FACTBOX: Sierra Leone's civil war

(Reuters) - Prosecutors will call their first witnesses to the stand on Monday in the delayed trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, charged with orchestrating atrocities in Sierra Leone.

Taylor, once one of Africa's most feared warlords, faces charges of rape, murder, mutilation and recruitment of child soldiers at the U.N.-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone, set up to try those most responsible for the 1991-2002 conflict.

Here are some key facts about the conflict.

* The war began in 1991 when ex-army corporal Foday Sankoh and his Revolutionary United Front took up arms against then- President Joseph Momoh, seizing towns near Liberia's border.

* Although the rebels found some popularity at first, they earned a reputation for murder, rape, mutilation and recruiting child soldiers. Other factions also committed atrocities.

* The war was funded partly by diamonds mined in southern and eastern Sierra Leone. This helped lead to a global campaign against so-called blood diamonds mined in conflict zones.

* The Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), a group of army officers allied to the rebels, overthrew elected President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah in 1997. A Nigerian-led regional force reinstated Kabbah within a year.

* A truce was agreed in 1999 after heavy fighting in Freetown, but it fell apart in 2000. Former colonial power Britain sent troops to help a struggling U.N. force.

* Driven back into the countryside, rebels allowed U.N. troops to deploy to the areas they held in 2001. Disarmament was completed in 2002 and the war was formally declared over.