January 20, 2023 [Finland] Day 7: The first witnesses heard
Expert witness Ilmari Käihkö is heard
The defense questions Ilmari Käihkö, associate professor of War Studies (Swedish Defence University)
The expert witness Ilmari Käihkö was heard remotely before the Turku Court of Appeals. The defense had named him as a witness, so they questioned him first. The defense began by asking Mr Käihkö to describe his expertise. Mr Käihkö stated that his expertise is mostly based on field research that he conducted between 2012 and 2016 on the Second Liberian Civil War. He spent 15 months in Liberia conducting ethnographic research with people who had participated in the war. Mr Käihkö stated that he focused on three organizations: Liberian government troops, LURD and one other rebel group fighting against Charles Taylor from the Ivory Coast. According to the witness, he is one of the top scholars on Liberia.
The defense pointed out that when the statement was requested from Mr Käihkö, most of the questions concerned events Monrovia in 2003, and asked if he had anything else to add. The witness answered in the negative and pointed out that not a lot of research had been done on the subject. The defense informed the expert that since his statement was issued, a few things had developed during the trial, and therefore they had to go through certain details again.
Mr Käihkö testified that the first battle in Monrovia took place in 1998. Three so-called World Wars – terms used to describe these fights – took place in 2003, from June to August. LURD attacked from the northern parts of the country and government troops defended Monrovia. According to Mr Käihkö, no other group attacked Monrovia between 1999 and 2003. He also testified that the “Siege of Monrovia” is a term used when discussing the World War III in 2003.
Mr Käihkö testified that he first arrived in Monrovia in 2012, and he was living very close to Waterside, visited the area almost daily and spoke regularly with local residents for many months. The starting point for his research was the textual sources available on the Second Liberian Civil War, namely a few NGO reports and news articles. He stated that the main part of his research was based on interviews, as he had interviewed hundreds of people throughout Liberia. About half of them were interviewed in Monrovia. He pointed out that there were challenges, as many people didn’t remember dates.
Mr Käihkö was asked whether certain names were brought up by the interviewees. He mentioned that former soldiers tended to “have a very narrow perspective” and may only know their own commander. However, Benjamin Yeaten, Roland Duo, and various other senior commanders’ names were mentioned by those he interviewed in Monrovia. He stated that the names Gibril Massaquoi or Angel Gabriel were not brought up by the people he interviewed. Mr Käihkö confirmed that in the areas adjacent to Waterside, such as Old Bridge and Iron Gate, there was no fighting before the LURD attack in 2003. He stated that LURD had fought their way to Monrovia during previous years, but in summer 2003 they had been able to reach the capital for the first time. The term “Siege of Monrovia” referring to the third attack, World War III, lasted for about a month. He stated that many people from Monrovia spoke of famine and lack of food related to this attack, as well as of LURD shelling the city with mortars. Food security was deteriorating, as LURD had managed to capture Freeport and was keeping food stored there. The government-controlled area started to run out of food, so people started to search for it outside their homes. Mr Käihkö stated that both sides responded to looters with violence. He mentioned one incident that he had heard about, where Benjamin Yeaten came to Waterside and ordered a heavy machine gun to shoot into a store. The store was close to Ecobank’s office and the former Swedish Embassy. Mr Käihkö testified that this was not necessarily the only incident, but it had occurred where he was staying. He explained that this incident was probably related to the conflict, as the inhabitants of the city would not have been that likely to loot food during previous years.
According to Mr Käihkö, there are not many written sources available on battles in Lofa after 1999. Nobody has written down the events in smaller villages, and he estimated that many things occurred there that have not been recorded. Mr Käihkö reiterated his statements from the expert report: LURD attacked in 1999, and in 2000 or 2001 “Guinea pushed LURD into Liberia”. For a long time, Foya was occupied by government troops that were supported by the RUF from Sierra Leone. Government forces resupplied their troops in Lofa with helicopters. Mr Käihkö was asked about LURD’s occupation of Voinjama. He testified that ex-fighters used a term “three-month occupation” and that it was also widely reported in Liberia.
On RUF’s activities in the region, Mr Käihkö testified that Charles Taylor tried to use the RUF as much as possible, especially in Lofa. From the 1990s, there was a trade route between the RUF and Charles Taylor. There were Sierra Leoneans living in Waterside, and some Sierra Leoneans participated in the attack in Ivory Coast. The largest number of Sierra Leoneans and RUF members fighting on Taylor’s side were found in Lofa county. Mr Käihkö was under the impression that the RUF was fighting as an independent force, as there had been some incidents between the Liberians and the RUF. He mentioned that, for the most part, the names of Liberian commanders, such as Zigzag and Benjamin Yeaten, came up in his research.
Mr Käihkö was not aware of a particular RUF road-clearing operation in Lofa, but he said that a lot of battles were fought over the control of roads. During the World Wars, Lofa was under LURD control. In his second expert report, Mr Käihkö had been asked about the possibility of a government convoy travelling through Lofa, from Monrovia to Kolahun, in the summer of 2003. He testified in court that this would have been highly unlikely, as the main roads and larger towns were under LURD control. However, he mentioned that other routes might have been possible, but this would have been considerably slower than taking the main roads. According to Käihkö, the situational awareness government troops had in 2003 must have been very poor. While they were using radios and satellite phones, outside these means, acquiring reconnaissance information would have been extremely difficult. On Bo Waterside, Mr Käihkö testified that the area was under constant fighting between April and May 2003. The town changed ownership multiple times during this time. LURD was in control of the city in August 2003 until the end of the war.
The prosecution questions Ilmari Käihkö
The prosecution began their questions by asking Mr Käihkö why people in Liberia may have difficulty in remembering dates and timing events. He answered that based on his personal speculation, the most important reason was the level of education. This is also affected by the fact that a difference in the perception of history. He described that in the West, history is perceived in a chronological manner, while in Liberia, especially in the countryside, history is perceived in a more cyclical manner. He noted, for example, that many people were able to remember the day of the week, but not the year that an event took place. Mr Käihkö also mentioned that war is a highly traumatic event and had lasted for a long time in Liberia. He stated that timing war events had not been a priority: none of the wartime events were ever handled or discussed in public so that everyone could participate in the discussion. Mr Käihkö described the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) as a “missed opportunity” and stated that it did not benefit ordinary Liberians or the international research community.
Mr Käihkö further testified that he visited Lofa county a few times in 2012 and 2013 for interviews. He also met people from Lofa in Monrovia. Most of his interviews were conducted in Voinjama and surrounding villages and he had done one trip to Kolahun. He explained that he mainly focused on LURD fighters, who had knowledge of their own activities but did not know of Sierra Leonean fighters. He also explained the term ‘convoy’, which he had used in his expert report, as “multiple vehicles moving as a cohesive unit”. As the roads and main towns were under LURD control, he deemed it highly unlikely that an enemy convoy could travel all the way via main roads. However, he could not rule this out for smaller roads.
Käihkö then went on to describe the vehicles used by Taylor’s forces. He explained that people of higher status may have had Jeeps or Range Rovers at their disposal. Support elements included “technicals”, i.e., pickup trucks with anti-air machine guns mounted on them. Such vehicles could, in theory, use roads in worse condition than the main roads. He deduced this from the fact that regular cars would not be able to use such roads but that it was a known fact that Taylor’s forces used cars to get around. Taylor also used helicopters to fly to Foya, and used aerial weapons to bomb rebel positions.
Finally, the prosecution asked Mr Käihkö about the cell phone network in Liberia. He described “black spots” in network coverage, as cell phones mostly worked in and around Monrovia, and not in rural areas. He recalled that in 2003, most people did not use cell phones, and only higher-ranking fighters such as commanders used radios and satellite phones. He estimated that that the first cell phones arrived in Liberia after the year 2000.
The defense’s final questions to Ilmari Käihkö
The defense had a few extra questions for Mr Käihkö. In his report, he had mentioned that his most important discussions had been with around 40 ex-fighters. Mr Käihkö testified that his main goal was to understand what had happened to them. He mentioned that not too many Liberians were keen on speaking about these issues, stating that “they themselves have committed war crimes and experienced trauma” and that he had to work on gaining their trust. He had mainly spoken to the ex-fighters about what they had done during the war. The defense asked what kind of ex-fighters he had interviewed, and he explained that he did not speak to the most senior commanders, but mostly held mid-level fighters, such as battalion commanders. Mr Käihkö recalled the names Zigzag or Benjamin Yeaten coming up but said that he would have to check his notes to see if any other names did. He confirmed, however, that the names Gibril Massaquoi or Angel Gabriel did not come up.
According to Mr Käihkö, war names were commonly used during the second civil war. He suggested that they were partially used for ritual purposes and partially for security reasons, to hide one’s identity, and to obscure a person’s role in the fighting. He also explained that fighters may resort to code names as they lived among civilians and may have fought within or against their own communities. According to Mr Käihkö, telling people both one’s real name and war name was not too exceptional, as Benjamin Yeaten went by both his real name, and his code name ‘50’. The defense asked Mr Käihkö how this would apply to Sierra Leonean fighters in Liberia. He suggested that the fact that they have less ties to Liberia may impact the use of war names but stated that he would prefer not to speculate. Finally, Mr Käihkö suggested that more senior commanders would use their real names more than more lower level fighters.
Witness Mikael Vairio is heard
The defense questions Mikael Vairio
As a defense witness, Mr Vairio was questioned by the defense first. He first confirmed that he was the only person in the Finnish police (NBI) who had been involved in the investigation from the very beginning.
Next, he described the steps that led to the Finnish police investigating the case. He testified that firstly, the case came from Civitas Maxima via a Finnish law firm. When the head of investigation, Thomas Elfgren and another policeman received the case, they began the preliminary enquiry. Mr Vairio joined the investigation in 2018 and Gibril Massaquoi was named as a suspect. The acts to be investigated were based on material received from Civitas Maxima, who had conducted interviews in Liberia. Civitas Maxima sent the NBI seven interviews and relayed information about Mr Massaquoi’s residence in Finland.
Next, Mr Vairio spoke of the police’s first trip to Liberia in 2019. The objective of the first trip was not to search for and interview witnesses, but to see whether a preliminary investigation could take place. Therefore, the police went to various villages and introduced themselves as policemen from Finland interested in wartime events. People spoke about the war, but no official interviews were conducted. Mr Vairio could not say whether Mr Massaquoi’s name came up on this first trip. Their visits to villages were based on the material sent by Civitas Maxima. On their second trip, the police re-interviewed all the persons previously interviewed by Civitas Maxima. These interviews made it clear to the police that they needed to conduct their own additional investigations, as there were some contradictions between the original interviews conducted by Civitas Maxima and the following interviews conducted by Finnish police. The NBI also looked for written evidence. They went to the United States to find newspapers from the years of the civil war, and accessed the Liberian TRC report from there. Mr Vairio stated that Mr Massaquoi’s name did not come up in the newspaper articles in a way that “supported the suspicion” against him.
Mr Vairio was asked about the fact that the statements from the TRC’s report relating to Kamatahun Hassala often mention names Zigzag Marzah and Stanley. He testified that this did not change the investigation, as Zigzag Marzah lives in Liberia. The NBI had met with him, but he had demanded large sums of money, so was this was not pursued further. Mr Vairio stated that he understood that the NBI did not have the jurisdiction to investigate the acts of people living in Liberia and there was no specific agreement between them and the Liberian authorities that nobody besides Massaquoi would be investigated.
According to Mr Vairio, the NBI found out, through the material received from Civitas Maxima, that Hassan Bility had a claim as a victim in the case. However, the head of investigations decided not to re-interview Background 1, as the NBI thought that he may have a conflict of interest in the case. The NBI met with Background 1, who also said that it would be best if he was not heard as a witness due to his role in the organization connected to the case. Mr Vairio explained that when the police went through material from the Special Court case of Charles Taylor in 2009, they discovered that Background 1 was the first person to connect the names Gibril Massaquoi and Angel Gabriel. He could not recall whether they had got this information from the material provided by Civitas Maxima. When asked if the investigation team had discussed how the defense counsel would have reacted about the fact that Hassan Bility was the first person to connect Gibril Massaquoi and Angel Gabriel, and if he was personally surprised that the name Angel Gabriel did not appear on any official documents before Bility’s testimony, the witness answered that they had not discussed it, but they were mostly questioning whether Mr Bility should be heard at all during the investigation, and that many things had been considered at the time. Mr Vairio was asked whether the police worked in co-operation with Civitas Maxima and the GJRP. He said that they did, and that they had also been in contact with the authorities of different countries, such as Homeland Security in the US.
Next, Mr Vairio was asked about Employee 1, and how he had come to be chosen as the main facilitator for the Finnish police in Liberia. Mr Vairio explained that during the first trip, GJRP offered one of their other employees to help with the practical arrangements, as it quickly became clear that “the operation would not work without on-site helpers”. However, the first person seemed too inexperienced to them. Later, in Lofa, the NBI met with Employee 1, who was there with another investigative team. The NBI asked for Employee 1’s help as well. Mr Vairio described the arrangements made between Civitas Maxima, GJRP and the facilitators: he would contact Civitas Maxima and ask for the time period for which the NBI would need Employee 1’s help. During this time, Employee 1 would not be on GJRP’s payroll. Then, Civitas Maxima would pass this request on to GJRP. When employed with the NBI, Employee 1 would have a contract with the Finnish police and would sign a non-disclosure agreement. He could not work for GJRP at the same time as he worked for the NBI.
Mr Vairio was then asked about the co-operation between the GJRP and the Finnish police. He explained that the main co-operation was the fact that Employee 1, and previously, the other facilitator, were working with them. Employee 1 had been sent to find Zigzag Marzah.
The defense asked about Employee 1’s role during the second police trip to Liberia. According to Mr Vairio, Employee 1 had been on the ground conducting investigations before the police had done their first interviews. Therefore, he arranged contact with the seven people whose interviews Civitas Maxima had passed on to the police. In addition, when the Finnish police went to the villages to look for witnesses, Employee 1 came with them. Mr Vairio provided an example of when Employee 1’s expertise helped the NBI: based on stories about a house being burned with people inside in Kamatahun, they had gone to Kamatahun Tahamba. However, it quickly became clear that they had gone to the wrong place. Once they realized that there was a village called Kamatahun Hassala nearby, they sent Employee 1 there to confirm that this was in fact the place that the witnesses had been speaking of. This allowed the NBI then to conduct their own visit to the village and to find witnesses there. In Kamatahun Hassala, Employee 1 was given instructions to find out whether people had been burned in a house in that village and to write down what people said about it. He passed this information, with names and contact details, written on paper, to the police. Mr Vairio could not remember whether the name Gibril Massaquoi was mentioned. At this point, Employee 1 was not instructed to ask about RUF soldiers, the clothing of the perpetrator or the commanders present on scene. According to Mr Vairio, Employee 1 must have been instructed to ask about these things at some point during the investigation. Mr Vairio repeated that when they went to villages to introduce themselves, they didn’t tell people what they were there for. He stated that they “just said in general that we were interested in the events of the war”.
Next, there was a discussion as to the timings of the different missions conducted by Employee 1 and the NBI. Mr Vairio stated between the NBI’s first and second trip, they had not sent Employee 1 on any missions. The NBI only found out after their April trip in 2019 about Kamatahun Hassala, and then sent Employee 1 there. He stated that Employee 1 went to Kamatahun Hassala before the NBI’s third trip. However, the defense raised that Employee 1 had written that he had visited some villages in Lofa on the same dates of the NBI’s April trip, to which Mr Vairio responded that he may have remembered the dates wrong. He then stated that Employee 1 might have had instructions on what to ask the people being interviewed, as the NBI was only interested in Sierra Leoneans and the RUF. The Court examined Employee 1’s notebook, where he had written instructions mentioning things such as burnings in houses, killings, diamonds, mass graves, churches, generals and “Kamatahun house”. There was also a list of the witnesses who had answered these questions and mentioned “Kamatahun Hassala”. Mr Vairio confirmed that it was possible that these kinds of instructions were given to Employee 1. Here, the defense pointed out that the NBI had written, in the pre-trial investigation report, that they themselves had interviewed all the witnesses, which would counter the fact that the questions had already been asked by Employee 1 before the police.
Mr Vairio was also asked about a village called Kiantahun. He testified that during the third trip, the police were around Kamatahun. He couldn’t remember where the information came from, but they went to Kiantahun with the lead investigator Elfgren. They went to the village and said that they were interested in “wartime issues”. They were told to return a few days later, and were then able to speak to the villagers. Mr Vairio stated that he did not know whether Employee 1 had been to Kiantahun. Then the defense referred to the pre-trial investigation report and Employee 1’s notebook. These documents suggested that Employee 1 had in fact contacted these witnesses before the NBI. There was a lengthy discussion as to whether this was so, and the notebook was displayed to the court. Finally, the defense pointed out that Employee 1 had told the lower court on his own accord that he went to the village, which Mr Vairio could not explain.
According to Mr Vairio, the NBI did not notice that the witnesses became aware of who or what was being investigated until the end part of the investigation, when it had become public. He could not say whether they had noticed this earlier during the investigation. However, he stated that a lot of the ex-fighters who were interviewed were found through other ex-fighters, so they might have known between them. He testified that a few witnesses might have said that Employee 1 told them that the investigation was about Gibril Massaquoi, despite him having been instructed not to mention the name. However, Mr Vairio stated that this did not lead to any action by the NBI.
Next, the images that were used for photo identification were discussed. According to Mr Vairio, the NBI did not deem it necessary to include photos of Zigzag Marzah or Stanley. Vairio was under the impression that the rest of the photographs used were of random people. The NBI did not pay attention to the change in the rate of correct photo identifications.
The court then discussed Employee 1’s work in Monrovia. Mr Vairio testified that his main task was to contact the witnesses, arrange their transportation and guide them to their accommodation. The defense raised that there were days recorded where Employee 1 was working with for the Finnish police, but he was not being paid by the NBI, to which Mr Vairio responded that there may have been days when the police were back in Finland and asked Employee 1 to do something for them. He also stated that it was agreed that during his employment with the NBI, he would not work for or be in contact with the GJRP in any way. His salary was the same as that of his regular employment. The lower court had increased the salary at some point, but Mr Vairio was not aware of who had authorized this.
The prosecution questions Mikael Vairio
The prosecution began by asking about Employee 1’s notebook. Mr Vairio was not aware of where he had received the actual notebook from, but the NBI did provide him with office supplies. Mr Vairio stated that Employee 1 might not have wanted to have his notebook displayed before the court. He explained that he understood why, as it came about suddenly. According to Mr Vairio, they were never any doubts as to the integrity of Employee 1 or GJRP. The details of the investigation were never discussed with Hassan Bility, but Mr Vairio stated that they may have discussed the investigation on a general level. He confirmed that the NBI never told Employee 1 what the witnesses had said in their interviews, and that he never knew about the contents of the interviews. According to Mr Vairio, Employee 1 was never given the pre-trial investigation report and to his knowledge, Employee 1 had never requested these documents from the NBI registrar. He could not say how Employee 1 could have come to know what the witnesses had said. According to Mr Vairio, the police had a good impression of Employee 1. They were able to communicate with him easily and had received training in The Hague. According to Mr Vairio, Employee 1 never asked about the results of the investigation, and he “understood his role”. Mr Vairio was under the impression that Employee 1 did not find out which witnesses were for the defense and which ones were for the prosecution. Employee 1 had never asked, and Mr Vairio was under the impression that he had handled all the witnesses in a similar manner.
The defense’s final questions to Mikael Vairio
After the prosecution, the defense had a few more questions about Employee 1’s notebook, and the fact that he had not wanted to disclose it. Mr Vairio stated that he could not remember when this was but recalled that Employee 1 believed that there were things in the notebook not related to the case with the Finnish police. Mr Vairio could not explain why all the witnesses contacted by Employee 1 spoke of Gibril Massaquoi or Angel Gabriel, he speculated that he may have selected only those that talked about the RUF and Sierra Leoneans. Mr Vairio was not aware whether Civitas Maxima had requested the investigation documents from the NBI registrar.
Civilian 24’s recording is viewed
For the final part of the hearing, the court watched the recording of Civilian 24’s testimony before the lower court, as the witness had passed away before the appeals proceedings.