Los Angeles Times Magazine
04 August, 2003
Bodies are placed in a mass grave on the day that peacekeeping forces arrived.
Civil conflict had wrecked Liberia for more than a decade, claiming up to 250,000 lives, and leading to half a million internally displaced people and around 320,000 in exile. In August, Nigerian peacekeepers arrived, followed by US troops. President Charles Taylor left the country, and an interim administration was set up in October under Gyude Bryant. US troops later withdrew, and the UN launched a major peacekeeping mission, beginning to disarm former combatants.
