Comoros: ex-president Ahmed Abdallah Sambi sentenced to life imprisonment

Former Comorian President Ahmed Abdallah Sambi has been sentenced to life imprisonment.

Photo: AFP/Tony Karumba

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

In the Comoros, former President Ahmed Abdallah Sambi and 11 co-defendants were sentenced on Monday morning by the State Security Court.

A special jurisdiction whose decisions cannot be appealed.

The sentences range from two years in prison, suspended to life, for the former president, convicted of “high treason”.

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The verdict was delivered in the absence of former President Sambi and his lawyers, who only took part in the first hearing last Monday, before no longer appearing before the Court to denounce a court they consider biased and illegitimate.

The 12 co-accused were being prosecuted for the so-called “

” case, ie the alleged embezzlement of large sums of money from the sale of Comorian passports to foreigners.

The prosecutor had advanced the sum of 1.8 billion euros embezzled, more than the GDP of the archipelago.

But according to the lawyers of

no trace of this money was discovered and the facts had moreover been requalified from “

” to “

”.

An incrimination that does not exist in Comorian criminal law.

According to the defense, it was not surprised by the verdict: "

" commented on Monday Me Mahamadou Ahamada, reached by telephone.

Read also: in the Comoros, former President Sambi asks for help from Tanzania

Ahmed Abdallah Sambi is 64 years old, his pre-trial detention since August 2018 has been deemed "

" by the United Nations, and his family denounces kidnapping.

Another condemned: the former vice-president and presidential candidate of 2016, Mohamed Ali Soilihi, currently in France for medical reasons.

He gets 20 years in prison.

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• Comoros

• Justice

• Corruption