Sudan’s protest and opposition group coalition on Sunday said it was not against handing over the deposed President Omar Al Bashir to the International Criminal Court for trial over genocide charges, reported Gulf News.
The Sudanese army ousted Al Bashir in April after a nationwide agitation against his rule. The Hague-based ICC has accused the autocrat of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity for his alleged role in the devastating conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region.
“We have no objection in handing over Al Bashir to the ICC,” Ibrahim Al Sheikh, a leader of umbrella protest movement the Forces of Freedom and Change, told reporters late on Sunday. “All the members of the Forces of Freedom and Change agree on that.”
Notably, the army generals who came to power in the aftermath of the president’s fall have refused to hand him over to the ICC. Al Bashir is currently in a prison in Khartoum and is facing trial on corruption charges. He served as the president of Sudan for three decades after seizing power in an Islamist backed coup in 1989. Since August, the country is being ruled by a joint civilian-military sovereign council, which includes leaders of the protest umbrella. The body is tasked with overseeing the transition to full civilian rule.
Meanwhile, on Sunday, protesters came out on the streets in the city of Wad Madani, the provincial capital of al-Jazirah province, in large numbers demanding the disbanding of the former ruling party that underpinned President Omar al-Bashir’s three decades in power.
They have called for the removal of Bashir’s partisans from all government institutions and setting up of an independent investigation into the deadly breakup of protests in June. The protest was called by a local group linked with the Sudanese Professionals’ Association.
