Good (news) Friday: Jill Carroll released; Charles Taylor captured!

Even though commenting on good news out of Iraq seems an oxymoronic proposition these days, I am sufficiently relieved by Jill Carroll’s release yesterday to do so. Carroll, of course, is the journalist who was kidnapped on the streets of Baghdad nearly three months ago by desert-variety bandits who now control movement there more than U.S. forces do. Indeed, where western media focuses on the westerner who is occasionally kidnapped for ransom (and, despite pro forma political demands, money is almost always the motive), these bandits kidnap Iraqis every day with impunity and barter their lives like a common commodity.

Ah, but this is “Good (news) Friday”. Therefore, I shall suffice to thank God for Jill’s release - especially since she claims to have been treated relatively well by her captors. Although (forgive me, I can't help myself), is it just me or does she seem to have suffered an acute attack of Stockholm syndrome? I could not help thinking so as I watched the interview she gave after her release from which this photo was taken. Moreover, how is it that she seems to have gained so much weight in captivity? Okay, OK! I shall reserve judgment on this until she's back in America and feels more free to speak her mind.... For now, I pray God rids the streets of Iraq of roving hostage takers and suicide bombers. Because, frankly, I don't see how American forces and their Iraqi trainees will ever "rout them out".

From the sublime to the ridiculous:

Charles Taylor is the former Liberian leader who was forced into exile in Nigeria in August 2003 after being indicted by a United Nations war crimes tribunal for atrocities he committed during his brutal 14-year rise and fall. As a warlord, Taylor commanded rebel forces who raped, tortured and killed indiscriminately on their march to power. And as Liberia’s president, he aided, abetted and traded (guns for diamonds) with rebel leaders whose forces did in Sierra Leone what his forces did in Liberia.

Yet such was his hubris that, when he went into exile, Taylor reportedly assumed that his gilded cage on the Nigerian coast was more sinecure than holding pen. Now, how ridiculous is that! But he clearly did not anticipate his improbable successor, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, joining President Bush in demanding his extradition to stand trial for his war crimes. And, after a pathetic attempt to escape on Tuesday, Nigerian forces caught him within 24 hours and delivered him, symbolically, to Johnson-Sirleaf in Liberia where he was immediately taken by UN forces to the war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone. Although reports are that, for security reasons, Sierra Leone has asked the Netherlands to host Taylor’s trial in The Hague.

However, Liberian nationalists and prominent pan-Africanists have argued that Liberia's sovereignty and regional dignity would be undermined if Taylor is not tried in Liberia (or, at worst, in Sierra Leone). But this argument reflects misguided jingoism and foolish pride. After all, if the trial of Saddam Hussein in Iraq has taught us anything, it's that such a trial would probably make a national martyr of Taylor, fuel an insurgency against Johnson-Sirleaf's government and detract national attention and resources from the important work nation building. By contrast, when the Serbs consented to have their former leader and accused war-criminal Slobodan Milosevic tried in Hague, it sealed his fate to die with a whimper in relative obscurity.

So here’s to the fate that awaits Charles Taylor (think Slobodan, not Saddam). And let’s hope that his capture puts all despots (like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe) on notice that their day of reckoning is drawing nigh. Because Taylor today, Kony tomorrow? Who knows for whom the bell will toll in due course?

NOTE: Click here for my CNN commentary of President Bush's would-be assassins....

Jill Carroll, journalist hostage, Stockholm syndrome
Charles Taylor, Liberia, Nigeria exile, The Hague tribunal