Monrovia, Liberia, 04/26 - Liberian environmental activist, Silas Siakor, has brought pride to his war-torn country by winning this year`s prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize.

Siakor, 38, was awarded the Goldman Prize, the environmental equivalent of the Nobel Prize, at a colourful ceremony in San Francisco Monday for exposing evidence that former President Charles Taylor used profit from massive logging to fuel a brutal war in the West African sub-region.

Siakor is currently head of the environmental group Sustainable Development Institute, SDI, and is co-author of two leading publications on the status of the Liberian forest.

The Liberian and five other winners will each get the prize money of US$125,000, considered the world`s largest prize for grassroots environmentalists.

Goldman Environmental Prize winners are honoured every April in the United States at a ceremony to present them to the world to celebrate their outstanding accomplishments.

Siakor told PANA by phone from the US shortly after receiving the prestigious award that he will use the prize money further his environmental group`s work in Liberia.

The Goldman Prize founder, Richard Goldman said the Liberian environmental activist and the other winners were among the most important people in the world, having fought, often alone and at great personal risk, to protect the environment in their countries.

Siakor, during the years of civil war in his country, worked to protect the biodiversity of the Upper Guinean Rainforest that span some five West African nations, and played a leading role in raising the issue of conflict timber to widespread international attention.

Siakor also worked with international NGOs to provide field evidence to support the need for United Nations sanctions on timber sales from Liberia to stop the timber trade from fuelling war in Liberia and the sub-region.

He undertook this work at great personal risk and received a number of direct threats on his life.

He has also pushed for reform of the forestry sector in Liberia and in Africa, including promoting the Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG) policy to Africa through the African Forest Law Enforcement and Governance Process (AFLEG).