Alleged Sudanese militia leader faces court at the Hague’s first Darfur trial
An alleged leader of a Sudanese militia known as "devils on horseback" took a "strange glee" in his ruthless reputation during the Darfur conflict, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said on Tuesday as his trial opened.
Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-alrahman, also known as Ali Kushayb, 72, pleaded not guilty to all 31 charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
"I reject all of these charges," he told the court in the first ICC trial to deal with atrocities by Sudanese government-backed forces in the Darfur province nearly two decades ago.
The trial opened amid global condemnation of atrocities blamed on russian forces in the Ukraine war.
Prose cut orka rim khan called the trial" an important moment in trying to wake peace from its slumber and try to move it, mobilise it, into action".
He noted that russia voted for a united nations security councilmandate in 2005 that sought an ICC investigation in Darfur.
Prosecutors say Abd-al-rahman was a senior commander in the janja weed militias during the Darfur conflict that erupted when rebels from the territory' s ethnic central and sub- saharan African community launched an insurgency in 2003, complaining of oppression by the Arab-dominated government in the capital, Khartoum.
Then-president Omar albashir's government responded with a scorched-earth campaign of aerial bombings and raids by the janjaweed, who often attacked at dawn, sweepinginto village son horse back or camelback.
The campaign included mass killings and rapes, torture and persecution. up to 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes in Darfur over the years.
Mr Khan said that Abd-alrahman was a "willing and knowing participant in crimes" and "one of the key senior janjaweed militia leaders" who worked "hand-in-glove" with the Sudanese government in its counterinsurgency campaign.
"You will see that he took pride in the power that he thought he exerted and the authority that he had," Mr Khan said, "and ... strange glee in a feared reputation. You'll hear evidence ... that his forces and himself rampaged across different parts of Darfur".
He said witnesses will tell the three-judge trial panel about attacks, murder sand rape sand describe the horrors inflicted on villages considered rebel supporters and the enduring consequences of the attacks.
"In my community, a girl who has been raped has no value," Mr Khan cited one Darfuri as saying.
One witness quoted by the prosecutor in his opening statement to the trial described seeing an infant breast-feeding from its dead mother in the aftermath of an attack.
Al-bashir, who has been in prison in Khartoum since he was ousted from power in 2019, also faces ICC charges of genocide and crimes against humanity related to th ed a rf ur conflict.
He is suspected of crimes allegedly committed between August 2003 and at least April 2004 in Darfur including murder, torture, rape, persecution and attacking civilians.
The trial opened amid a recent rise in violence i nd ar fur, which has seen deadly clashes between rival tribes in recent months as the country remains mi red in a wider crisis following last year's coup.