Charles Taylor, the warlord who brought 14 years of death and destruction to Liberia, yielded the presidency under pressure from rebels, the United States and West African neighbors - but not before vowing, "I will be back."

Taylor surrendered power to his vice president as rebels lay siege to the capital, and then flew into exile in Nigeria.

Three U.S. warships briefly hove into view off Monrovia within minutes of Taylor's ceding power to his vice president, Moses Blah. In Denver, President Bush called Taylor's exile "an important step" but gave no hint whether it moved him closer toward deploying more U.S. troops to assist with peacekeeping or humanitarian relief efforts.

"It is an important step toward a better future for the Liberian people," Bush said.

Hundreds of Liberians, thin and ragged, lined their country's rock-lined shores, exclaiming and hugging at a dramatic day they prayed would mark a turning point for their country.

Taylor flew to Abuja, the Nigerian capital, within three hours of resigning as president. Rebels have seized most of Liberia in their three-year campaign to depose Taylor.

Family, friends and a small lingering cadre of supporters cried and wailed at Liberia's main airport as Taylor climbed the stairs of a jet provided by Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.

Taylor, a Liberian-born, Boston-educated business student who trained in guerrilla fighting in Libya, faces a U.N.-backed war-crimes indictment for his trafficking with a vicious rebel movement in neighboring Sierra Leone.

Standing U.N. sanctions against him and dozens of associates accuse him of diamond- and arms-trafficking with insurgents in much of West Africa.

Fellow West African leaders lauded Taylor for yielding power. The sweaty, crowded handoff ceremony featured Blah and Taylor under generator-lit chandeliers, run by scrounged fuel in a war-battered city that has been without electricity for years.

"It is our estimation that today, the war in Liberia has ended," declared President John Kufuor of Ghana, who with Obasanjo and South African President Thabo Mbeki was instrumental in coaxing Taylor into exile.

"It is indeed shameful that as Africans we have killed ourselves for such a long time," Mbeki said. "It is indeed time that this war should come to an end."

The United States, which oversaw Liberia's founding by freed slaves in the 19th century, has provided some logistical support and funding to the West African peace mission.

"The United States will work with the Liberian people and the international community to achieve a lasting peace after a decade of suffering," Bush said.

Bush also thanked the leaders of several Liberian neighbors, including South Africa, Mozambique and Nigeria, which has readied three homes in the remote southeastern jungles for Taylor and his family.

At Monday's handover ceremony in Monrovia, Taylor, in a white safari suit, sat side-by-side with Blah, in flowing white traditional robes. Both men were enthroned in oversized velvet-and-geared chairs in an executive mansion chamber reinforced against assassination attempts.

"History will be kind to me. I have fulfilled my duties," he said, relaxed and smiling in a hymn- and prayer-filled ceremony that seemed part send-off, part revival, with the Liberian leader stopping once to compliment himself for being such a good speaker.

He repeated much of his farewell address recorded Sunday night - but unheard by Liberians until Monday morning, with radio stations off the air for days because of the lack of fuel and food in the government-held part of the capital.

Accusing the United States anew of forcing him out, Taylor showed nothing suggesting repentance for launching once-prosperous Liberia into bloodshed in 1989, when as a rebel he led a small insurgency to topple then-President Samuel Doe.

"I have accepted this role as the sacrificial lamb ... I am the whipping boy," Taylor said.

His parting words appeared to startle the crowd: "God willing, I will be back," he said, drawing murmurs rather than the heavy applause that Kufuor's declaration of peace received.

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