Court suspends ex-Chad dictator trial to ready new lawyers

The bodies came daily.

“Two police pushed me into a room, they held me down and connected electricity wires all over my body”, said Bganbaye, who was 20 and pregnant at the time and bears deep scars on her chest that she said were the result of torture. He was also a prisoner until 1989 for reasons he still doesnt understand.

Former Chadian dictator Hissene Habre in 2005 (left) and 1990 (right).

Chad’s former President Hissene Habre has been removed from the courtroom at his trial for crimes against humanity.

Victims of the Habre regime say the trial could be a turning point for justice in Africa.

Habre’s trial caps a 15-year battle by victims and rights campaigners to bring the former strongman to justice in Senegal, where he fled after being toppled in a coup.

Clement Abaifouta, a prisoner himself, had to wrap them in sacks and bury them.

“So there are a lot of historical aspects to this”.

He risks a sentence of at least 30 years in prison. “I fainted”, she said in an interview in N’Djamena, the capital.

On Tuesday, Habre sat alone and silent in front of the panel of judges, dressed in a white robe and matching turban and clutching prayer beads, surrounded by eight security personnel.

Habre’s easy exile in Senegal was a symbol of impunity in Africa until he was taken into custody and charged in 2013.

The hearings will set a historic precedent as until now African leaders accused of atrocities have been tried in global courts.

The trial marks the first time an African ex-president faces justice in sub-Sahara Africa, with about 2,500 of the dictator’s victims submitting their testimonies.

“This is the first case anywhere in the world – not just in Africa – where the courts of one country, Senegal, are prosecuting the former leader of another, Chad, for alleged human rights crimes”, Reed Brody, a lawyer at Human Rights Watch (HRW), told AFP.

The commission particularly blamed Habre’s political police force, the Directorate of Documentation and Security, saying it used torture methods.

“The appointed lawyers have a duty to defend Habre”.

Survivors of the abuse have been the main advocates for justice, working toward this trial for about 15 years.

The trial, which was attended by 1,000 participants, spectators and journalists, was punctuated by a series of adjournments as attempts were made to bring Mr Habre to the dock. In jail, he and 40 other prisoners were crammed into a room with no light. Some nights he’d hear screaming of those being tortured and see his friends come back barely alive.

“People died in this cell”, he said.

In December 1990 the doors were opened to the prison cells in N’Djamena. The documents listed more than 12,000 victims of Chad’s detention network.

When in capability, Habre had sizable assist from the United States and France as he tended as a “bulwark” against former Libya tyrant Moammar Gadhafi, in accordance with Human Rights Watch.

“It’s been a long path”, said Guengueng. “None of the victims, if we are calling them that, ever saw Hissene Habre“. If you would like to discuss another topic, look for a relevant article.

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