Liberia finance official held on dissidence charge

MONROVIA, Liberia (Reuters) -- Liberia's auditor general and former central bank governor, Raleigh Seekie, has been arrested by the National Security Agency for alleged involvement in dissident activities, family members said.

"Mr Seekie was arrested on Thursday morning after NSA men carried out a search at his home," a family member who asked not to be named told reporters late on Thursday.

Seekie was governor of the Bank of Liberia in 1995-96 and also served as transport minister during the early days of President Charles Taylor's government.

Taylor, a former civil war faction leader, became president after an election in 1997 that formally ended the war.

Serious fighting broke out in the north of the country in early July, started -- according to the government -- by Liberian rebels who had crossed over from Guinea.

Seekie belongs to the Krahn ethnic group and was a member of the United Liberation Movement (ULIMO-J) war faction headed by Roosevelt Johnson, who has been linked to the dissidents.

Taylor has also said that Moslem civil war and election rival Alhaji Kromah was among those responsible for the July incursion, along with Chea Doe, brother of slain President Samuel Doe.

He has accused opposition politician Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who came second in the 1997 presidential election, of involvement with the dissidents.

This allegation was based on a list of collaborators he said had been found on a rebel who had been killed in the fighting.

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