Uhuru Kenyatta trial ‘disappoints’ Fatou Bensouda

International Criminal Court prosecutor Fatou Bensouda arrives at the court in The Hague on October 18, 2013. 

In Summary

• Ms Bensouda blamed Kenya’s failure to cooperate for her decision to delay prosecuting President Kenyatta.
• Mr Kenyatta’s trial, related to post-election violence dating back to 2007-2008, has been dogged by repeated delays.

By AFP

JOHANNESBURG

International Criminal Court Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has expressed her “personal disappointment” that President Uhuru Kenyatta’s case had been suspended.

Ms Bensouda blamed Kenya’s failure to cooperate for her decision to delay prosecuting President Kenyatta for alleged murder, deportation, rape, persecution and “other inhumane acts”.

NOT DROPPED CASE

“I want to express my personal disappointment that perhaps the case has not gone the way we wanted it to go,” she said in Johannesburg.

Ms Bensouda insisted she had not dropped the case, but had a duty to tell the Hague-based judges she did not have the evidence needed to proceed at this stage.

Mr Kenyatta’s trial, related to post-election violence dating back to 2007-2008, has been dogged by repeated delays.

Prosecutors had hoped to receive company records, bank statements, records of land transfers, tax returns, phone records and foreign exchange records to prove a link between the President and the violence in which 1,200 died and 600,000 others displaced.