A former Liberian insurgent is on trial accused of committing crimes towards humanity, torture and acts of barbarism through the civil struggle in his nation.
Kunti Kamara is 47 however he was youthful than 20 when he was among the many leaders of the Ulimo armed group in Lofa county between 1993 and 1994.
Kamara denies “complicity in massive systematic torture and inhumane acts” and says that he doesn’t know any of the witnesses accusing him.
He faces life in jail if convicted.
According to court docket paperwork, his crimes embody hitting a person and opening his chest with an axe to drag out his coronary heart and eat it, together with permitting and abetting rape and sexual torture, and compelling folks into compelled labour.
Kamara, who’s on trial in Paris, has admitted being a battlefield commander and main about 80 troopers through the struggle, saying he did this to defend himself towards a rival faction.
He stated he left Liberia after the top of the primary civil struggle in 1997, heading to the Netherlands, then to Belgium earlier than arriving in France about two years earlier than his arrest in 2018.
He is being tried beneath a French legislation recognising common jurisdiction for torture and crimes towards humanity. Previous trials have prosecuted crimes referring to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
Elise Keppler, affiliate worldwide justice director at Human Rights Watch, stated the trial is particularly essential resulting from “the failure of Liberian authorities to hold to account those responsible for serious crimes during the civil wars”.
Liberia’s civil wars resulted within the deaths of an estimated 250,000 folks between 1989 and 2003.
In 2009, the nation’s post-war reality and reconciliation fee known as for the prosecution of dozens of former warlords and commanders.
But that decision has been ignored by successive governments
The trial in Paris is predicted to final 4 weeks.
Source: information.sky.com”
