CHAD: Protests in Chad as child abduction accused return to court

For a second day protesters gathered at N'Djamena courthouse in Chad on Thursday (November 8), furious at suggestions the Europeans charged with abducting 103 African children should be tried in France. Six French members of the Zoe's Ark group are facing trial after they were stopped last month from flying the youngsters to Europe aboard a chartered Spanish passenger jet. They returned to court in N'Djamena on Thursday to a hostile reception from the crowd. The accused, together with four Chadian nationals also facing charges, met the investigating judge. Three Spanish air crew and a Belgian pilot are also charged as accomplices in the case which has strained ties between France and its former colony and focused a spotlight on the work of humanitarian groups operating in violence-torn east Chad. French President Nicolas Sarkozy provoked anger when he promised earlier in the week to take the accused back to Paris. Zoe's Ark has said the children involved were orphans from the neighbouring Darfur region, but U.N. officials in Chad said almost all the infants had at least one parent and came from the Chad-Sudan borderlands. Demonstrator Gapili Pallou said they'd heard on the radio that Sarkozy wanted the accused to be tried in France, but said Chad had its own laws and had been independent since 1960. "Chad and its justice are capable of judging its criminals here in Chad as far as the members of Zoe's Ark are concerned," said Pallou. The accused face up to 20 years in jail with hard labour if found guilty in Chad. They would get lesser sentences in France and Paris is highlighting the fact that the two countries have a judicial cooperation deal that might make extradition possible.

ITN Source | November 8, 2007

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