An Ethiopian judge adjourned Tuesday a trial launched by prosecutors seeking a death sentence for Mengistu Haile Marian, an exiled former dictator already sentenced to life in prison.
Judge Desta Gebru adjourned the trial till July 3 after defence lawyers filed their own appeal calling for Mengistu’s life sentence to be lifted and lesser terms for the ex-dictator’s aides.
Hearings for the prosecutors’ appeal, filed last week, were scheduled to begin Tuesday but have been adjourned until next month so both appeals can be considered at once, the judge said.
“We appeal not just against the prosecutor’s appeal, but also against the life-imprisonment sentence handed out earlier. We ask the court to review both cases at the same time,” said Girmasellasie Araya, a defence lawyer.
An Ethiopian court sentenced the former dictator in absentia last January to life in prison for genocide and other crimes. Mengistu has lived in exile in Zimbabwe since being overthrown in 1991.
The prosecution had called for Mengistu to be executed after he was convicted at the end of the marathon 12-year trial that ended on December 12.
But Justice Nur Mohammed said at the time that the court believed other punishments were sufficient.
The sentence followed the Ethiopian Federal High Court’s conviction of Mengistu and 11 of his top aides on 211 counts of genocide, homicide, illegal imprisonment and illegal property seizure.
The trial related to atrocities committed during the 1977-78 “Red Terror” period when tens of thousands of people were killed or disappeared in Mengistu’s bid to turn Ethiopia into a Soviet-style workers’ state.
Zimbabwe has always ruled out the possibility of extraditing the 69-year-old former Ethiopian leader, who ruled until 1991.