Cote d’Ivoire announced Thursday it will transfer Charles Ble Goude, the jailed right-hand man of former president Laurent Gbagbo, to the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.
In September last year, The Hague-based ICC unsealed a warrant for 42-year-old Ble Goude, who faces four counts of crimes against humanity over 2010-2011 post-election unrest.
Mr Gbagbo’s former youth leader was arrested in Ghana more than a year ago and extradited to Cote d’Ivoire but the authorities were hesitant to send him to the war crimes court.
Ble Goude, once known as Gbagbo’s “Street General”, will be transferred to the ICC “as soon as possible”, government spokesman Bruno Kone tsaid after the cabinet meeting during which the decision was made.
In a statement, the ICC said it “welcomes the decision of the Ivoirian authorities and is ready to move forward with proceedings against him as soon as he is transferred”.
The firebrand former leader of the “Young Patriots” will join his former boss in ICC detention.
Mr Gbagbo, who was transferred to the Netherlands in late 2011, also faces four counts of crimes against humanity but the court has yet to confirm the charges, pending further investigation.
The Ivorian crisis started with Mr Gbagbo’s refusal to concede defeat in November 2010 elections, sparking armed clashes that killed more than 3,000 people.
His election rival Alassane Ouattara, now the president, eventually ousted him thanks to international military backing.
Abidjan’s decision came as a surprise to many as it had previously refused to extradite Gbagbo’s wife Simone, also wanted by the ICC, on the grounds that its judiciary now offered sufficient guarantees of a fair trial.
Ble Goude’s lawyer, Claver Ndri, said the decision to transfer his client was politically motivated and had no legal standing.
Legal process
Like Mr Gbagbo, Ble Goude will be stuck in an endless legal process and become an ICC “hostage”, Ndri said, but added he had no doubt the former youth leader would be found innocent in the end.
Mr Gbagbo loyalists are still a force to be reckoned with in Ivorian politics and Ouattara had in recent months tried to foster reconciliation with gestures toward the opposition.
The leader of Gbagbo’s FPI party, Pascal Affi N’Guessan, regretted the decision, arguing that it would not ease tensions.
“This does not show that the country is advancing on the path of normalisation, of some kind of way out of conflict,” he said, but cautioned he would only make further comments when more is known about the transfer.
Mr Ble Goude said in an interview in 2012 that he was not afraid of going to the ICC.
“I am not an advocate of weapons, I never maintained a single militia. If the ICC wants to invite me for having organised protest marches, I have no problem appearing before the ICC,” he said.
“I am ready to go before the ICC so that we may finally know in Cote d’Ivoire who did what.”
Mr Ble Goude galvanised support for Gbagbo during the crisis with fiery speeches urging mass mobilisation against what he called pro-Ouattara “rebels” and their foreign backers, France and the UN.
NMG
Leave a Reply