Uhuru Kenyatta trial postponed by international criminal court
|
Version 0 of 1. The international criminal court has postponed the trial of Kenya's president on charges he orchestrated violence after his country's 2007 elections. The court said it would instead hold a hearing on 5 February – the day Uhuru Kenyatta's trial was due to have started – into a request by prosecutors for a three-month adjournment in the case and a request by the president to have the case thrown out altogether. The delay is the latest setback in the case against Kenyatta, who insists he is innocent of all charges against him. Prosecutors asked for a delay in the case in December after one witness pulled out and another admitted giving false evidence. At the time, ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said she needed time to reconsider her case. "Having carefully considered my evidence and the impact of the two withdrawals, I have come to the conclusion that currently the case against Mr Kenyatta does not satisfy the high evidentiary standards required at trial," she said. In a decision issued on Thursday, judges revealed that Kenyatta's defence team had filed a confidential request on 13 January for the court to "terminate the proceedings ... on the grounds of insufficiency of evidence". No further details of the defence request were available. Judges ordered Kenyatta's lawyers to file a public version by next Tuesday. Last year Kenyatta's defence team asked for the case to be thrown out. Kenyatta denies charges of crimes against humanity, including murder, rape, forcible population transfer and persecution, for his alleged role organising violence after 2007 elections that left more than 1,000 people dead. Kenya's deputy president, William Ruto, is on trial at the ICC on similar charges. He has pleaded innocent. |