'The time to be afraid is over': the quest for justice and healing in Liberia

Pressure is mounting in the west African country - recovering from 14 years of conflict - for a war-crimes tribunal to bring 'closure'

As a child in Liberia's first civil war, Rustonlyn Dennis remembers seeing dead bodies in the street. In 1991, her immediate family managed to get out of the shattered capital, Monrovia, and survived, but a dozen relatives starved to death.

Civilians were attacked, child soldiers recruited and ethnic groups were targeted in that war, setting a pattern for many of the wars that were to follow on the African continent. Hundreds of thousands of people died.