News Desk

On Wednesday, the International Criminal Court convicted an al Qaeda related leader with charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity that had occurred in Timbuktu, northern Mali. Al Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud, a senior member of the Islamic Police, was recruited by al Qaeda leaders, said the ICC in a statement. Al Qaeda, alongside Islamist Group Ansar Dine, enacted a system to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity in Timbuktu between April 2012 and May 2013, in which the Islamic Police played a “pivotal role”.

The ICC have confirmed that Al Hassan was responsible for directly committing or being involved in these crimes of torture and crimes against humanity, including outrages upon personal dignity. The court of the Dutch city of The Hague, held him accountable to crimes relating rape, sexual slavery, forced marriage and harming protected objects from the fact that there were inadequate amount of evidence convicting him of the crime, said the statement.