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The international criminal court has sentenced an al-Qaida-linked extremist leader to 10 years in prison for war crimes and crimes against humanity carried out when he headed the Islamic police in Timbuktu in Mali, west Africa.
Al-Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud was convicted in June of torture, religious persecution and other inhumane acts. Judges found he was a “key figure” in a reign of terror after Islamic extremist rebels overran the ancient desert city in 2012.
“This regime and these acts had a traumatic impact on the population of Timbuktu,” the presiding judge, Kimberly Prost, told the court in The Hague.
Dressed head to toe in white traditional robes, al-Hassan was expressionless as he listened to the sentence being read out.
The 48-year-old was a member of Ansar Dine, an Islamic extremist group linked to al-Qaida that held power in northern Mali at the time, and served as Timbuktu’s head of police. A French-led military operation in 2013 forced the group from power, but rebel elements have continued to stage attacks on Malian and international forces.
To the disappointment of many human rights groups, al-Hassan was acquitted of several charges focusing on the abuse of women. The three-judge panel found that rape and sexual slavery did occur while his group controlled Timbuktu, but al-Hassan could not be connected to those crimes.
The court did find there was sufficient evidence to convict al-Hassan of charges including torture, outrages upon personal dignity, and cruel treatment. It found prisoners were abused by being kept in tiny, filthy cells and repeatedly flogged.
Both sides have appealed.
Al-Hassan denied he was guilty. His defence lawyer, Melinda Taylor, told judges during the trial that his position in the Islamic police force obliged him to respect and carry out decisions made by an Islamic tribunal. “This is what the police around the world do,” Taylor said.
The 10-year sentence will be reduced by time served. Al-Hassan has been in ICC custody since March 2018, leaving about three and a half years remaining.
The trial is the second case at the ICC linked to Ansar Dine’s brutal occupation of Timbuktu. Another member of the group, Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi, was convicted in 2016 and sentenced to nine years’ imprisonment for attacking nine mausoleums and a mosque door in the city in 2012.
Mali, along with its neighbours Burkina Faso and Niger, has for more than a decade battled an insurgency fought by armed groups, including some allied with al-Qaida or Islamic State. After military coups in all three nations in recent years, the ruling juntas have expelled French forces and turned to Russia’s mercenary units for security assistance instead.
