The crimes included murder, violation, persecution, torture and attacks against civilians in the cities of Kodoom, Bindisi, Mukjar and Deleig.
In a ruling of 355 pages, Judge President Joanna Korner and Judges Reine Alapini-Gansou and Althea Violet Alexis-Windsor concluded Beyond the reasonable doubt that Ali Kushayb ordered, supported and participated in generalized and systematic terrorist attacks That led to mass murders and forced displacement.
Indiscriminate murders
The Janjaweed, the armed militias armed and supported by the Sudan security forces, were part of the Jardtum campaign to crush a rebellion by non -Arab groups in 2003. The villages were razed, the summarily executed men and the women raped in what the UN later described as one of the most serious humanitarian crises of the early twentieth century.
Among the evidence presented was a testimony that describes how Janjaweed fighters “killed the inhabitants of the city indiscriminately,” shooting people fleeing for their lives.
Another story remembered an injured father who urged his children to “leave him behind and save” as the militia progressed.
Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman in the opening of his trial in the CPI. (Photo of 2020)
A case of many first
Ali Kushayb surrendered to the ICC in 2020 shortly after the fall of the leader of Sudan, Omar Al-Bashir, after evading the authorities for more than 12 years.
Your sentence will continue and the sentence can be appealed. A repair phase will also open for victims.
The conviction marks several milestones for international justice: It is the first verdict of the ICC in the situation of Darfur, the first case referred to by the UN Security Council in Resolution 1593 (2005) that results in condemnation, and the first condemnation by ICC for gender -based persecution.
The CPI prosecutor’s office said that other pending arrest orders continue to chase Bashir, former Interior Minister Ahmad Harun, and former Minister of Defense, Abdel Raheem Hussein, accused of similar crimes.
Echoes of the past
The conviction occurs when Darfur once again descends to violence in the middle of the current war between the Sudan Army and the Paramilitary Fast Support forces (RSF), which, according to reports, emerged from the militias of Janjaweed and the former leadership in 2013.
The reports of mass murders and attacked attacks have resurfaced in Darfur, which caused comparisons with the horrors of two decades ago.
Only in September, at least 91 civilians were killed in the capital city besieged by El Pasher during a series of strikes by the RSF, which involved drone bombings and land incursions.
An aerial view of the carbonized land and burned structures in a town located between the cities of Nyala (capital of southern Darfur) and the Geneina (capital of West Darfur). Hundreds of villages were attacked, looted and destroyed. (Photo of 2004)
‘Justice will prevail’
The attached prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan praised the verdict as “a crucial step to close the impunity gap in Darfur”, adding that “sends A resounding message to the perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan, both past and present, which justice will prevail.”
She said the trial “is a tribute to the courage of thousands of victims Darfuri who expected and fought for justice over the years.”
‘A very long repair’
The High Commissioner of Human Rights, Volker Türk, also welcomed the decision, qualifying it “An important recognition of the enormous suffering suffered by the victims of their atrocious crimes“And a” first repair measure for a long time. “