war crimes

Unveiling a Buried Truth: The Thiaroye Massacre and France’s Colonial Legacy In the shadows of history lies the forgotten story of the Thiaroye massacre, a tragic event that has recently come under the spotlight with revelations pointing to a deliberate cover-up. On December 1, 1944, French troops opened fire on West African soldiers demanding their due pay at the Thiaroye camp near Dakar, Senegal. For decades, the official death toll was reported as at least 35. Yet, new findings suggest that these numbers are drastically…

A Long-Awaited Justice: ICC's Landmark Conviction in Darfur Conflicts The International Criminal Court in The Hague delivered a momentous verdict on Monday, finding former Janjaweed militia leader Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, also known as Ali Kushayb, guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. This marks the tribunal's first conviction linked to the Darfur crisis, shedding light on one of the darkest chapters in Sudan's history. A Decades-Long Pursuit for Accountability The Darfur conflict, which erupted over…

ICC’s Pursuit of Joseph Kony: A Legal Precipice in Global Justice The halls of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague are echoing with a new, yet familiar, resonance as judges begin hearings that could shape the future of international justice. The target of this renewed scrutiny: Joseph Kony, the elusive leader of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a rebel group infamous for a reign of terror across Uganda and neighboring nations. A Fugitive of Many Faces Joseph Kony's name first appeared on the ICC’s radar…

U.N.-backed human rights investigators called Friday for the establishment of an "independent and impartial force" to safeguard civilians in Sudan, condemning both warring sides for war crimes such as murder, mutilation and torture. They also warned that foreign governments supplying arms or financial support could be complicit. In their first report since being formed by the U.N.'s main human rights body last October, the fact-finding team further accused the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and…

Starvation as a Weapon: The Catastrophic Fallout of Sudan's Conflict Independent U.N. specialists have denounced the ongoing conflict in Sudan, accusing warring factions of weaponizing hunger. A dire report from a non-governmental organization warns that famine could claim the lives of up to three million individuals in this devastated African nation. Sudan descended into turmoil in April 2023 when the tensions between the national military and the notorious Rapid Support Forces (RSF) erupted into violent confrontations in…

Chadian authorities on Monday handed over a former Central African militia leader to the International Criminal Court on suspicion of war crimes and crimes against humanity, the Hague-based court announced.…

The United States on Monday imposed sanctions on an Eritrean official it accused of being involved in serious human rights violations in the conflict in Ethiopia's Tigray region, where thousands of people have been killed and more 2 million displaced people.…

Sudan will hand over longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court along with other officials called for the Darfur conflict, Foreign Minister Mariam al-Mahdi said on Wednesday. "The Cabinet decided to hand over wanted officials to the ICC," Mahdi was quoted as saying by state media. Bashir, who ruled Sudan with an iron fist for three decades before being ousted from popular protests in 2019, is charged with genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur. The UN says 300,000 people…

A tablet provided by a mercenary for the Russian Wagner group in Libya provides evidence of the mercenaries' involvement in mining and booby trapping of civilian areas and other possible war crimes, BBC News reported on Wednesday. The investigation, mostly conducted through evidence from the tablet's contents, has revealed the extent of operations by the shadowy Russian mercenary group in Libya's civil war, which include links to war crimes and the Russian military. As the BBC reported, they also managed to gain rare…

A Swiss court on Friday sentenced a West African rebel to 20 years in prison for rape, murder and cannibalism, which he committed during Liberia's civil war. The case was also Switzerland's first war crimes tribunal in a civil court. It involved 46-year-old Alieu Kosiah who went under the nom de guerre "bluff boy" in the rebel faction United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy (ULIMO) who fought against former President Charles Taylor's army in the 1990s. Kosiah faced 25 charges including one…