ETHIOPIA/VARIOUS: FILE: Ethiopia's supreme court sentences former Marxist ruler Mengistu Haile Mariam to death

Record ID: 723799

  • Title: ETHIOPIA/VARIOUS: FILE: Ethiopia's supreme court sentences former Marxist ruler Mengistu Haile Mariam to death
  • Date: 27th May 2008
  • Summary: (BN12) ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA (FILE) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MENGISTU WITH FORMER CUBAN LEADER FIDEL CASTRO
  • Embargoed: 11th June 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVADKD1SWHC4R6J1P6LU3VKMYOF3
  • Story Text: Ethiopia's supreme court on Monday (May 26) sentenced to death former Marxist ruler Mengistu Haile Mariam. A prosecution appeal had argued a life sentence he was given for genocide was unequal to his crimes.
    But Mengistu, who has lived a life of comfortable exile in Zimbabwe since he was driven from power in 1991, is unlikely to face punishment unless Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe loses a run-off election next month and cedes power.
    The prosecution in July appealed a life term handed to Mengistu in January 2007, after he was found guilty of genocide for thousands of killings during a 17-year rule that included famine, war and the "Red Terror" purges of suspected opponents.
    He and more than a dozen other senior officers were found guilty after a 12-year trial that found that Mengistu's government was directly responsible for the deaths of 2,000 people and the torture of at least 2,400.
    In a three and a half hour ruling read by the court, the court said crimes committed by Mengistu and his co-defendants by killing an emperor and burying him under a toilet "is unheard of in the annals of human history".
    Even after Mengistu was overthrown, bodies were still being found in the late 1990's. Witnesses revealed that former emperor Haile Selassie was buried under what had been Mengistu's personal office. A public exhumation was later ordered and in 2000 he was given an imperial funeral.
    Mengistu seized power in 1974 after the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie, and clawed his way to the top in the military junta called the Derg.
    His regime's brutality was exemplified by the Red Terror purges of 1977-78, in which at least 1,200 suspected political opponents were murdered and their bodies dumped in the streets as a warning to others.
    Mengistu and 19 co-defendants were sentenced to death, and one person, Lieutenant Akililou Belae, were sentenced to life.
    The sentence will be carried out after the head of state approves it.
    Of the 19 sentenced to death, two are hiding in the Italian embassy in Addis Ababa.
    Witnesses had told the court that family members who went to collect the bodies of their loved ones were asked to pay for the bullets that killed them, and evidence included torture videos.
    Zimbabwe has refused to extradite Mengistu since he fled there in 1991, when rebels led by current Prime Minister Meles Zenawi toppled his regime and took the capital Addis Ababa.
    But were Mugabe to cede power if he loses next month's run-off to opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, Mengistu could be extradited.
    Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change in late 2006 said it would withdraw the protection afforded by Mugabe's government, which considers Mengistu a friend of Zimbabwe's liberation struggle.
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