Politics

Gambian ex-minister convicted in Swiss court for crimes against humanity

Published

7 months ago

May 17, 2024

In a landmark decision utilizing Europe’s universal jurisdiction, a Swiss court on Wednesday found a former Gambian government minister guilty of crimes against humanity committed under former dictator Yahya Jammeh. It sentenced him to 20 years in prison.

Ousman Sonko was convicted guilty of multiple counts of deliberate killing, torture, and false detention by the Federal Criminal Court. The former interior minister of the Gambia, Sonko, was cleared of any charges of sexual assault in 2016.

“The trial chamber found Ousman Sonko guilty of multiple counts of intentional homicide, multiple counts of torture and multiple counts of deprivation of liberty, each as a crime against humanity,” the court said in a statement.

“The trial chamber concludes that Ousman Sonko committed these crimes…. as part of a systematic attack against the civilian population.”

Using universal jurisdiction, which enables the prosecution of the most serious crimes anywhere, Sonko is the highest-ranking official to ever be tried by a European nation. The campaign organization TRIAL International, located in Geneva, backed the plaintiffs when they launched the initial complaint against Sonko.

While criticizing his seven-year pre-trial imprisonment, which he claimed included some time in solitary confinement, Sonko refuted the allegations and charged the plaintiffs with lying.

Jammeh and Sonko had a falling out during the last few months of the dictator’s 22-year totalitarian reign, which came to an end in January 2017 when the leader was forced to leave to exile in Equatorial Guinea following an electoral setback. Sonko was detained in Switzerland in the same month he applied for asylum.

Using universal jurisdiction, which enables the prosecution of the most serious crimes anywhere, Sonko is the highest-ranking official to ever be tried by a European nation.

The campaign organization TRIAL International, located in Geneva, backed the plaintiffs when they launched the initial complaint against Sonko.

While criticizing his seven-year pre-trial imprisonment, which he claimed included some time in solitary confinement, Sonko refuted the allegations and charged the plaintiffs with lying.

Sonko was detained in Switzerland in the same month he applied for asylum. Meanwhile, the public prosecutor in Switzerland had requested the maximum sentence of life in jail.

“The conviction of Ousman Sonko, one of the pillars of Yahya Jammeh’s brutal regime, is a major step on the long road to justice for Jammeh’s victims,” Reed Brody, a war crimes prosecutor attending the trial, told Reuters.

“The long arm of the law is catching up with Yahya Jammeh’s accomplices all around the world, and hopefully will soon catch up with Jammeh himself,” he said.

The Bellinzona court heard details of crimes allegedly committed between 2000 and 2016 by Sonko or under his supervision between January and March. This is Switzerland’s second-ever civilian prosecution for crimes against humanity.

Politics

Egyptian court upholds ex-presidential candidate Ahmed Tantawy’s sentence

Published

9 hours ago

December 18, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

Former presidential candidate, Ahmed Tantawy, and his campaign manager, Mohamed Abou El-Diar, were found guilty of faking election paperwork, and given a one-year jail term with labour by an Egyptian court, Tantawy’s legal team announced Tuesday.

Last year, Tantawy was the most well-known candidate to run against Abdel Fattah al-Sisi for a third term, winning 89.6% of the vote.

To avoid receiving the necessary number of public endorsements to be on the ballot, he halted his campaign before to the election, alleging harassment and arrests directed at hundreds of his family members and associates.

Egyptian authorities criticised Tantawy’s tactic of distributing unapproved copies of endorsement forms to garner popular support, but they denied any misconduct.

Egypt’s Misdemeanour Appeals Court upheld the May court ruling on Monday, which prohibits Tantawy from seeking public office for five years and mandates that he pay a fine of 20,000 Egyptian pounds ($395).

Tantawy’s defence team member and well-known human rights attorney Khaled Ali said in a Facebook post on Tuesday that the appeals procedure was riddled with anomalies.

Ali said lawyers struggled for months to confirm court dates, with hearings appearing absent from official schedules and case files missing from court registries.

The public prosecution was not immediately available to comment on the ruling or on Ali’s allegations over the process.

Politics

Court orders Uganda to compensate LRA war crimes victims

Published

9 hours ago

December 18, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

Uganda’s tribunal has ordered the government to pay up to 10 million Ugandan shillings ($2,740) to each victim of Lord’s Resistance Army commander, Thomas Kwoyelo, the first senior rebel leader to be convicted.

Kwoyelo, a mid-level LRA leader, was sentenced to 40 years in jail in October for war crimes like murder, rape, slavery, torture, and kidnapping.

Kwoyelo’s “indigent” status prevented him from compensating the victims, thus the court ordered the government to compensate.

Kwoyelo’s crimes were “a manifestation of failure on the part of the government that triggers a responsibility on the state to pay reparations to the victims,” the verdict added.

The court also ordered various financial compensation to Kwoyelo’s property destruction and theft victims.

From strongholds in northern Uganda, the LRA brutalised Ugandans under Joseph Kony for over 20 years while it fought the military to destroy the government.

The militants raped, abducted, cut off victims’ limbs and mouths, and bludgeoned them to death using crude implements.

Under military pressure, the LRA withdrew to lawless forests in South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Central African Republic in 2005 and perpetrated civilian atrocities.

Although assaults are rare, Kony and splintered groups are reported to dwell there.

Kwoyelo was taken by the Ugandan military in 2009 in the northeastern Congo, and his case made its way through Ugandan courts until he was found guilty in August.