A landmark conviction for war crimes in Sudan shows the wheels of global justice do turn - albeit slowly

Abstract

[From introduction] Despite the International Criminal Court (ICC) being under immense pressure right now, its first conviction for crimes in Darfur, and the first for gender-based persecution as a crime against humanity, is a major win.

On October 6, a senior leader of the Sudanese pro-government militia known as the Janjaweed, Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, was found guilty on 27 charges of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity. The court rejected his defence of mistaken identity.

From around August 2003, Sudanese government forces and the Janjaweed carried out large-scale attacks on civilians in the Darfur region. This included targeted killings, summary executions, assaults, rapes, theft of livestock and the forced displacement of more than two million people.

The targets of this violence were mostly communities who shared the ethnicity of various rebel groups, and later other Arab and non-Arab tribes.

It has taken over 20 years, but the delivery of justice is a major development for international law, for Sudan and for the ICC itself. The case demonstrates that while the wheels of international criminal justice turn slowly, they do turn.