning from Ghana. Blah has since resigned and is being held by the Liberian authorities.

The U.S. embassy was not immediately available for comment.

"(Blah) will be explaining in the next few days to the nation and the world what perpetrated this action on his part," said Taylor, adding that 30 senior government officials had been involved in the failed coup attempt.

Liberia has had close ties to the United States ever since the nation was founded in 1847 by freed American slaves. Taylor did not accuse any foreign embassies by name and referred to the United States as Liberia's "best ally" on Thursday.

Soon after rumors of his arrest circulated in Monrovia, Taylor went on national radio from Accra on Wednesday to say he was free and would return.

The head of an elite security force also spoke on state radio, calling on soldiers to remain in their barracks and for civilians to stay at home.

Taylor said on Thursday that Liberia's cabinet would be asked to resign at the end of next week to pave the way for a government of national unity, once the peace talks had ended.