The United States has deported Mayama Sesay, a former Liberian rebel commander widely known by the alias “Black Diamond”, for her role in recruiting and leading child soldiers during Liberia’s second civil war.
The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said Sesay, 43, was expelled in September after years of legal battles over her immigration status.
According to ICE, Sesay entered the US on a visitor’s visa in 2014 and sought permanent residency the following year after marrying a US citizen. However, she was taken into custody in April 2025 by ICE officers in Atlanta following an immigration judge’s ruling that she lacked credibility and had indeed recruited child soldiers.
“Sesay, infamously known as the rebel commander ‘Black Diamond,’ played a prominent role in recruiting and leading child soldiers during Liberia’s civil wars,” ICE said in a statement.
“She commanded an all-female fighters’ unit and gained notoriety for her brutal tactics, including restraining and beating captured soldiers and deploying mortar bombs to terrorize and kill both military personnel and civilians.”
The US agency added that Sesay had been designated as a war criminal in Liberia.
Sesay rose to prominence in her early 20s as a battlefield commander, allegedly training underage recruits to fight against forces loyal to former Liberian president Charles Taylor.
Her deportation comes as Liberia continues to grapple with the legacy of two back-to-back civil wars, which spanned from 1989 to 2003 and claimed an estimated 250,000 lives. The conflicts were marked by massacres, rape, mutilation, and the widespread use of child soldiers.
The small West African nation, still recovering from years of conflict and the devastating 2014 Ebola epidemic, has been working to rebuild its institutions and strengthen accountability for wartime atrocities.
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