BELGIUM: Exiled Congolese opposition leader Jean-Pierre Bemba was arrested by Belgian authorities in Brussels on Saturday on an International Criminal Court warrant for war crimes committed in the Central African Republic.
"Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo, president and commander-in-chief of the Mouvement de Libération du Congo (MLC), is alleged to be criminally responsible for four counts of war crimes and two counts of crimes against humanity committed on the territory of the Central African Republic from 25 October 2002 to 15 March 2003," the ICC said in a statement on its website.
Mr Bemba, a former rebel leader who fled the Democratic Republic of Congo last year saying he feared for his life, is wanted in connection with what the ICC says was a campaign of killings and mass rapes of civilians carried out by his rebel forces in the neighbouring Central African Republic.
His MLC insurgents, who also fought in Congo's 1998-2003 war, intervened in the Central African Republic in support of then president Ange Félix Patasse, who was fighting rebels led by François Bozize. Mr Bozize subsequently toppled Mr Patasse in a coup in 2003 and is the current head of state in the former French colony.
Both Mr Bemba, who had been in exile in Portugal, and Mr Patasse, who lives in exile in Togo, deny the war crimes accusations.
Mr Bemba, a businessman turned politician, became vice- president in a transitional government after Congo's 1998 to 2003 civil war, in which four million people died. He subsequently lost to incumbent president Joseph Kabila in elections in 2006.
- (Reuters/Bloomberg)