ICC appeals court confirms Banda’s arrest warrant
March 4, 2015 (KHARTOUM) – The appeals chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) rejected an appeal by a Darfur former rebel commander and confirmed an arrest warrant against him.
The court had requested the cooperation of Sudanese authorities s to facilitate Banda’s presence at trial. As Khartoum was not responsive to ICC request, the court of war crimes considered that there are no guarantees that he will be in an objective position to appear voluntarily, and concluded that an arrest warrant was necessary to ensure the accused’s presence.
However his lawyer lodged an appeal against the decision of trial chamber IV to replace the order to appear by the warrant.
The “issue on appeal was not the issuance of the arrest warrant itself but the question of whether the Trial Chamber should have provided Mr Banda with a further opportunity to present submissions on the appropriateness of replacing the summons to appear with a warrant of arrest (…),” said the president of the appeals court Judge Sang-Hyun Song.
Song added that Banda didn’t prove that in the absence of the alleged error, the Trial Chamber decision would have substantially differed from the one rendered. Further he said the former rebel didn’t present legal argument supporting that the procedural step of inviting further submissions was required as a matter of law
His name appeared recently in a statement issued by a group of LJM commanders protesting the lack of compensation of military equipments they rendered to the Sudanese government.
The former rebel faces three counts of violence to life in the form of murder, war crimes of attacking a peacekeeping mission and pillaging.
He allegedly commanded a 1,000-strong rebel force in the September 2007 attack, on the African Mission in Sudan (AMIS) base in Haskanita in North Darfur. They looted the camp of 17 vehicles, refrigerators, computers, mobile phones, ammunition and money.
Twelve African Union peacekeepers were killed and eight others severely injured. The victims came mainly from Nigeria, Senegal, Mali and Botswana. It was the deadliest single attack on the peacekeepers since they began their mission in late 2004.
(ST)