Liberian Troops Kill Leader of Attempted Coup

MONROVIA, Liberia —  Soldiers loyal to Liberian leader Samuel K. Doe on Friday captured and shot to death former military commander Thomas Quiwonkpa, leader of this week’s coup attempt. Sources said the bloody corpse was put on display.

Doe also announced in a radio and television broadcast in this West African nation that anyone found on the streets after a 6 p.m. curfew will be considered a rebel and executed immediately.

“The situation in this country is very tense. . . . I repeat, if you are caught one minute after 6 o’clock you will be executed,” Doe said. Foreign diplomats breaking the curfew will “face the full force of the law,” he added.

Quiwonkpa, 30, Liberia’s military commander until 1983, led a group of rebels in a predawn attack Tuesday in an effort to topple Doe. The rebels captured radio stations and proclaimed their coup a success before loyal troops counterattacked and all but wiped out resistance to Doe late Wednesday night.

15 Reported Killed

Government officials said at least 15 people--10 rebels and five government soldiers--were killed in the fighting around Monrovia, the capital.

In his broadcast, Doe said Quiwonkpa--his onetime friend who helped stage a military coup in 1980 that brought Doe to power--was captured by three soldiers in a house Friday morning near a radio station at Elwa Junction, about 10 miles outside Monrovia.

“Quiwonkpa’s captors shot him,” Doe said.

Doe was an army master sergeant on April 12, 1980, when he and fellow sergeants killed President William F. Tolbert in a bloody coup and seized power in Africa’s oldest republic, founded in the 19th Century by freed American slaves.

The ensuing public executions of government officials on the beach of Monrovia brought international condemnation.

Although Quiwonkpa helped Doe seize power in 1980, he had a falling out with Doe in 1983 and spent the past two years in exile in the United States.

Doe in his broadcast Friday warned citizens against harboring rebels and said tight security will remain in force while they are being tracked down.