Judges at the International Criminal Court on Wednesday convicted a Malian jihadist of war crimes and crimes against humanity during the terror group’s nine-month occupation of the ancient city of Timbuktu.
The three-member panel said the man, Al-Hassan Ag Abdel Aziz, was a former police chief who played a key role in the Islamic police, organizing a repressive apparatus aimed at imposing an extreme form of sharia law on the more tolerant Islam that is traditional in Timbuktu, a center of knowledge and culture.
Presiding judge Antoine Kesia-Mbe Mindua said Mr Hassan was “found guilty by majority of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including torture, cruel treatment and outrages on personal dignity, for the public flogging”.
Mr. Hassan, 46, was also convicted of religious persecution and taking part in a sham trial by an Islamic court.
Prosecutors insist he participated in crimes against women who were raped and forced into sexual slavery by jihadist fighters. But the judge said that while several women testified that they were raped by jihadist police during arrests for improper dress or extramarital sex, and that other women were forced into marriage, Mr. Hassan did not participate in those cases and was not criminally responsible.
Mr. Hassan was also charged but acquitted of involvement in the destruction of the tombs of revered local Muslim saints, whose worship the jihadists describe as heresy.
His verdict is expected to be announced soon, according to the court.
Hassan has pleaded not guilty to all charges but has not denied being a member of the jihadist group Islamic State, which is linked to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), an al-Qaeda affiliate operating in the Sahara.
The ruling comes nearly a week after the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued an arrest warrant for Ansar Dine founder and leader Iyad Ag Ghaly, also known as Abou Fadl, whose whereabouts are currently unknown.
Most Malians are unaware of the trial, said El Hadj Djitteye, an analyst who worked in Timbuktu during the occupation and later founded the Timbuktu Sahel Strategic Studies Center.
By contrast, he said, Ag Ghali is one of Mali’s best-known jihadists and any trial against him would be closely watched, potentially radically altering the prevailing view in the West African country that the ICC is irrelevant to Mali’s current predicament.
The jihadists’ capture of Timbuktu was notorious at the time because the desert city had long been a site of pilgrimage for Muslims and was known for its revered mosques and collection of ancient manuscripts. In early 2013, French and Malian troops retook control and expelled the jihadists.
Veteran Mauritanian filmmaker Abdelrahmane Sissako later depicted the ordeal faced by local residents in his acclaimed 2014 film Timbuktu.
In an earlier case in 2016, the court ruled Sentenced to nine years in prison Another jihadist showed remorse and admitted to ordering and taking part in the attack on the holy sites in Timbuktu.
The damaged mausoleum has been restored with the help of foreign donors.
But many of the abuses against women and men cited in Mr. Hassan’s trial are similar to those still taking place in other parts of Mali and in neighboring countries.
Over the past decade, groups allied with al-Qaeda and the Islamic State have unleashed increased violence in the country and elsewhere in West Africa, making the vast region south of the Sahara, known as the Sahel, a hub of terror activity.
In 2012, jihadist groups such as Ansar Dine controlled only parts of northern Mali. Now, al-Qaeda and Islamic State fighters have expanded into the center and south of the country, as well as Neighboring Niger More than half Burkina Faso.
Over the years, these organizations have village, vessel and FleetTens of thousands of civilians died and millions were displaced. Research institute track conflict and UN figures.
“The jihadists have become deeply embedded in local society,” said Ibrahim Yahya Ibrahim, deputy director of the International Crisis Group’s Sahel program in Dakar, Senegal. “This makes it more difficult to root them out,” he added.
The current conflict gripping Mali began in 2012, when a loose alliance of Tuareg rebels and Islamist militants seized control of large swathes of the country’s north. The militants eventually came to rule several towns in the region, including Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal.
French troops drove Ansar Dine from Timbuktu Leaving Mali in 2022 After ten years of mission Many experts believe that failureUN peacekeepers also withdrew from Mali late last year as relations deteriorated with the country’s military rulers, who The 2020 coup and with Russia.
In addition to attacks in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, Ansar Dine’s al-Qaeda affiliate has carried out attacks in other West African countries, including Benin, Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire.
Ruth MacLean Contributed reporting.
