30 April, 2017
A special tribunal upheld the life sentence for Chad's former President Hissene Habre for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the final decision of a landmark case, a judge presiding over the court in Senegal said on Thursday.
The Extraordinary African Chambers had also ordered him last July to pay compensation to each victim who suffered rape, arbitrary detention and imprisonment during his rule, as well as to their relatives, a decision also upheld on Thursday.
DAKAR, Senegal (AP) An appeals court in Senegal has upheld the life sentence of former Chad dictator Hissene Habre on war crimes charges.
"The African Union must ensure that the mandated Trust Fund implements the reparation order of the court effectively and fairly", said Amnesty International's Erica Bussey.
Habre is the first former head of state to be convicted for human rights abuses in the court of another nation.
The Extraordinary African Chambers, a body created by Senegal and the African Union (AU), sentenced Habre last May to life behind bars, an unprecedented ruling seen as a blow to the impunity long enjoyed by autocratic rulers. The court later ordered him to pay tens of millions of dollars in compensation to victims.
One of Habre's lawyers, who asked not to be named, said he was "confident" of his team's chances, lashing out at what he termed "Western sponsors" of the trial. He was escorted out of the trial on the first day of witness testimony for shouting. The African Union (AU) will now work with worldwide partners to locate Habre's assets and gather the funds.
Reed Brody, a US-based lawyer who has worked closely with Habre's victims to secure the conviction, said he would be "astonished and devastated if the conviction were overturned".
The appeals court, however, dropped the rape conviction against the 74-year-old former dictator because the charge had been introduced during the trial.
Brody, the U.S. lawyer, said the ruling was "a powerful message that the days when tyrants could brutalise their people, pillage their treasury and escape overseas to a life of luxury are coming to an end". Habre had been originally indicted by a Senegalese judge in 2000, with the case then going to Belgium and eventually back to Senegal due to survivors' relentless demands for justice. The International Criminal Court, based in The Hague, can not prosecute crimes committed before it was established in 2002.
"I hope that all the dictators in Africa take notice - no one is above the law!" he said.
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