Ethiopian Review

Suspects of post-election violence will join the long list of African and foreign leaders facing trial at The Hague. They include:

Omar al-Bashir

The ICC chief prosecutor issued a warrant of arrest against the Sudanese President in March on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. They relate to his five-year campaign of violence in western Sudan’s Darfur region.

He is also facing fresh charges of genocide, even though he is not charged with the crime.

The warrant was the first against a sitting Head of State by the world’s only permanent war crimes tribunal.

Charles Taylor

It marked the first time a former African Head of State has faced such a trial. The former Liberian President faces 11 charges. They relate to terrorising civilian population, murder, sexual violence (rape and sexual slavery), physical violence (cutting off limbs), using child soldiers, forced labour and looting.

Jean-Pierre Bemba

Bemba, the former Vice-President of the Democratic Republic of Congo, is facing war crimes charges for alleged atrocities from October 2002 to March 2003.

A pre-trial panel of judges “found sufficient evidence to establish substantial grounds to believe that Bemba is criminally responsible” for murder, rape and pillaging, said a court statement.

Joseph Kony

The ICC is also pursuing cases involving Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda, Thomas Lubanga, former leader of a militia in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a Sudanese minister and a Janjaweed leader over Darfur killings and rape in the Central Africa Republic.

The ICC judges issued arrest warrants on July 8, 2005 against Kony and other senior LRA commanders, including Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen for crimes against humanity and war crimes they are suspected to have committed between 2002 and 2004. They are alleged to have abducted children and transformed them into soldiers and sexual slaves.

Slobodan Milosevic

The former Yugoslav President’s war crimes trial at The Hague had just entered its fifth year when he was found dead in his cell.

He was indicted by a UN international tribunal and had been detained at the UN centre near The Hague since June 2001.

Milosevic faced 66 counts for crimes against humanity, genocide, and war crimes during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.

- By Lucianne Limo | The Standard