MONROVIA, Liberia — Charles Taylor, the warlord who brought 14 years of death and destruction to Liberia, yielded the presidency yesterday under pressure from rebels, the United States and West African neighbors — but not before vowing, “I will be back.”
Mr. Taylor surrendered power to his vice president as rebels lay siege to the capital, and then flew into exile in Nigeria.
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Three U.S. warships briefly sailed into view off Monrovia within minutes of Mr. Taylor’s ceding power to his vice president, Moses Blah.
In Denver, President Bush called Mr. Taylor’s exile an “important step” but gave no hint whether it moved him closer toward deploying more U.S. troops to assist with peacekeeping or humanitarian relief efforts.
“It is an important step toward a better future for the Liberian people,” Mr. Bush said.
Hundreds of Liberians, thin and ragged, lined their country’s rock-lined shores, exclaiming and hugging at a dramatic day they prayed would mark a turning point for their country.
“From now on, everything is going to be all right,” said 25-year-old Ansu Outland.
“Peace, peace,” others shouted in the jostling crowds, under eyes of government fighters armed with AK-47s.
Mr. Blah, the new president, begged the United States to send troops.
“My message to President Bush is, ’Please, President Bush, come and save Liberia. … Please save us from this nightmare. We are suffering. We are dying,’” Mr. Blah told CNN.
Mr. Taylor flew to Abuja, the Nigerian capital, within three hours of resigning as president. Rebels have seized most of Liberia in their three-year campaign to depose Mr. Taylor.
Family, friends and a small lingering cadre of supporters cried and wailed at Liberia’s main airport as Mr. Taylor climbed the stairs of a jet provided by Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.
At the top, the 54-year-old Mr. Taylor turned and raised a white handkerchief to wave at the crowd. Security forces brusquely hustled him inside before he completed the gesture.
With Mr. Taylor out of sight, the South African, Ghanaian and Mozambican presidents who came to escort him into exile lingered on the tarmac for their own, red-carpet send-off from Liberia’s new president.
Mr. Taylor, a Liberian-born, Boston-educated business student who trained in guerrilla fighting in Libya, faces a U.N.-backed war-crimes indictment for his trafficking with a vicious rebel movement in neighboring Sierra Leone.
U.N. sanctions against him and dozens of associates accuse him of diamond and arms trafficking with insurgents in much of West Africa.
Fellow West African leaders lauded Mr. Taylor for yielding power. The sweaty, crowded ceremony featured Mr. Blah and Mr. Taylor under generator-lit chandeliers, run by scrounged fuel in a war-battered city that has been without electricity for years.
“It is our estimation that today the war in Liberia has ended,” declared President John Kufuor of Ghana, who with Mr. Obasanjo and South African President Thabo Mbeki was instrumental in coaxing Mr. Taylor into exile.
In Accra, Ghana, site of off-and-on peace talks, rebel leader Sekou Conneh said: “The war is over. I’m happy, and I know everybody is happy.”
The United States, which oversaw Liberia’s founding by freed slaves in the 19th century, has provided some logistical support and funding to the West African peace mission.
“The United States will work with the Liberian people and the international community to achieve a lasting peace after a decade of suffering,” Mr. Bush said.
Mr. Obasanjo welcomed Mr. Taylor at the international airport in the Nigerian capital, Abuja. The two leaders shook hands and embraced before walking down a red carpet together to the presidential lounge.
Mr. Taylor, dressed all in white and smiling as he descended from the plane, did not address reporters.
At the ceremony to hand over power yesterday in Monrovia, Mr. Taylor, in a white safari suit, sat next to Mr. Blah, in flowing white traditional robes. Both men were enthroned in oversized velvet-and-geared chairs in an executive-mansion chamber reinforced against assassination attempts.
Mr. Taylor’s exit was unbowed.
“History will be kind to me. I have fulfilled my duties,” he said, relaxed and smiling in a hymn- and prayer-filled ceremony that seemed part send-off, part revival, with the Liberian leader stopping once to compliment himself for being such a good speaker.
“I have accepted this role as the sacrificial lamb. … I am the whipping boy,” Mr. Taylor said.
His parting words appeared to startle the crowd: “God willing, I will be back,” he said, drawing murmurs rather than the heavy applause that Mr. Kufuor’s declaration of peace received.
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