Friday, July 18, 2008

Sudan President under investigation for genocide

Here was a nice story. Praised in the deeply ethical supporter of human rights, The Times of Oman as a great Arab statesman (while their editor in chief Mr Al Zedjali was hobnobbing with him at the Korean-Arab summit recently - see earlier post) the President of Sudan, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, is being investigated for genocide and war crimes by the International Criminal Court. Finally. Interesting that in yesterdays Times he's refered to as Field Marshal Omar Hassan Ahmed Al Beshir, president of Sudan (their lack of capitalisation on the p in president BTW).

The Times mentioned nothing about his little ethnic cleansing progrom in Sudan of course, but simply cut and paste his speach and the Koreans talking about how they were looking forward to getting in their and extracting resources.

IHT story
When Luis Moreno-Ocampo, prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, reported to the United Nations Security Council last month, he painted a dire tableau of death, rape and dispossession in Darfur, saying the entire state apparatus was involved in a five-year campaign of terror there. His target, it seemed, was Sudan's president.

This week, the prosecutor privately informed Security Council members that on Monday he would ask the judges at the court in The Hague to issue an arrest warrant for President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan, diplomats said. They said that the prosecution plans to bring charges of crimes against humanity and genocide in Darfur, a region of Sudan. The UN secreteray general, Ban Ki Moon, was also informed out of concern for the security of UN peacekeepers in the area, the diplomats said.

The prosecutor's office has called a news conference for Monday to disclose its plans.

The indictment of a sitting head of state in a war-torn country would not be unprecedented: Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia and Charles Taylor of Liberia were both charged by international war crimes courts while in office.
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3 comments:

  1. Regardless of my agreement or disagreement with the ICC's decision, I think that Sudan is over-reacting and making a lot of noise out of this issue, and I also think that they shouldn't have reacted this way because the ICC can simply do no shit. I wonder why is the government afraid of it like this..

    Like seriously, they're making a lot of noise. All the Sudanese TV stations these days are talking about nothing but the ICC's decision, by making programs showing citizens' patriotism, showing that even al-Bashir's opponents (of course except the Darfurians) are by his side in this ordeal putting their clashes and disagreements aside. al-Bashir has been making a lot of meetings with government officials, the parliament, and even asking for emergency meetings from the African Union and Arab League. What is all that for? It's seriously not worth it. If the man thinks that he's innocent, he shouldn't make all this noise. Just ignore, because the ICC can't do anything anyways.

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  2. Times of Oman in Viewpoint even had supported Taliban when they destroyed Buddhist bamiyan rock carvings inspite of appeals from budhists from all over the world. They fill the space by bombarding the reader with terms like Zionists, imperialists et al. which no body understands. It is funny to note that readers who write letters to Times are the same set of 10 people, repeatedly. If Khaleej times is allowed to be sold early in the morning, the establishment will close down.

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  3. Amjad,

    I'd be really interested to know your opinion sir. Please share.
    As for what tyhey can do, well, it will certainbly crimp his holiday plans somewhat. And his banking options.

    The man is sooo guilty.

    Interesting that The Economist puts China in the dock along with him, for aiding and abbetting hgis genocide to get access to the oil... typical.

    Anon.
    Yeah. One of the things that annoys me is that there are so many smart, sharp, 'real' Omani intellectuals out there, and we all have to put up with this sock puppet who uses his position to pretend to be an Omani intellectual.

    Grrrr.

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