DRC Court Hands Death Sentence to Colonel Over Killing of UN Experts
A military court in the Democratic Republic of Congo has sentenced Colonel Jean de Dieu Mambweni to death after finding him guilty of involvement in the killing of two United Nations experts who were investigating violence in the country’s Kasai region in 2017.
The ruling concerns the deaths of Zaida Catalan and Michael Sharp, who were on assignment to document alleged atrocities linked to militia activity when they were intercepted near Moyo-Musila.
The two were later abducted and executed, with their remains recovered weeks afterward.
The military tribunal concluded that Colonel Mambweni was not only aware of the operation but played a role in facilitating or enabling the attack, upgrading his responsibility from earlier findings.
In a previous 2022 trial, he had been sentenced to ten years in prison for lesser offences, including failure to protect lives and disobeying military orders.
Prosecutors appealed that verdict, arguing that the evidence pointed to a deeper level of involvement, which the High Military Court in Kinshasa ultimately accepted. The court reclassified the case as murder and a war crime, issuing the death penalty.
Although the sentence is severe, executions have not been carried out in the country since 2003, meaning the ruling is likely to result in life imprisonment in practice.
The case remains one of the most significant linked to the Kasai conflict, which drew international attention following reports of widespread militia violence and human rights abuses during the unrest.
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