American actress Mia Farrow took to the stand on Monday in the war-crimes trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor and disputed supermodel Naomi Cambell’s sworn testimony about whether so-called “blood diamonds” Campbell received as a gift more than a decade ago had come from the warlord.
Campbell, 40, admitted last week to the UN war crimes court that she received uncut stones from two men in South Africa in 1997, but claimed she didn’t know they were diamonds or that they were linked to Mr Taylor, who is indicted by the UN for war crimes for his role in supporting brutal rebels in Sierra Leone’s civil war between 1996 and 2002.
Campbell had insisted that she did not know the identity of the two men who gave her the three “dirty looking pebbles” following a charity dinner hosted by Nelson Mandela in 1997.
Farrow, 65, said in her testimony that Campbell had in fact boasted that the gift was from Mr Taylor at a breakfast the next day, according to Britain’s Telegraph.
“Naomi Campbell entered the room where my children and I were already eating breakfast. As I recall it, she was quite excited and said, in effect, ‘oh my god, in the middle of night I was awakened by knocking at the door. It was men sent by Charles Taylor and he sent me’, as I recall, ‘a huge diamond,” Farrow said.
Miss Farrow had attended the dinner, a charity event to raise money for Mr Mandela’s children’s charity, with two of her sons and a daughter.
UN prosecutors have accused Mr Taylor, 62, of taking illegally mined diamonds from Sierra Leone insurgents in return for weapons that were used in a campaign of terror which killed 120,000 people and included child enslavement and mutilation atrocities.
Critical to their case being presented at The Hague is the allegation that Mr Taylor’s staff gave Miss Campbell uncut gems as a present after they met at the star-studded gala which was also attended by Miss Farrow, Nelson Mandela, his future wife Graca Machel, Quincy Jones, Imran and Jemina Khan.
Mr Taylor has denied any ownership or links to trading in illegal diamonds.
Farrow said that she had phoned Campbell last year to plead with her to give evidence against Charles Taylor after the supermodel refused to testify, eventually being subpoenaed to appear under threat of imprisonment on August 5.
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