Sudan Says to ‘Hand over’ Bashir for International War Crimes Trial

Sudan’s deposed president Omar al-Bashir looks on from a defendant’s cage during the opening of his corruption trial in Khartoum on August 19, 2019. (AFP)
Sudan’s deposed president Omar al-Bashir looks on from a defendant’s cage during the opening of his corruption trial in Khartoum on August 19, 2019. (AFP)
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Sudan Says to ‘Hand over’ Bashir for International War Crimes Trial

Sudan’s deposed president Omar al-Bashir looks on from a defendant’s cage during the opening of his corruption trial in Khartoum on August 19, 2019. (AFP)
Sudan’s deposed president Omar al-Bashir looks on from a defendant’s cage during the opening of his corruption trial in Khartoum on August 19, 2019. (AFP)

Sudan will hand ousted longtime president Omar al-Bashir to the International Criminal Court along with two other officials wanted over the Darfur conflict, Foreign Minister Mariam al-Mahdi said Wednesday.

Bashir, 77, has been wanted by the ICC for more than a decade over charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Sudanese region.

The United Nations says 300,000 people were killed and 2.5 million displaced in the Darfur conflict, which erupted in the vast western region in 2003.

The “cabinet decided to hand over wanted officials to the ICC,” Mahdi was quoted as saying by state news agency SUNA, without giving a time frame.

The cabinet’s decision to hand him over came during a visit to Sudan by ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan, who met with Mahdi on Tuesday.

But the decision still needs the approval of Sudan’s transitional ruling body, the sovereign council, comprised of military and civilian figures.

On Wednesday, Khan met with the leader of the sovereign council, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, as well as Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, its deputy chair.

Daglo said Sudan “is prepared to cooperate with the ICC,” SUNA reported.

ICC spokesperson Fadi El Abdallah did not comment on the announcement, saying Khan was “in Khartoum to discuss cooperation matters”, but that the prosecutor would hold a press conference on Thursday afternoon.

The transitional authorities have previously said they would hand Bashir over, but one stumbling block was that Sudan was not party to the court’s founding Rome Statute.

But last week, Sudan’s cabinet voted to ratify the Rome Statute, a crucial move seen as one step towards Bashir potentially facing trial.

‘Horrific crimes’
Bashir, who ruled Sudan with an iron fist for three decades before being deposed amid popular protests in 2019, is behind bars in Khartoum’s high security Kober prison.

He is jailed alongside two other former top officials facing ICC war crimes charges -- ex-defense minister Abdel Rahim Mohamed Hussein and Ahmed Haroun, a former governor of South Kordofan.

The Hague-based ICC issued an arrest warrant for Bashir in 2009 for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur, later adding genocide to the charges.

Bashir was ousted by the military and detained in April 2019 after four months of mass nationwide protests against his rule.

The former strongman was convicted in December 2019 for corruption, and has been on trial in Khartoum since July 2020 for the Islamist-backed 1989 coup which brought him to power. He faces the death penalty if found guilty.

Amnesty International has previously called for Bashir to be held accountable for “horrific crimes”, referring to the genocide in Darfur.

Vow for justice
Sudan has been led since August 2019 by a transitional civilian-military administration, that has vowed to bring justice to victims of crimes committed under Bashir.

Khartoum signed a peace deal last October with key Darfuri armed groups, with some of their leaders taking top jobs in government, although violence continues to dog the region.

The Darfur war broke out in 2003 when factions took up arms complaining of systematic discrimination by Bashir’s government.

Khartoum responded by unleashing the notorious Janjaweed militia, recruited from among the region’s nomadic peoples.

Human rights groups have long accused Bashir and his former aides of using a scorched earth policy, raping, killing, looting and burning villages.

In July, a peacekeeping force completed its withdrawal from the war-ravaged region.

But after years of conflict, the arid and impoverished region is awash with automatic weapons and clashes still erupt, often over land and access to water.

Last year, alleged senior Janjaweed militia leader Ali Muhammad Ali Abd al-Rahman, also known by the nom de guerre Ali Kushayb, surrendered to the court.

ICC judges said in July he would be the first suspect to be tried over the Darfur conflict, facing 31 counts including murder, rape and torture.



Netanyahu Denounces Tactical Pauses in Gaza Fighting to Get in Aid

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
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Netanyahu Denounces Tactical Pauses in Gaza Fighting to Get in Aid

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) attends the Knesset plenum vote on the ultra-Orthodox conscription to military service law, in the Knesset, Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, 10 June 2024. (EPA)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized plans announced by the military on Sunday to hold daily tactical pauses in fighting along one of the main roads into Gaza to facilitate aid delivery into the Palestinian enclave.

The military had announced the daily pauses from 0500 GMT until 1600 GMT in the area from the Kerem Shalom Crossing to the Salah al-Din Road and then northwards.

"When the prime minister heard the reports of an 11-hour humanitarian pause in the morning, he turned to his military secretary and made it clear that this was unacceptable to him," an Israeli official said.

The military clarified that normal operations would continue in Rafah, the main focus of its operation in southern Gaza, where eight soldiers were killed on Saturday.

The reaction from Netanyahu underlined political tensions over the issue of aid coming into Gaza, where international organizations have warned of a growing humanitarian crisis.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who leads one of the nationalist religious parties in Netanyahu's ruling coalition, denounced the idea of a tactical pause, saying whoever decided it was a "fool" who should lose their job.

DIVISIONS BETWEEN COALITION, ARMY

The spat was the latest in a series of clashes between members of the coalition and the military over the conduct of the war, now in its ninth month.

It came a week after centrist former general Benny Gantz quit the government, accusing Netanyahu of having no effective strategy in Gaza.

The divisions were laid bare last week in a parliamentary vote on a law on conscripting ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military, with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant voting against it in defiance of party orders, saying it was insufficient for the needs of the military.

Religious parties in the coalition have strongly opposed conscription for the ultra-Orthodox, drawing widespread anger from many Israelis, which has deepened as the war has gone on.

Lieutenant-General Herzi Halevi, the head of the military, said on Sunday there was a "definite need" to recruit more soldiers from the fast-growing ultra-Orthodox community.

RESERVISTS UNDER STRAIN

Despite growing international pressure for a ceasefire, an agreement to halt the fighting still appears distant, more than eight months since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas fighters on Israel triggered a ground assault on the enclave by Israeli forces.

Since the attack, which killed some 1,200 Israelis and foreigners in Israeli communities, Israel's military campaign has killed more than 37,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health ministry figures, and destroyed much of Gaza.

Although opinion polls suggest most Israelis support the government's aim of destroying Hamas, there have been widespread protests attacking the government for not doing more to bring home around 120 hostages who are still in Gaza after being taken hostage on Oct. 7.

Meanwhile, Palestinian health officials said seven Palestinians were killed in two air strikes on two houses in Al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza Strip.

As fighting in Gaza has continued, a lower level conflict across the Israel-Lebanon border is now threatening to spiral into a wider war as near-daily exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militia have escalated.

In a further sign that fighting in Gaza could drag on, Netanyahu's government said on Sunday it was extending until Aug. 15 the period it would fund hotels and guest houses for residents evacuated from southern Israeli border towns.