CHAD: After more than a decade of living in comfortable exile, a deposed Chadian dictator nicknamed "Africa's Pinochet" was arrested by police in Senegal yesterday
Hissene Habre (63), who is accused of mass murder and the torture of political opponents, faces extradition to Belgium and a trial for crimes against humanity. He was ousted by current Chadian president Idriss Deby in 1990.
Two years later, a Chadian government inquiry accused Mr Habre of 40,000 political killings and 200,000 cases of torture.
"This news fills me with joy and satisfaction," said Clement Abaifouta, who spent four years in one of the dictator's jails.
Mr Abaifouta claims that during his imprisonment he was forced to bury the corpses of hundreds of inmates killed by beatings, electric shocks and disease caused by inhumane conditions.
The former president, who lived in a walled seaside villa in the Senegalese capital, Dakar, will be held in custody while a judge decides whether to grant Belgium's extradition request.
Belgium has issued an international arrest warrant holding him responsible for atrocities committed while he was in power from 1982 to 1990.
Mr Habre's lawyers have said their client had no knowledge that his police tortured and killed political prisoners. The warrant was issued under Belgium's universal jurisdiction law, which allows its judges to prosecute human rights violations no matter where they were committed.
In 2000, a court in Senegal charged the former president with torture and crimes against humanity, but later ruled that he could not be tried there. Mr Habre's lawyer said at the time that the ruling meant that Senegal could not extradite his client.
Human rights groups hailed yesterday's arrest as a turning point for Africa. "Fear is finally changing sides," said Boucounta Diallo, a lawyer representing alleged torture victims. "From now on, dictators will watch themselves."
Aside from Rwanda, where a global outcry has forced prosecutions, there is a poor track record of African dictators facing justice for crimes. Idi Amin enjoyed a comfortable exile in Saudi Arabia, while Ethiopian dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam found refuge in an exclusive suburb of Zimbabwe's capital, Harare.
"I think it's important to break the cycle of impunity," said Reed Brody, a lawyer with Human Rights Watch. "Leaders have brutalised their countries, pillaged their treasuries and then just go abroad to live with their bank accounts."
Mr Brody said he found abandoned police files in Chad that detailed the deaths in detention of 1,208 people under Mr Habre's rule. He said the former president enjoyed a luxurious life in exile. - (Guardian service)