Sudan: TMC revokes death sentences against Akar, Arman
The Transitional Military Council issued Thursday a
decree to revoke death sentences issued against Sudan People's Liberation
Movement’s chairman Malik Akar and its secretary-general Yasser Arman.
Al-Taher Haja, spokesman of the council, told Asharq
Al-Awsat newspaper that the decision was part of the implementation of the
measures intending to create confidence-building measures aiming to achieve
peace in Sudan.
This decision coincided with the Sudanese security
authorities releasing former vice president Bakri Hassan Saleh and three
leaders of the former regime.
A court in Sinjah (in the south of Sudan) issued in
March 2014 death sentences against 17 leaders of armed movements that resisted
Bashir's regime after the rebellion broke out in South Kordofan and Blue Nile
states in September 2011.
In June, the military authorities deported Arman and
his companions Mubarak Erdul and Khamis Jalab to the capital of South Sudan,
Juba, after days of their return to Khartoum to participate in ongoing
negotiations between the council and the popular movement leaders within the
Forces of Freedom and Change.
Back then, the TMC justified its decision saying
that Arman is facing an execution sentence and the legal procedures relevant to
amnesty weren’t taken. Thus, it preferred to move him to Juba, which approved
to receive him.
