Madagascar: tense atmosphere during the trial of the "Apollo 21 Project" case
In front of the entrance to the courtroom.
Gendarmes, soldiers and police, in civilian clothes or not, monitor the comings and goings of the participants in the trial.
Despite requests from defense lawyers, journalists were not allowed to record, film or take photos during the hearing.
© SarahTétaud / RFI
Text by: RFI Follow
2 min
In Madagascar, a long-awaited trial opened on Monday, December 6, at the Antananarivo criminal court.
Twenty people including two Frenchmen and their wives as well as five senior officers and a former Prime Minister are on trial for having participated in the "Apollo 21 Project", a supposed coup attempt and assassination of the President of the Republic as well as of some members of his entourage, and which should, according to the investigation, have been carried out last July.
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With our correspondent in Antananarivo,
Sarah Tétaud
This first day was mainly devoted to reading, in Malagasy and French, the indictments.
This Monday evening, the defense lawyers requested the nullity of the procedure for non-compliance with the right of defense.
The judge will announce, in the morning of Tuesday, if the trial resumes or stops definitively.
For this first day of hearing, it is in a tense atmosphere and under high security that the trial opened this Monday at 9:30 am.
About sixty security forces, mostly armed with Kalashnikovs and some with hoods, supervised the twenty defendants summoned to appear and the twenty journalists who came to cover the case.
After the drawing of lots of four jurors (citizen-assessors), more than three hours were necessary to read the indictment, in Malagasy then in French, so that the foreign defendants can "
understand what they are being accused of.
», Explained the president of the court.
Several charges have been retained, including "criminal association", "criminal association", "conspiracy" or even "attack".
A Franco-Malagasy as well as a French, both former officers of the French army, were presented as the main suspects in the case.
►Also read: The trial of the alleged coup attempt opens in Antananarivo
Around 4 p.m., five of the defense lawyers spoke in turn to demand that the proceedings be declared null and void. Among the arguments presented are a violation of the rights of the defense, the presumption of innocence and the secrecy of investigation as well as the failure to respect the separation of powers. Arguments swept aside by the Advocate General and representative of the prosecution: “
You lawyers, you did not do your job. You should have notified the procedural flaws during the investigation,
”he replied.
It was on these exchanges that the hearing was finally suspended, around 5:30 p.m.
It resumes Tuesday with the deliberation, on the form, of the judge.
If an abandonment of the proceedings were recorded, the immediate effect would be the end of all proceedings.
"
It would be a first for this kind of case
", explains a lawyer to RFI, but the chances of such an outcome "
are almost zero
", explains another, for whom the trial is far too political to stop like this. .
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Madagascar
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