Al Mahdi, who was handed to the ICC by Niger late last year, has previously told the court he is a graduate of the teachers’ institute in Timbuktu and had been a civil servant in the education department from 2011.
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The court can’t bring charges in that case because Syria is not a member of the court and the U.N. Security Council hasn’t called for an ICC investigation, court spokesman Fadi El Abdallah said.
Ahmad Faqi al-Mahdi in the courtroom of the International Criminal Court in the Hague last September.
Mahdi, aged about 40, is also the first Islamic extremist charged by the ICC, and the first charged with crimes arising out of the conflict in Mali.
After the indictment, Mahdi addressed the Malian people: “I would like to seek the pardon of all the people of Timbuktu”.
Mahdi said he would accept the will of the court “with pain and with a broken heart”, but said he was “pinning my hope on the fact that the punishment meted out to me will be sufficient for the people of Timbuktu and Mali to offer forgiveness, for mankind to offer forgiveness”. Mahdi added, “I would like to make them a solemn promise that this was the first and the last wrongful act I will ever commit”.
Mahdi told the tribunal, based in The Hague, that he regretted the damage he had caused and was “really sorry”.
A Malian militant accused of attacking the fabled desert city of Timbuktu chose its most revered ancient shrines for destruction “to serve as examples”, the International Criminal Court heard on Tuesday (Aug 23). Timbuktu was founded in the 5th century.
He already had connections in the jihadist world, rubbing shoulders with the man who would become spokesman for Ansar Dine in Timbuktu, Sanda Ould Bouamama, and through his marriage to the niece of Houka Houka Ag Alfousseyni, an Islamic judge.
As the head of the “Hisbah” or the “Manners Brigade” he had ordered the shrines to be destroyed, prosecutors say. “They were historic monuments that did not constitute military targets. All, except one, were inscribed on the World Heritage List”.
“The courts have been slow to recognize this, but there is a clear link between crimes committed against people and attacks on their cultural heritage”, said Andras Riedlmayer, a scholar of Islamic art and architecture at Harvard.
Mahdi is expected to be convicted and sentenced later this week. They captured northern Mali in 2012 and then Timbuktu for about ten months before worldwide intervention in 2013.
Believed to be a member of the al Qaeda-affiliated Ansar Dine in Mali, Mahdi oversaw ransacking of the UNESCO World Heritage site.
The revered personages buried in the mausoleums in Timbuktu worth its nickname of “city of 333 saints” who, according to Malian experts of Islam are considered the protectors of the city, may be requested for weddings, imploring rain or fight against starvation.
Although he could have faced up to 30 years in prison, al-Mahdi struck a deal that will likely net him just nine to 11 years behind bars.
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He added Muslims should not get involved in such acts that he had been as it does no good to humanity.
