Thousands Flee Fierce Fighting in Liberia

MONROVIA, Liberia —  Fierce clashes rocked a suburb of Liberia’s capital, Monrovia, on Saturday, triggering an exodus of civilians after police and militiamen laid siege to a deposed warlord’s home and his supporters fought back.

Police units surrounded the house of Roosevelt Johnson on the orders of the transitional ruling council of state, which has accused Johnson of murder after a clash with militia rivals near his home.

“The decision now is for the police to bring Mr. Johnson to justice,” council member Charles Taylor, the man who launched Liberia’s civil war in 1989, told British Broadcasting Corp. radio.

Witnesses said fighters from Taylor’s National Patriotic Forces of Liberia and other militia had joined the siege, a suggestion Taylor rejected.

“This is not an act by a warring faction against Johnson. This is the government of the Republic of Liberia acting,” Taylor said.

Witnesses said they saw at least one body in the street, that of a girl apparently killed in cross-fire.

However, there was no casualty toll immediately available from a reliable source.

The fighting, during which the two sides used machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons, shattered the calm of the residential suburb of Sinkor near the airport before dawn.

Aid workers in the West African nation reported several houses ablaze.

Thousands of civilians, many of them women with bundles on their heads and children carrying hastily gathered possessions, headed for the safety of the city center, two miles away, or the outskirts of Monrovia.

“The whole area has been deserted,” one fugitive commented.