Martina Johnson, former Liberian NPFL rebel commander, is to stand trial in Belgium over alleged war crimes. Photograph: Courtesy Nordic African News

Plied with drugs and guns that many had been trained to use overnight, waves of child soldiers were sent into Monrovia as cannon fodder, forcing horrified west African peacekeepers to mow them down as one of the most brutal chapters of Liberia’s civil war began on 15 October 1992 when rebels attempted to seize the capital.

Overseeing Operation Octopus was a female commander called Martina Johnson. As part of the operation, a heavy artillery unit shelled residential areas throughout the four-month offensive, and allegations of torture were made that stood out even in a war characterised by mutilations and mass rapes.

This September she was called to account for her actions for the first time at a court in Belgium’s riverside city of Ghent. She is currently under house arrest with an electronic bracelet awaiting a court date. Johnson denies all of the accusations which have been brought against her, according to press reports.

The landmark case, coming after years of dogged work by campaigners, is a milestone in the quest for international justice, which has so often failed to bring to book the perpetrators of some of the most vicious wars in modern Africa. It shows, too, how rather than international courts such as the international criminal court (ICC), the long arm of justice may have a further reach with national courts that allow “universal jurisdiction”.

Thirteen countries have enacted the law that allows individuals to be pursued for serious human rights abuses regardless of where they were committed and the nationality of those involved. Johnson’s case came after three of her victims living in Liberia filed a complaint that focused heavily on Operation Octopus. She is only the second person to be charged for crimes relating to the country’s two civil wars that spanned 14 years.

“What is important to understand with Liberia is that, 11 years after the last war, there has been no justice. There were two very, very vicious civil wars, hundreds of thousands killed, but no convictions,” says Alain Werner, director of Civitas Maxima, the Geneva-based organisation that collects documentation surrounding the allegations.