Umar al-Bashir

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Umar al-Bashir (2009)

Umar Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir , very often Omar al-Bashir ( Arabic عمر حسن أحمد البشير, DMG ʿUmar Ḥasan Aḥmad al-Bašīr ; * [Officially on January 1 ] 1944 in Hosh Bannaga at Shendi , Sudan ), is a former Sudanese politicians , revolutionaries , dictator and soldier . He was the ( authoritarian ruling) President of Sudan from 1993 until his deposition by the military in April 2019 .

He came to power in 1989 after a bloodless military coup in Sudan and ruled the country according to an Islamic fundamentalist stance. For genocide , crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Darfur conflict , the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague has issued an arrest warrant against al-Bashir - and thus for the first time against an incumbent head of state. Due to the lack of cooperation between the UN Security Council and the ICC, the investigations were temporarily suspended in December 2014 due to a lack of prospect of success. In 2020 the Sudanese interim government announced that Bashir would be extradited to the ICC.

Career

Al-Bashir comes from an old family in the Islamic dominated north. In 1960 he joined the army and graduated from military academies in Egypt , Malaysia , Pakistan and in 1988 in the USA . The convinced Arab nationalist quickly made a career in the army up to lieutenant general . He also has military experience as a paratrooper in the 1973 Yom Kippur War against Israel on the Egyptian side. After his return from Egypt he was deployed in the fight of the government troops against the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in the south of the country.

In Sudan he had been an advocate of an Islamic fundamentalist stance since the 1980s and thus strengthened the north against the Christian - animist southern parts of the country. Al-Bashir actively promoted the application of Sharia law in his domain . If he had the impression that individual Islamists in his own camp were endangering his power, he also took action against these fellow believers.

Coup

On June 30, 1989, al-Bashir and a group of officers took power in Sudan after a bloodless military coup which was supported by Iran . He founded the Revolutionary Command Council for the Salvation of the Nation (RCC), appointed himself commander in chief of the armed forces and head of state. With his Revolutionary Command Council, he established a repressive Islamic fundamentalist regime and led a bitter campaign against the south of the country. The Christian and ethno -religious south consisting of three southern provinces already felt neglected in the colonial era and since the country gained independence on January 1, 1956, it was oppressed by the north. The South Sudan demanded a high degree of autonomy that is not assured even al-Bashir. Umar al-Bashir ruled the country as sole ruler with his National Congress Party .

Presidency

From 1993, al-Bashir was also formally president of the state and was confirmed in office in this capacity in elections in 1996 and 2000. In 1999, al-Bashir suppressed a constitutional amendment that Hasan at-Turabi had introduced into the National Assembly as a law, which would have curtailed his power, by dissolving parliament . The US put Sudan on their list of rogue states in the 1990s . Under al-Bashir, Osama bin Laden was able to stay in the country until 1996 without any problems. After the terrorist attacks on August 7, 1998 on the US embassies in Nairobi / Kenya and Dar es Salaam / Tanzania , the United States carried out military actions against Khartoum because supporters of the terrorists were suspected in Sudan. The rocket attack destroyed the Ash Shifa pharmaceutical factory in al-Chartum Bahri . This led to al-Bashir's break with the western world power. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , however, al-Bashir took part in the anti-terrorist measures initiated by the USA.

Since 2003, al-Bashir took action against separatist movements in the Sudanese province of Darfur , where several rebel groups in the Darfur conflict rebel against the authoritarian regime in Khartoum.

In 2004, al-Bashir's regime ended the war against the country's southern provinces. With the peace treaty concluded in January 2005, a joint North Sudanese-South Sudanese transitional government was formed. There was no final decision on the division of the income from the oil wells.

In February 2011, al-Bashir announced that he would no longer run in the next presidential election, but withdrew his statement and faced the presidential election in April 2015, which he won on April 27 with 94 percent of the vote. Officially, 46.4 percent of citizens voted, while election observers from the African Union estimated a turnout of just 30 to 35 percent.

ICC arrest warrant

On July 14, 2008, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Luis Moreno Ocampo , announced an arrest warrant against al-Bashir for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in the ongoing Darfur conflict. This was the first case in which the ICC chief prosecutor applied for an arrest warrant for an incumbent head of state. The pre-trial chamber of the ICC issued the requested appeal on March 4, 2009. The indictment of genocide was not included in a majority decision (with a separate vote by the Latvian judge Anita Ušacka ), as insufficient evidence had been presented for this; However, the court expressly reserved the right to later expand the arrest warrant to include this allegation. Just one year later, on July 12, 2010, the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber issued an additional arrest warrant for genocide. Al-Bashir is charged with intent to destroy the Fur , Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups in particular by killing, wounding or exposing them to life-threatening conditions.

The critics of the arrest warrant (e.g. the People's Republic of China , Russia , the Arab League , African Union ) described the ICC's charges as an obstacle to peace negotiations in Darfur . In July 2009 the African Union passed a resolution disregarding the arrest warrant for al-Bashir. However, the African Union Congress , due to take place in Malawi in 2012 , had to be relocated to Ethiopia after Malawi's President Joyce Banda refused to receive al-Bashir. In 2013, al-Bashir freely visited the People's Republic of China, Iran , Ethiopia and Nigeria . However, he had to leave Nigeria prematurely after human rights activists there went to court to obtain his arrest.

On December 12, 2014, Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda informed the UN Security Council that she had to stop her investigation due to a lack of prospect of success. Because the African states that Al-Bashir had visited after the international arrest warrant was issued were not prepared to execute it. It is like "looking for Al Capone - but only with the polite request to Capone if he does not want to turn himself in, as well as with the request to other powerful groups if they could not catch him and hand him over".

On June 14, 2015, the South African North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria ruled that al-Bashir, who was in South Africa at the time for an African Union summit, was not allowed to leave the country until the ICC's arrest request had been decided has been. South Africa is a member state of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court . However, on June 15, 2015, al-Bashir left South Africa for Sudan in disregard of the order of the South African court. In South Africa, al-Bashir's unhindered exit became a constitutional crisis. He had been brought to the airport with a police escort, obviously with the knowledge of the South African government. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that countries that had recognized the statutes of the International Criminal Court would also have to execute its arrest warrants. In his native Khartoum, al-Bashir was greeted by cheering supporters. Official Sudanese government spokesmen mocked the unsuccessful action against him as "lame and meaningless". The ICC condemned the actions of the South African government by unanimous decision.

On February 11, 2020, the Sudanese interim government announced that Bashir would be extradited to the ICC.

Fall

On April 11, 2019, al-Bashir was overthrown by the military after popular protests that began in 2018. Defense Minister Ahmed Awad Ibn Auf followed at the head of Sudan . Al-Bashir was held in an undisclosed location and taken to Kober prison in northern Khartoum on April 17. In a subsequent search of his house, cash worth around seven million euros in various currencies was found. Since then, the Sudanese public prosecutor's office has been investigating him on suspicion of money laundering and illegal possession of foreign currencies. He was charged with corruption in June 2019 and found guilty on December 14 of the same year and sentenced to two years in prison. In November 2019, his National Congress party was banned.

Marriages

Umar al-Bashir is married to his cousin Fatima Khalid. He later married Widad Babiker Omer as a second wife. Widad Babiker Omer has several children from her first marriage and married Bashir after her first husband died in a helicopter crash. Bashir has no biological children.

literature

Web links

Commons : Umar al-Bashir  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ ORF at / agencies red: Sudan: Long-term ruler Bashir resigned. April 11, 2019, accessed April 11, 2019 .
  2. ↑ tagesschau.de: Sudan: Putsch against Al-Bashir? Retrieved April 11, 2019 .
  3. ^ Ronen Steinke: Victory over the world justice. Süddeutsche Zeitung, December 15, 2014
  4. ^ Sudan ready to surrender Bashir to ICC for war crimes. africanews.com, February 11, 2020, accessed February 11, 2020
  5. ^ Roman Deckert, Tobias Simon: Sudan: Baschir forever? In: Inamo 80 . Winter 2014, p. 57
  6. ↑ Tom Schimmeck : Sudan: The power of Sudan's president is crumbling. July 12, 2012, accessed December 18, 2014 .
  7. ↑ Sudan: Al-Bashir renounces re-candidacy. In: ORF . February 21, 2011, accessed February 21, 2011 .
  8. ^ Sudan: Elections 2015 Omar al-Bashir
  9. ↑ Bashir receives congratulations from world leaders on his election victory. Sudan Tribune, April 28, 2015
  10. ↑ Khalid Abdelaziz: Sudanese President Bashir re-elected with 94 percent of vote. Reuters, April 27, 2015
  11. ↑ Suspected war crimes: Tribunal issues arrest warrant for Sudan's president. In: Spiegel Online . March 4, 2009, accessed December 18, 2014 .
  12. ↑ www.icc-cpi.int (PDF).
  13. ^ Sudan: Darfur - ICC Charges Sudanese President With Genocide. allAfrica.com, July 12, 2010 and ICC judges endorse genocide charges against Sudanese president. Sudan Tribune, July 13, 2010
  14. ^ African Union in rift with court. BBC News, July 3, 2009
  15. ↑ Ethiopia to host Africa Union summit after Omar al-Bashir Malawi row. BBC News, June 12, 2012, accessed June 16, 2015 .
  16. ↑ Where can Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir go now? BBC News, June 15, 2015, accessed June 16, 2015 .
  17. ^ Sudan's President Bashir leaves AU summit in Nigeria. BBC News, June 15, 2015, accessed June 16, 2015 .
  18. ^ Ronen Steinke : Victory over the world justice. Süddeutsche Zeitung, December 15, 2014.
  19. ^ High Court of South Africa, Gauteng Division, Pretoria: Interim Order of June 14, 2015, Case No. 27740/15 (Southern Africa Litigation Center v. Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development et al.) ( Memento from June 17, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  20. ↑ Sudan's President is not allowed to leave South Africa . Article on derStandard.at from June 14, 2015.
  21. ↑ a b Wanted Sudan leader Bashir avoids South Africa arrest. BBC News, June 15, 2015, accessed June 15, 2015 .
  22. ↑ Wanted president Omar al-Bashir arrives home in Sudan as South Africa faces backlash for letting him leave. The Telegraph, June 15, 2015, accessed June 15, 2015 .
  23. ^ Anita Powell: South Africa failed obligations by not aresting Sudan's Bashir. allafrica.com, July 7, 2017, accessed July 7, 2017
  24. ↑ Sudan: Investigators find millions at Sudan's ex-president Al-Bashir. handelsblatt.com of April 21, 2019, accessed on April 21, 2019.
  25. ↑ Sudan's judiciary is investigating al-Bashir for money laundering. sn.at from April 20, 2019, accessed on April 26, 2019.
  26. ↑ tagesschau.de: Sudan's ex-president al-Bashir convicted of corruption. Retrieved December 14, 2019 .
  27. ↑ Sudan: Former President Omar al-Bashir is accused of corruption. Zeit Online from June 13, 2019, accessed June 14, 2019.
  28. ↑ Sudan strengthens women's rights and bans Bashir party. Spiegel Online from November 29, 2019, accessed on December 6, 2019
  29. ↑ https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/sudans-frueherer-machthaber-al-baschir-zu-zwei-jahren-haft-verendungt-16535997.html
  30. ↑ Fred Bridgland: President Bashir, you are hereby charged… . In: The Scotsman , July 14, 2008. Retrieved April 12, 2019. 
personal data
SURNAME Bashir, Umar al-
ALTERNATIVE NAMES al-Bashir, Umar Hasan Ahmad; al-Bashir, Omar Hassan Ahmad; عمر حسن احمد البشير (Arabic)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Sudanese politician; President (1993-2019)
DATE OF BIRTH January 1, 1944
PLACE OF BIRTH Hosh Bannaga near Schandi , Sudan