Liberian president links election rival to fighting

MONROVIA, Liberia (Reuters) -- Liberian President Charles Taylor has linked opposition politician Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to rebels fighting in the north of the country.

Taylor named Sirleaf, runner-up in the 1997 presidential election that ended Liberia's bloody seven-year civil war, during a Friday meeting with Muslim leaders.

"We have a list of dissidents, collaborators in our possession and Johnson Sirleaf is one of them," Taylor said, adding that the list had been found on a slain rebel.

Taylor also named his Muslim civil war rival Alhaji Kromah, who was third in the election, Chea Doe, brother of slain prewar President Samuel Doe, and politician Laveli Supuwood.

He said that all three would be arrested if they entered Liberia. All three live in exile, Johnson Sirleaf, a former U.N. official, in neighboring Ivory Coast.

The rebels entered Liberia from Guinea on July 8, straining ties between the two neighbors. Taylor has accused Guinea of harboring its opponents, a charge Guinea denies.

Fighting has been concentrated in and around the northern provincial capital of Voinjama, a Kromah stronghold during the war.

The Muslim leaders, who met Taylor in his capital Monrovia, condemned the fighting in the north.

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