Sudan’s rulers have agreed
to hand over ex-President Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court
(ICC) to face genocide and war crimes charges.Bashir is accused of serious
crimes in a conflict that broke out in Darfur in 2003 and led to the deaths of
300,000.
The commitment came at peace talks between Sudan’s government and rebel groups from the Darfur region.Information Minister Faisal Saleh did not specifically name him when announcing the move, but said the decision applied to all five Sudanese suspects wanted by the ICC over Darfur.
“Justice cannot be achieved if we don’t heal the wounds,” said
Mohammed Hassan Eltaish, a spokesman for the Sudanese government.”We
agreed that everyone who had arrest warrants issued against them will appear
before the ICC. I’m saying it very clearly,” he added.
Al-Bashir was sentenced in December by a court in the capital, Khartoum, to two years’ detention in a correctional center for corruption in the first of several cases against him. He also faces trials or investigations over the killing of protesters and his role in the 1989 coup that brought him to power.
Al-Bashir faces five counts of crimes against humanity for murder, forcible transfer, extermination, torture and rape; two counts of war crimes for attacks against civilians; and three counts of genocide for killings and creating conditions meant to bring about the destruction of the targeted group, allegedly committed between 2003 and 2008 in Darfur.
Sudan’s civilian government, which is running the country under a three-year transition with the military, has been seeking to make peace with rebels in Darfur and other neglected regions which had been fighting al-Bashir’s government for years.Darfur rebels and residents have long demanded that al-Bashir should be tried.
Violence in the West Darfur region in January has killed at least 65 people and wounded more than 50, as well as displacing thousands, according to an international peacekeeping mission.
Conflict spread in the impoverished western region in 2003 after mostly non-Arab rebels rose up against Khartoum. Government forces and mainly Arab militia mobilized to suppress the revolt were accused of widespread atrocities and genocide.
The Hague-based ICC opened its investigation into Darfur in June 2005, following a referral to the court by the United Nations Security Council.
It issued arrest warrants for Bashir in 2009 and 2010 over his alleged role in war crimes including genocide in Darfur province, which he denies.
Along with al-Bashir, the ICC indicted two other senior officials: Abdelrahim Mohamed Hussein, who was interior and defence minister during much of the conflict, and Ahmed Haroun, a senior security chief at the time who last month was named by al-Bashir to run the ruling National Congress Party.
