Credit: ©ICC-CPI /   Bosco Ntaganda during the delivering of the judgment of ICC Trial Chamber VI at the seat of the Court in The Hague (The Netherlands) on 8 July 2019.

By Gary Raynaldo    /  DIPLOMATIC TIMES

The International Criminal Court Thursday sentenced Bosco Ntaganda to 30 years in prison after he was convicted this summer of 18 counts, including murder, rape, sexual slavery and using child soldiers. Ntaganda was the first person to be convicted of sexual slavery by the ICC and overall the fourth person the court has convicted since its creation in 2002.  Ntaganda, nicknamed “Terminator”,  is former rebel involved in numerous armed conflicts in both Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.  In his conviction,  Trial Chamber VI found that the Union des Patriotes Congolais [Union of Congolese Patriots] (UPC) and its military wing, the Forces Patriotiques pour la Libération du Congo [Patriotic Force for the Liberation of Congo] (FPLC), were at all times involved in at least one non-international armed conflict with an opposing party, in Ituri, district of the DRC from on or about 6 August 2002 to on or about 31 December 2003.

“As the highest individual sentence is 30 years of imprisonment, and the maximum imprisonment for a specified number of years is also 30 years, the Chamber can only impose 30 years or life imprisonment as the overall joint sentence. …the Chamber found that the crimes for which Mr Ntaganda has been convicted, despite their gravity and his degree of culpability, nevertheless do not warrant a sentence of life imprisonment.”

-Summary of ICC  Trial Chamber VI’s sentencing judgment 

The Defence and the Prosecution may appeal the ICC’s  Sentencing Judgment within 30 days.  Reparations to victims will be addressed in due course, according to the sentencing judgment.