ICC sentences Malian Islamist to 10 years over Timbuktu repression

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THE HAGUE (Reuters) – A Malian Islamist who helped run the police force imposing sharia law on Timbuktu after the city was captured by militants in 2012 was sentenced to 10 years in prison by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Wednesday.

Judges said Al Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz, 47, had played a key role in the Islamic police set up by the Ansar Dine Islamist group in the city on the fringe of the Sahara Desert.

He had taken part in or been present at many public floggings that left deep psychological wounds on victims and onlookers, the judges said.

“This regime and these acts had a traumatic effect of the population of Timbuktu,” they said.

Al Hassan, who had pleaded not guilty to the charges at the start of his case in 2020, was present in court clad in all white with a traditional West African robe and headdress. He showed no emotion as the sentence was read out.

In July this year, Al Hassan had already been convicted of several counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes including persecution and torture.

He has been in the ICC’s detention center since March 2018 and the more than six years he has already spent in detention will be deducted from his time. The ICC often grants release when over two-thirds of a sentence has been served so he is not expected to remain in jail much longer.

(Reporting by Stephanie van den Berg, Editing by Charlotte Van Campenhout and Angus MacSwan)