Timbuktu in 2012: In Mali's desert city of raging Islamists. They murder and rape of infidels and dissenters, and century blow up ancient shrines. In the middle of the aggressors Al-Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud - so it is for at least the investigators of the International criminal court (ICC) in The Hague.

Al-Hassan should not be any hangers-on have been, but rather one of the heads of the Islamists, namely the chief of the religious police. And, as such, he was terrorized between April 2012 and January 2013, the inhabitants of the city. The cruelty of the perpetrator is particularly directed against women. 2018 Al-Hassan was arrested in Mali and the International criminal court transferred. On Tuesday will be opened in The Hague in the trial against him.

Also the destruction of cultural assets is responsible for

in 2018 the Gambia-born chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda "on the basis of the collected evidence" the 1977-born Al-Hassan "crimes against humanity, and war crimes" alleged that: "According to our findings, Mr. Al-Hassan is responsible for the following serious crimes: cruel treatment, torture, violation of the Dignity of other people, in particular, degrading treatment, rape and sexual slavery". This includes attacks on historical monuments and religious buildings, as well as the imposition of sentences without previous judgment by a regularly constituted court, would be Fatou Bensouda said in a official Video message.

The Prosecutor added: "We have the victim in sight. They shall know the justice that you rightfully earn. For us, it comes to the fight against impunity, especially in the case of such serious crimes against humanity. We want to make a positive contribution to the promotion of peace, security and stability in the society." It was also their hope for Mali.

how Much Power Al-Hassan?

how Much is the alleged chief of police had in Islamist-controlled Timbuktu, really? Has he committed the alleged crime, in Essence, voluntarily or on the orders of higher instances, such as the Ansar Dine leadership? These are the essential questions that will be clarified in the course of the proceedings.

While the Prosecutor at the ICC of Al-Hassan has a very high importance, the Thomas Schiller is a little different. The head of the office of the CDU-near Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung in Mali's capital, Bamako, is of the opinion that the accused played a prominent role in the hierarchy of the Islamists, however, this role was Essentially limited to the city of Timbuktu: "He was not a prominent figure of the Islamist forces in General. He certainly played the role of a main actor of that conquest, which was driven by Islamist forces," says Schiller.

around a thousand kilometers North of the capital, description of Timbuktu, on the edge of the Sahara desert, is also called the "pearl of the desert" or "city of 333 saints" and has been one of world heritage site in 1988. As of 2012, fighters of a coalition of several Islamist grouping, including AQMI (al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb) and Ansar Dine ("supporters of the faith"), large areas in the North of Mali under their control and the city of Timbuktu conquered, they began to make the culture of the significance of the location, destroy it.

Also to this destruction, the accused Al should have been-Hassan involved. Also, he had put the by the fundamentalists demanded bans of music, dance, arts and sports under the application of force by, say, the Prosecutor. Only months later, the reign of terror is over: In January 2013, Timbuktu of Mali, is liberated, and French soldiers.

the culprit Is known?

"Al-Hassan is, for many people, Timbuktu is quite a term. The majority of the Malians are likely to have hardly ever heard of him," said Thomas Schiller. You should not forget that the vast majority of Malians had been living in the South of the country and thus hardly with the events in Timbuktu in 2012 faced. The process of the games in Mali, certainly not the Central role: "The vast majority of Malians are certainly not looking at what is happening in The Hague, but they will see how their everyday security is deteriorating daily," said the representative of the Adenauer Foundation in Bamako.

Al-Hassan is the second Malian Islamist, will be charged in court in The Hague. In 2016, the ICC, Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi, was sentenced to nine years in prison for the destruction of world heritage sites, the court of justice at the time, for the first time as a war crime appreciated. Al-Mahdi, a leader of the Islamist Tuareg militia, Ansar Dine, had confessed to his Offense and to forgive me for prayers. May be he could testify against Al-Hassan as a witness.

author: Antonio Cascais, Daniel fur

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Date Of Update: 13 July 2020, 06:26