Congolese ex-rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba has been jailed for 18 years following a landmark conviction at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and sexual violence.
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| Bemba listening to ICC proceedings |
He was accused of failing to stop his rebels from killing and raping people. Bemba's lawyers have already said they will appeal against his conviction. Judges announced sentences of between 16 and 18 years for five counts of rape, murder and pillaging, with the jail terms running concurrently.
The eight years Bemba has already spent in custody will be deducted from his term.A well-connected businessman and the son of prominent Congolese businessman Bemba Saolona may just have to serve a sentence befitting a goat killer.
WHO IS THIS THUG?
1998: Helped by Uganda to form MLC rebel group in Democratic Republic of Congo
2003: Becomes vice-president under peace deal
2006: Loses run-off election to President Joseph Kabila but gets most votes in western DR Congo, including Kinshasa
2007: Flees to Belgium after clashes in Kinshasa
2008: Arrested in Brussels and handed over to ICC
2010: Trial begins
2016: Found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity
Bemba was "extremely disappointed" with the sentence, his lawyer, Kate Gibson, told AFP news agency.
"Other commanders should take notice that they, too, can be held accountable for rapes and other serious abuses committed by troops under their control," said Geraldine Mattioli-Zeltner, HRW's international justice advocacy director.
The MLC is now a major opposition party in DR Congo and Secretary General Eve Bazaiba criticized
the ICC ruling and sentence.
"We will never cease denouncing the selective justice of the ICC," she told supporters in the capital Kinshasa.
True, ICC may be selective in a way and it destroys people confidence, these kind of thugs deserve to hang, maybe that is why some leader in a country on the south of Africa is afraid to leave his post.... but for him it may have been the final blow.