The massive protests staged by Sudanese protesters a year ago, against the hike in the pricesof commodities and food shortages, which prompted the military to oust him in April, eventually received a response on Saturday, 11 December as a Sudanese court convicted the country former authoritarian ruler Omar Hassan al-Bashir of money laundering and corruption.
The citizens of Sudan have expressed their agony on the brutality of the atrocities committed by the leader’s security forces in the last 30 years of his reign, and Jehanne Henry, a Human Rights Watch associate director has stated that the two-year sentence is not a match with the justice expected by the populace, and will in no way, appease them.
Reports have it that Bashir is also connected with several criminal cases, and terrorism such as harbouring Osama bin Laden, and having a hand in the bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, and many more;therefore, he is wanted by the International Criminal Court; however, he has remained untouched even with the ICC arrest warrant.
Although the Sudanese law has mandated him to spend the two-year sentence in a government correctional facility for elderly people who are convicted of non-death penalties, however, he is set to remain in jail due to several other charges pressed against him. Many concerned Sudanese have condemned the verdict and blamed the country judicial system, as the government intention on the matter is still refrained from the public.
