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Ntabo Ntaberi Sheka was convicted of “murder, rape, sexual slavery, enlisting children under the age of 15” a decade ago, a military court ruled.
This photograph taken on November 24, 2011 shows the leader of a faction of the Mai Mai militia group, Ntabo Ntaberi Sheka, wanted on an arrest warrant on charges of mass rape, campaigning for a seat ahead of the national elections on 26 November in Walikale, North Kivu. Image: AFP
GOMA – A former militia leader in the Democratic Republic of the Congo was sentenced Monday to life in prison for war crimes and mass rape, a decision hailed by the United Nations.
Ntabo Ntaberi Sheka was convicted of “murder, rape, sexual slavery, enlisting children under the age of 15” a decade ago, a military court ruled.
The UN representative in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Leila Zerrougui, said the ruling shows that “impunity is not inevitable.”
Sheka founded the Nduma Defense of Congo (NDC) militia, active in the troubled North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where he claimed to be fighting the Rwandan Hutu rebels of the FDLR.
Authorities issued Sheka’s arrest warrant in January 2011 after a series of attacks in which the NDC and two other groups allegedly raped nearly 400 people in 13 villages between July 30 and August 2, 2010.
The NDC was also accused of having recruited at least 154 children into its ranks.
Sheka surrendered to the UN peacekeepers in July 2017.
“We are satisfied with this verdict, it is a strong signal for other warlords …” Kahindo Fatuma, a spokesperson representing the victims, told AFP. “The victims will be a little relieved.”
NGOs also welcomed the ruling.
“The authorities have shown today that they are capable of handling an incredibly complex case, both legally and from a security point of view,” Daniele Perissi, head of the Great Lakes Program at the NGO TRIAL International, said in a statement.
Dozens of armed groups are active in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, a lawless region rich in mineral resources. They have wreaked havoc there in the decades since the official end of the 1998-2003 war, which claimed millions of lives.
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