Liberia has charged former Vice President Jewel Howard-Taylor with drug trafficking, money laundering and other offenses as part of an investigation into an alleged transnational narcotics network, the Justice Ministry said Wednesday.
Howard-Taylor, who served as vice president from 2018 to 2024, was stopped while attempting to leave Liberia at Roberts International Airport and taken to Liberia National Police headquarters, the ministry said in a statement.
She faces charges including unlicensed importation, sale, distribution and transportation of controlled substances, as well as drug trafficking, criminal solicitation, criminal facilitation, criminal conspiracy and money laundering.
Howard-Taylor was married to former Liberian President Charles Taylor, who was convicted by an international war crimes court for sponsoring atrocities in Sierra Leone.
The government also charged three foreign nationals in absentia for their alleged roles in the network: Croatians Nikolai Ivancic and Mihovil Vrovac, and Ukrainian Tara Zaderieko.
Authorities said they would pursue measures to locate and apprehend them.
The charges follow last month’s announcement of Liberia’s largest-ever drug seizure — tons of cocaine worth about $336 million — which authorities said implicated senior police officials. The two cases are not connected.
By FCCT Editorial Team
, an independent military force, and allied militias in Sudan raped several dozen women and girls in West Darfur’s capital, El Geneina, and those fleeing to Chad between late April and late June 2023, Human Rights Watch said today. The assailants appear to have targeted people because of their Massalit ethnicity and, in some cases, because they were known activists.){kind=link}