Ghana-based Liberian ex-rebel leader confesses to killing thousands

MONROVIA, Liberia -- A former rebel commander known throughout Liberia as Gen. Butt Naked has returned to the nation his troops terrorized to confess to the killings of thousands.

Milton Blayee, who now lives in Ghana, returned this week to acknowledge before the country's truth and reconciliation commission that his men killed 20,000 Liberians.

An estimated 250,000 people were killed in Liberia's on-and-off 14-year civil war, which ended in 2003.

Its truth and reconciliation commission, modeled after the one in post-apartheid South Africa, has been airing the worst of the abuses in a war characterized by the eating of human hearts, the use of child soldiers and the colored wigs and costumes worn by intoxicated rebels.

The 37-year-old Blayee, who is now an evangelist and a church pastor, earned his nom de guerre from his practice of storming into battle without a stitch of clothing, a move intended to terrify the enemy. He appeared before the truth commission this week and confessed to the killings because he felt that asking for forgiveness could help heal the wounds of the past, he told The Associated Press in an interview on Saturday.

"I have been looking for an opportunity to tell the true story about my life and every time I tell people my story, I feel relieved," he said.

A member of the Krahn ethnic group, Blayee belonged to the same tribe of former President Samuel K. Doe, whose death by torture in 1990 at the hands of another rebel leader was one of the seminal moments of the conflict. He told the truth commission that he was first exposed to killing in 1982 at the age of 11 when he was ordained a traditional priest of the Krahn people.

When the torture of Doe, including the cutting off of his ears, was captured on videotape and distributed throughout Monrovia, Blayee said he felt he needed to seek revenge.

"The tradition made me believe that as a priest (of the Krahn) the tradition suggested that I make a human sacrifice before going into battle," he said.

"The political leaders (of the rebel movement he commanded) and myself came to a term that if they wanted me to fight they should allow me make those human sacrifices," he said.

The sacrifices included "the killing of an innocent child and plugging out the heart which was divided into pieces for us to eat."

Between the time he was ordained a traditional priest and the time he stopped fighting in 1996, he said, "more than 20,000 people fell victim (to me and my men). They were killed."

In 1996, he converted to Christianity and preaches forgiveness. "The Gospel," he said, "has given me courage and confidence to discourage people from continuing with the past."

While asking for forgiveness, Blayee says he's ready for whatever the truth commission will decide to do to him. In the meantime, he's busy carrying on his duties as a preacher, he said.

"I want to do more work while it is day, because night could come any time and I could be sentenced to jail, I could be electrocuted; I could be hanged; I could be given any other punishment," he said. "But I think forgiveness and reconciliation is the right way to go."

Liberia's violence began in 1979 when security forces killed dozens of people during massive riots. The following year, President William Tolbert was ousted in a coup by Doe, an illiterate master sergeant, who ordered Tolbert's Cabinet members tied to poles on a beach and executed.

The 1980 coup marked the start of nearly 25 years of instability from which the country - founded by freed American slaves in 1847 - is still struggling to recover.

Rebels led by ex-rebel Charles Taylor invaded in 1989, plunging the country into civil war. The former warlord won elections that handed him the presidency in 1997. Rebels took up arms against him three years later, and Taylor fled to exile in Nigeria in 2003. He is now facing charges of crimes against humanity at a tribunal in the Hague.

In Monrovia, a democratically elected government installed last year is now trying to heal the country's still bleeding wounds through the truth commission, which began hearing testimony in October 2006.

Some 200 people have been deployed across Liberia as well as overseas in communities where Liberian exiles live, including New York, to collect statements from victims and perpetrators. The commission has a two-year mandate.