Liberia's lower house of parliament on Tuesday approved a motion to set up a long-awaited war crimes court, more than two decades after the end of a devastating civil conflict.
The vote is the first step towards trying perpetrators of human rights violations and what the resolution terms "economic crimes" during two civil wars which left an estimated 250,000 people dead between 1989 and 2003.
No trials have yet been held for the massacres, mutilation, rape, and forced recruitment of child soldiers during the bloody conflicts.
"The resolution has been passed, and justice for the Liberian people has finally arrived," Jonathan Fonati Koffa, speaker of Liberia's House of Representatives, said after the vote.
Senate is the next stage
Lawmakers danced, sang and chanted: "War crimes court, we want justice," according to an AFP correspondent at the scene.
More than two-thirds of the house voted in favour of the resolution, which will now be debated by the Senate before it is passed onto President Joseph Boakai.
If it gains final approval, a statute will be drafted to establish the court.
Boakai announced his government's plan for a "war and economic crimes court" during his swearing-in speech in January.
Influential
A Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in 2009 recommended the establishment of the court, but the call went largely unheeded as a number of accused warlords remain influential in their communities.
Tuesday's resolution stated that the House of Representatives supports the "full implementation of the TRC recommendations, including the establishment of an Extraordinary Criminal Court in Liberia and commits to working with Boakai for the court's establishment".
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