As Liberia’s president from 1997 to 2003, Taylor supplied guns and ammunition to rebels in neighbouring Sierra Leone in a conflict notorious for its mutilations, drugged child soldiers and sex slaves, judges ruled.
He was found guilty of supporting the rebels during a civil war that claimed 120,000 lives between 1991 and 2002, in exchange for “blood diamonds” mined by slave labour.
Victoria Addison Taylor said she was getting information on her husband’s poor treatment from his British-based daughter from a previous marriage, Charlene Taylor, who has spoken to the former president once since he was moved to Frankland.
His current wife told AFP he was being subjected to daily strip searches, denied a blanket in his cell and believed there was a plot to have him killed.
The British government dismissed as “utter nonsense” claims made in October by a spokesman for the Taylor family that the ex-warlord was being treated badly in jail.
But the leader of his NPP party in Liberia this week threatened Britons living in the west African nation with reprisals over his treatment.
“If they try to make Taylor uncomfortable where he is, we can make Liberia very uncomfortable for some of their citizens through our traditional values,” NPP chairman Cyril Allen told journalists in the capital Monrovia.
“They are roaming around our interiors, they are roaming around our country, and this government cannot protect them.
“You cannot take our traditional leader and treat him like a common British criminal. If they don’t stop treating our (leader) in a manner that is unacceptable to us, we are going to fight back.”
Contacted by AFP, Britain’s Ministry of Justice made no immediate comment but British authorities do not generally confirm the location of prisoners.
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