Sierra Leone churchman Alex Tamba Teh testified at The Hague that he was part of a group of 250 civilians seized by rebel forces in April 1998.

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Prosecutors are trying to prove a link between Mr Taylor and war crimes. He has pleaded not guilty to 11 charges.

Mr Taylor, 59, is Africa's first former head of state to face an international war crimes court. He is accused of stoking the civil war in Sierra Leone in 1991-2001 so that he could gain control over its mineral resources.

Mr Tamba Teh told the trial in the Netherlands he was among a group of 250 civilians captured a decade ago in Sierra Leone's diamond mining district of Kono by rebel forces.

Decapitations

The men were separated from the women and children and a rebel commander, known as Rocky, told the clergyman to pray for them before opening fire with a machine gun, the court heard.

Mr Tamba Teh, 47, told the trial that Rocky had later told another commander, called Rambo, he had killed 101 men.

After that, a group of child soldiers, known as the "small boys' unit" was ordered by Rocky to cut the heads off the corpses.

The clergyman said some of the boys were too small to lift the guns they were dragging around.

Later, a captured child was dragged to a log by some child soldiers and had his hands and feet hacked off with machetes, the trial heard.

'Emotional distraction'

Mr Tamba Teh told the court: "He was crying, screaming, asking: 'What have I done?'"

He said the child soldiers then grabbed the boy by the stumps of his limbs and swung him into a toilet pit.

The witness did not draw any link between the events he described and Mr Taylor, who sat taking notes throughout the testimony.

The BBC's Mark Doyle in The Hague says Mr Taylor's defence team believes the testimony of victims is an emotional distraction that seeks to portray Mr Taylor as a monster.

Rather, the court should be trying to establish whether Mr Taylor backed the rebels, the defence says.

Mutilated

Mr Tamba Teh told the trial that he later narrowly survived a split vote among the commanders on whether he should live or die.

The clergyman told the court he ended up in a rebel camp, where women were repeatedly raped.

Captives had the acronyms of the rebel groups, such as the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), carved on their chests and backs with razors or knives, Mr Tamba Teh said.

Mr Taylor denies responsibility for atrocities committed by rebels during the civil war in neighbouring Sierra Leone.

The trial opened in June last year but proceedings were postponed after Mr Taylor fired his defence lawyer and boycotted the opening of the trial.

The ex-Liberian President is accused of responsibility for the actions of RUF rebels during the 1991-2001 civil war in Sierra Leone, which included unlawful killings, sexual slavery, use of child soldiers and looting.

(BBC)

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