Destroyer of Timbuktu’s heritage goes on trial in the Hague

Given his guilty plea, it is expected that al-Mahdi’s trial will conclude within a week.

An historic trial opens in the International Criminal Court in The Hague this Monday, historic for several reasons. The accused faces up to 30 years maximum.

A Malian armed fighter is facing the first ever court case against an individual charged with war crimes on a World Heritage site. According to the U.K.’s Sky News, al Mahdi told the judge that the details of his charge were “regrettably… accurate and reflect [ed] the events”.

The Malian jihadi, who is believed to be about 40 years old, warned fellow Muslims from committing similar acts as “they are not going to lead to any good for humanity”. They captured northern Mali in 2012 and then Timbuktu for about ten months before worldwide intervention in 2013. Kassongo said the destruction of the World Heritage-listed sites was also a financial blow to residents, crippling tourism in the remote African city.

Prosecutors say Mahdi led a group of Ansar Dine radicals to destroy 14 of Timbuktu’s 16 mausoleums in 2012 because they considered them totems of idolatry.

“These buildings were deliberately destroyed by Mr. Al Mahdi and his co-perpetrators before the very eyes of the people of Timbuktu, who looked on powerlessly”, she continued.

Mahdi is the first person to be tried on charges of destroying religious or cultural heritages sites since the establishment of the court in 2002.

Fatou Bensouda, the ICC chief prosecutor, told AFP that such cultural destruction “is tantamount to an assault on people’s history” and “robs future generations of their landmarks and their heritage”.

I am really sorry and I am really remorseful, and I regret all damage that I have caused the community in Timbuktu, my family, and my country, Mali.

Al-Mahdi, formerly a religious scholar and trainee preacher, was a local leader of the militant group, Ansar Dine, an ally of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb which planned to impose Sharia law in Mali until it was driven out by the French in 2013. He has become the first man to plead guilty at the court.

“It is also my hope that the years I will spend in prison will be source to purge the evil spirit that took me and I will keep my hopes high that the people will be able to forgive me”, Mahdi said at his trial. “We do want to forgive Ahmad Al Madi, but we need to be sure that he is being honest during this trial”, said Diadié Hamadoun Maiga, a member of Timbuktu’s Islamic High Council who led a local crisis committee during the occupation.

UNESCO renews also its full support to the people and government of Mali, and in particular to the local communities of Timbuktu, who have shown huge courage and determination to rebuild their Heritage, with the support of the global community.