BELLINZONA (Switzerland), June 20 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Alieu Kosiah has been found guilty of war crimes in a Swiss court, becoming the first Liberian to be convicted over the country’s civil war.
He was sentenced to 20 years for crimes including murder and rape.
Around 250,000 people were killed in Liberia’s two conflicts between 1989 and 2003, and many thousands more fled.
Switzerland recognises the principle of universal justice, meaning suspects accused of high-profile crimes elsewhere can be tried in its courts.
The trial was the first under a 2011 Swiss law that allows prosecution for war crimes committed anywhere in the world. It also marked the first time war crimes charges have been heard by a Swiss civilian court.
Kosiah, 46, was a former rebel commander, who fled to Switzerland before being arrested there in 2014.
The 20-year sentence includes the six years he has already served in detention.
He was detained after a civil rights group, Civitas Maxima, presented the Swiss attorney general with evidence of his involvement in war crimes, including the deliberate killing of civilians, sexual violence, abuse of corpses and acts of cannibalism.
The court in the southern Swiss city of Bellinzona found him guilty of 21 out of the 25 charges that he originally faced.
The crimes took place while he was fighting with Alhaji Kromah’s United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy rebel group against Charles Taylor’s troops in the remote Lofa County in the 1990s.
Before Kosiah’s guilty verdict, no Liberian had ever been convicted of crimes committed during the conflict.
A post-war truth commission did name people who could be prosecuted, but as some have held key government positions a special court has never been established.
