S Africa rejects bid to try 'mercenaries' at home

[seemslikeadream]

Last Update: Wednesday, June 9, 2004. 10:40pm (AEST)


A South African court has denied a request to bring 70 men held by Zimbabwe as suspected mercenaries home to face trial, rejecting lawyers' arguments they will not get a fair hearing in Harare.

Pretoria High Court Judge President Bernard Ngoepe said the demand for an official extradition request by defence lawyers exceeded the court's jurisdiction.

He said that the matter should be left to the South African and Zimbabwe governments.

"There is no evidence that the Government has done nothing in resolving the matter," he said.

"It is not for us to decide where they must stand trial."


more
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1128423.htm

Zim 70: Families devastated
09/06/2004 10:50 - (SA)

Pretoria - The families of 70 South African men held in Zimbabwe were on Wednesday devastated by the Pretoria High Court's ruling that it would not force President Thabo Mbeki's government to help bring the men back.

Lynn Paine, wife of flight engineer Ken Paine, who was among the 70 arrested in Harare on March 7, said the ruling now gave Zimbabwe a free hand to decide the men's fate.

"They can do what they like with them now," she said.


Paine said she would be in the Zimbabwean capital Harare on Thursday, where the 70 men are to appear for a custody hearing. The Zimbabwean judge may decide to set a court date at the hearing.

"They were pinning all their hopes on this. We now have to face them and give them this devastating news," she said.

Constitutional Court


But the judge disagreed with the families' contention that the South African government was not fulfilling its obligation to protect its nationals.

Lawyer Francois Joubert, representing the families, said they would probably appeal the decision at the constitutional court.

more
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,6119,2-7-1442_1539908,00.html

[bobthedrummer]

1. Isn't this a case for the World Court or an international judicial body?

NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW.

[seemslikeadream]

3. So many projects so little time! WORLD COURT would be fine

The mercenaries from Zimbabwe. Were they going to grab Taylor, execute a coup or guard a gold mine for Barrick? So many projects so little time!

Mercenaries were after Taylor: report
Alleged mercenaries facing charges of trying to topple the president of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea were actually on a mission to abduct former Liberian president Charles Taylor from Nigeria, a newspaper has reported.

This Day, quoting sources close to some of the South African nationals among the 70 presumed soldiers of fortune detained in Zimbabwe, said their objective was not to topple Equatorial Guinea's long-serving President Teodoro Obiang Nguema but to deliver Taylor to a special war crimes court in Sierra Leone.

Fifteen other presumed soldiers of fortune have been detained in Equatorial Guinea on charges of trying to oust Mr Nguema. One of the men has since died of cerebral malaria.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/24/1079939716746.html

and another mercenarie Hendrik Hamman
ONE of the pilots of a plane seized in Zimbabwe on Sunday with suspected mercenaries aboard is said to be a Namibian who farms near the Windhoek International Airport.

Hendrik Hamman has been identified so far as the only Namibian among the pilots, though pilots in Windhoek yesterday said they knew no person of that name among their ranks.

The Zimbabwean government said 18 Namibians were among the 64 suspected mercenaries believed to have been on their way to Equatorial Guinea to overthrow the government there.

http://www.namibian.com.na/2004/march/national/042D444CE1.html

Eeben Barlow, or
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=16671
Simon Mann, or
http://www.lam-online.com/news/africa/story.jsp?story=500325
Nick du Toit (whose name always put me in mind of female circumcision.)
http://www.africaonline.co.zw/mirror/stage/archive/040314/national2898...

In comparison to these three and their associates, Hannibal appears to be merely a galloping gourmet.
http://www.mail-archive.com/[e-mail]/msg12192.html


There's much more to the story it seems

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&a...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x1753441

[seemslikeadream]

4. The Dogs of War

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=84&art_id=vn20040310081125342C...

http://africanoilpolitics.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_africanoilpolitics_a...

http://www.thisdayonline.com/archive/2003/04/22/20030422bus07.html

http://www.netnomad.com/fineman.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/spain/article/0,2763,1166996,00.html

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=79&art_id=qw1079700483956B251&...

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=84&art_id=vn20040319045713308C...

http://africanoilpolitics.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_africanoilpolitics_a...

http://www.propagandacritic.com/articles/examples.osi.html
http://www.moveon.org/censure/caughtonvideo /

http://allafrica.com/stories/200403100875.html

http://www.usatoday.com/news/2004-03-18-2004-03-18_kelleymain_x.htm?cs...

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=68&art_id=vn20040312035832269C...

http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/ERC/democracy/1995_hrp_report/95hrp_report_a...

http://www.forbes.com/home_europe/newswire/2004/03/19/rtr1305198.html
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0403120249mar12,1,1...

[gratuitous]

2. "They can do what they like to him now"

Well, well, well. Perhaps "flight engineer" Paine might have thought about the possibility of capture before flying off to kill people for money. Now he's subject to the rulings of a court in a country that remembers quite well the excesses of South Africa's apartheid regime, and a people who may very well identify their loathing for that brutal, repressive bunch with the South African mercenaries currently in their custody.

My, my. The word "mercy" takes on new meanings all the time, doesn't it, boys?