The backlash from the incident forced Bokassa into exile and out of power.Īfter the Rhodesian Bush War, Robert Mugabe became known as a national hero in the liberated Zimbabwe, and he was elected president of the country in 1980. Bokassa allegedly beat children with his cane during the protest. In January 1979, Bokassa’s troops massacred civilians who were rioting over food prices in Bangui, and he later killed 100 schoolchildren who refused to purchase expensive uniforms bearing his image. During his time in power, he was also accused of cannibalism. His coronation ceremony cost an estimated $20 million, one third of the country’s budget for the year, and afterwards Bokassa became known for his lavish spending. He deposed his own cousin and took control of the country in a coup d’état on New Years Eve in 1965, and he threw out most of the governmental structure of the country shortly afterwards.īokassa named himself president for life in 1972 and emperor in 1976, declaring a monarchy. Jean-Bédel Bokassa, also known as "The Butcher of Bangui," was the leader of the Central African Republic and its successor state, the Central African Empire, from 1966 to 1979.
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He lost power in Liberia following a second civil war, and he is currently being held in the United Nations Detention Unit in The Hague, where he is on trial for war crimes including harboring members of Al Qaeda. Taylor was accused of aiding rebels fighting in the Sierra Leone Civil War during the 1990s by trading weapons for diamonds, and he has been charged with supporting atrocities against civilians and recruiting child soldiers during that conflict. "He killed my ma, he killed my pa, but I will vote for him," his famous campaign slogan ran. After the war, he was elected president of Liberia amid rumors that he would resume fighting if he lost the democratic election. In 1989, Taylor led an uprising from Côte d’Ivoire into Liberia, beginning a seven-year civil war that killed 200,000 people. In 1985, Taylor was arrested in the United States and held on a warrant for extradition to face charges of embezzlement in Liberia, and he allegedly escaped from a Massachusetts prison, fleeing to Libya to undergo guerilla training under Muammar Qadhafi.
Sources claim that he ordered the indiscriminate killings of civilians in an attempt to stop the revolution, and many worried that he would use his stockpile of chemical weapons against the Libyan rebels.Ĭharles Taylor served as President of Liberia from 1997 to 2003 following his victory in a bloody civil war. Libya fought wars against Egypt, Chad and Tanzania under Qadhafi.ĭuring the Libyan civil war, Qadhafi is said to have provided Viagra-like drugs to his soldiers for the purpose of raping women as a form of intimidation. Qadhafi was also blamed for the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, which killed 270 people when their plane exploded over Scotland. Qadhafi was implicated in the bombing of a Berlin discotheque in 1986 that killed three people and injured over 200, prompting the Reagan administration to launch air strikes against Libya. Qadhafi stockpiled chemical weapons while he was in power, and he was accused of supporting terrorist networks throughout the world in the 1970s and 1980s. Muammar Qadhafi ruled Libya from 1969 until February 2011, when protests that eventually escalated into a civil war forced him from power.