The former Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga has been sentenced to 14 years imprisonment for recruiting and using child soldiers. Lubanga pleaded not guilty but was convicted unanimously by judges in the International Criminal Court in March this year. ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo called for a "severe sentence" of 30 years. Speaking in June, he said the prosecution was seeking a sentence "in the name of each child recruited, in the name of the Ituri region". According to Human Rights Watch, over 60,000 people were killed in fighting between Hema and Lenda ethnic groups in Ituri...
Burmese opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, marked a new phase in the struggle to bring democracy to the land, by making her historic first appearance in parliament. ‘I will try my best for the country’ she told AFP, as she embarked on her first day. Suu Kyi united with fellow members of her National League for Democracy (NLD), as both the party and its leader emerge as mainstream political players in the light of a landmark result in the April by-elections, in which the party won 43 out of 45 seats at stake. The opposition leader’s entrance to parliament comes at an uncertain time for Burma...
The highest court in Egypt has ruled to overturn a parliament order by President Mursi to reconvene parliament, after a military council dissolved it last month. Thousands of Egyptians gathered in Tahrir Square to protest against the decision. MPs met shortly for the first time today before the speaker adjourned the sitting. Speaker Saad al-Katatni said that by holding the session, MPs were not going against the dissolution ruling "but looking at a mechanism for the implementation of the ruling of the respected court. There is no other agenda today". The MPs supported Mr Katatni’s proposal to...
The Egyptian military council has released a statement warning the new president Mohammed Mursi to uphold a court’s decision to dissolve parliament. The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) said it was confident that ‘all state institutions’ would respect the law and constitution. The statement is likely to infuriate the Muslim Brotherhood, according to a BBC correspondent Jon Leyne. Members of the Brotherhood believe it was the military that failed to respect the law by giving itself new powers after dissolving parliament last month, he says. A parliamentary meeting has been called for...
International envoy, Kofi Annan said he agreed with President Assad for a reworked political approach to end the 16 month conflict in Syria. In his third visit to Syria, the former UN chief, whose on the ground observers have been grounded due to escalating violence, said that he “stressed the importance of moving ahead with political dialogue, which the president accepted.” "We discussed the need to end the violence and ways and means of doing so. We agreed an approach which I will share with the armed opposition," he told reporters after meeting Mr Assad in Damascus. President Assad...
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has accused the US, Saudia Arabia, Turkey and Qatar of backing “terrorists” trying to overthrow his government. In an interview on Sunday with Germany’s ARD network, Assad said that he does not fear the same fate as Gaddafi or Mubarak, claiming that he was still in power because he had the support of his people and adding: "[…] to be scared, you have to compare. Do we have something in common? It's a completely different situation ... You cannot compare." Assad also claimed that the majority of victims of the uprising, which has been ongoing for 16 months,...
The student activists, who were arrested by Burmese authorities over plans to commemorate the 50th anniversary of a protest and subsequent crackdown by the government, have been released. Around 300 people gathered in Rangoon on Saturday to mark the anniversary, despite the arrests. Activists claim the detentions are proof that the Burmese government still has oppressive tendencies, despite democratic reforms. "Police officials told us that they just wanted to question us in connection with our plans to commemorate the anniversary," All Burma Students Union Phyo Phyo Aung told the Reuters...
Egyptian president Mohamed Mursi has ordered the country’s dissolved parliament to reconvene, a move which the Washington Post has described as “a bold stroke that will test the limits of the fledgling government’s power and provoke a confrontation with the country’s military leaders.” Egypt’s official news agency MENA reported that "President Mursi has issued a presidential decree annulling the decision taken on June 15, 2012 to dissolve the people's assembly, and invites the chamber to convene again and to exercise its prerogatives” and in reaction the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (...
The International Criminal Court will hand out its first ever sentence to the Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga, for using child soldiers in his rebel army in 2002-2003. Lubanga, 51 was convicted in March of war crimes, it will be the ICC’s first ever verdict since it started work a decade ago. Lubanga was found guilty of abducting children sa young as 11 and forcing them to commit atrocities, in the north east of the DRC. The Hague-based court’s former chief prosecutor, Luis Morena-Ocampo, called for a sentence of 30 years, saying his crimes were ‘of most serious concert to the international...
Stopping over at Afghanistan on Saturday, the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton described Afghanistan as an officially designated 'major non-NATO ally'. The status facilitates procurement of defence equipment and military training, without involving any security commitments. Addressing the media after meeting Afghan president Hamid Karzai, Clinton said, “We see this as a powerful symbol of our commitment to Afghanistan’s future...” “This is the kind of relationship we think will be especially beneficial as we do the transition and as we plan for the post-2014 presence.” Although the...