You thought wrong.
In
Vanity Fair, Tom Freston profiles the former Liberian warlord
turned evangelical minister whose alias many Americans know only
through a character in Matt Stone and Trey Parker's Broadway hit,
Book of Mormon. Snip:
Today
known as Joshua Blahyi, he devotes himself to running a ministry,
making amends, and rehabilitating former child soldiers. In his former
life he ran the Butt Naked Brigade, a militia aligned with Samuel Doe.
There were countless militias in those days, led by men who adopted noms
de guerre such as General Bin Laden and General Mosquito. Butt Naked’s
soldiers were particularly ruthless—killers and rapists who fought naked
except for guns and shoes. Their nakedness was meant to instill fear
and, they also thought, to protect them. By their own admission, before
battle they often sacrificed young children, ate their hearts, and drank
their blood. “The hearts were roasted,” Blahyi told me, as if that were
a mitigating detail. In 2008, in front of Liberia’s Truth and
Reconciliation Commission, he claimed that he and his followers had
killed more than 20,000 people.
Freston's June 2012 trip to Liberia was with
the One Campaign, Bono's anti-poverty advocacy group. Freston is board chair.
No comments:
Post a Comment