The International Criminal Court (ICC) revealed an arrest warrant on Friday towards Iyad Ag Ghaly, the alleged chief of the Ansar Dine Islamist group which took over Timbuktu in northern Mali in 2012.
Ghaly, often known as Abou Fadl, is accused of committing conflict crimes and crimes towards humanity between January 2012 and January 2013, the court docket stated. The arrest warrant towards him was issued in 2017 below seal however made public solely on Friday.
After Ansar Dine took over Timbuktu, it tried to impose sharia legislation. In earlier ICC circumstances of different Ansar Dine members, prosecutors stated the group had subjected girls in Timbuktu to rape and sexual slavery.
The al Qaeda-linked fighters additionally used pick-axes, shovels and hammers to shatter earthen tombs and centuries-old shrines reflecting Timbuktu’s Sufi model of Islam in what is named the “City of 333 Saints”.
One Islamist insurgent was given a nine-year sentence by the ICC in 2016 after pleading responsible to collaborating in destruction of Timbuktu’s spiritual monuments. A second Malian suspect is because of hear the decision in his case earlier than the ICC subsequent Wednesday.
The ICC, the world’s solely everlasting conflict crimes tribunal, has been inspecting occasions in Mali since 2012. French and Malian troops pushed the rebels again the next yr.
Source: www.anews.com.tr