By RFIPosted on 07-11-2019Modified on 07-11-2019 at 11:17
The judges of the International Criminal Court (ICC) have sentenced Bosco Ntaganda to 30 years in prison. The former Congolese militiaman was convicted of crimes against humanity and war crimes on July 8, 2019.
With our correspondent in The Hague, Stéphanie Maupas
Thirty years in prison: this is the sentence to which Bosco Ntaganda has been sentenced. The former military leader of the armed wing of the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC), one of the militias active in eastern DRC, in 2002 and 2003, was convicted on July 8 of attacks against civilians, murder, rape, sexual slavery, persecution, deportation and looting, crimes described as crimes against humanity and war crimes committed under his command.
Nicknamed "Terminator", " for his notorious violence ", the United Nations Mission in the Congo had estimated, he himself also participated in the crimes, notably by killing Father Boniface Bwanalonga, a priest recognized in the Lendu community. For the prosecution , his leadership, his brutality, and his lack of remorse count as aggravating circumstances.
► See also: DRC: former warlord Bosco Ntaganda sentenced by the ICC
Aware of what was at stake, Bosco Ntaganda had, during the pleadings in mid-September, expressed wishes for the new Congolese government, assuring him of his collaboration in the search for reconciliation. Supported in his wars of eastern Congo by Uganda then Rwanda, he had ensured, throughout his trial, to have acted for peace in Ituri.
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