Dabo Boukary trial in Burkina: General Gilbert Diendéré denies any involvement

Burkinabè General Gilbert Diendéré during the trial for the assassination of Thomas Sankara in Ouagadougou, October 11, 2021. (photo illustration) © OLYMPIA DE MAISMONT/AFP

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1 min

Dabo Boukary, a seventh-year medical student, was abducted and tortured to death by presidential security soldiers in May 1990. The trial began on Monday 19 September.

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With our correspondent in Ouagadougou,

Yaya Boudani

Called to the bar on the

first day of the trial

, Lieutenant-Colonel Mamadou Bamba denied having served as a guide for presidential security soldiers in May 1990. " 

I did not accompany soldiers to show the homes, nor identify any student in photos

 ," he argued during the hearing.

“ 

I had no connection with these soldiers

 ,” he insisted.

The accused maintained that he did not know the student Dabo Boukary, his eldest at the faculty of medicine.

Astonishment of Me Prosper Farama, one of the lawyers of the Dabo family: “ 

You were in medicine and you did not know Dabo Boukary, who was in the seventh year in the same faculty!

 »

General Gilbert Diendéré

, corps commander of the Pô commando training center at the time of the events, rejected any participation in the arrest of the students in May 1990. " 

It was around 11 p.m. that a soldier told me informed that a civilian had died within the council of the cartel

 ”, he said, before continuing: “ 

I immediately went to wake up the president of Faso to inform him.

 »

The court insisted: weren't the soldiers who arrested Dabo Boukay and tortured him under your command?

“ 

They were under my command, but they did not act under my command

 ,” retorted General Diendéré.

The third accused, Sergeant Victor Magloire Yougbaré, is on the run according to the prosecution.

He is the subject of an arrest warrant.

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  • Burkina Faso

  • Justice

  • Gilbert Diendere