The International Criminal Court (ICC) has granted reparations exceeding $56 million to more than 50,000 victims of the heinous crimes orchestrated by Dominic Ongwen, a convicted commander in the notorious Ugandan rebel group, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA).
Ongwen, convicted three years ago on 61 charges, including murders, rapes, forced marriages, and the recruitment of child soldiers during the years 2002-2005, faced an ICC appeals panel that definitively upheld his convictions and 25-year sentence in late 2022.
The presiding judge, Bertram Schmitt, meticulously detailed the unimaginable atrocities committed by Ongwen’s forces during their relentless attacks on four camps for displaced people in northern Uganda.
Judge Schmitt underscored the profound suffering of the victims, encompassing former child soldiers and children born as a result of rapes and forced pregnancies.
“Tens of thousands of individuals suffered tremendous harm due to the unimaginable atrocities committed,” he stated, emphasizing the multifaceted and long-lasting physical, moral, and material harm inflicted upon the victims.
Despite Ongwen’s conspicuous absence during the reparations hearing, the court ruled him liable for reparations while acknowledging his indigent status.
Notably, the $56 million in reparations is mandated to be paid by a trust fund for victims, established by the ICC’s member states, underlining the collective responsibility to address the aftermath of these egregious crimes.
Each victim is slated to receive a symbolic award of $812, while additional reparations will be directed towards comprehensive community-based rehabilitation programs.
Judge Schmitt fervently urged states, organizations, corporations, and private individuals to contribute to the trust funds for victims, emphasizing the critical role of global entities in supporting the mission and efforts towards healing and recovery.
The evidence presented during Ongwen’s trial laid bare the horrifying practices of the LRA, including turning female civilians into sex slaves, forcibly recruiting children into soldiers, and perpetrating murders within camps for internally displaced people.
The detailed findings of the court reaffirmed that the direct victims of these attacks, as well as those of sexual and gender-based crimes, and the children born out of these crimes, endured profound and lasting harm.
The Lord’s Resistance Army, originating in Uganda in the 1980s under the leadership of one of the ICC’s most-wanted fugitives, Joseph Kony, continued its reign of terror in Congo, Central African Republic, and South Sudan after being expelled from Uganda.
Ongwen himself, abducted as a 9-year-old by the LRA, metamorphosed from a child soldier to a senior commander responsible for orchestrating brutal attacks on displaced civilians in northern Uganda during the early 2000s.
Despite defense lawyers portraying Ongwen as a victim of LRA atrocities, the presiding judge emphasized Ongwen’s full responsibility as an adult when committing these crimes.
Activists welcomed Ongwen’s convictions, particularly for offenses against women, including rape, forced pregnancy, and sexual slavery.
Meanwhile, the elusive Joseph Kony, facing 36 charges including murder, torture, rape, persecution, and enslavement, remains at large.
The ICC seeks to hold a hearing into the evidence against Kony in his absence. Despite a 2012 viral video shedding light on Kony’s crimes and international efforts to capture him, his whereabouts remain unknown.
ICC cases against three other LRA leaders were terminated due to confirmation of their deaths before they could be apprehended.
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