Sudan has hanged 2 people convicted over the killing of Chinese oil workers and damaging an oil pipeline in troubled South Kordofan State 6 years ago.
The Sudanese ministry of Justice confirmed in a statement on Tuesday that the management of the Federal Kober Prison in Khartoum has executed the death penalty on the 2 convicts.
They were fighters of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) found guilty of killing the Chinese workers who were working at the Abu Dafra oil field in West Kordofan in 2008.
17 others Chinese workers were freed after spending a long time in captivity, the ministry added.
JEM has strongly condemned the execution of the convicts whom he described as freedom fighters claiming none of its ex combatants were involved in the death of the Chinese.
JEM spokesman Jibril Adam Bilal described the trial of the pair as politically motivated.
On 18 October 2008, nine Chinese oil workers and a Sudanese driver were said to have been abducted from the Abu Dafra oilfield.
The bodies of 5 Chinese workers were found a few days later near the area where they were abducted.
Source: StarAfrica.com, Sept. 17, 2014
Darfur rebels convicted of murder executed
On Sunday, the management of the federal Kober prison in Khartoum North carried-out the death penalty of 2 rebels, accused of killing Chinese workers in West Kordofan.
The members of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) were sentenced to death on charges of murdering the 5 Chinese who were working at the Abu Dafra oil field in West Kordofan in 2008. 17 others were acquitted.
On 18 October 2008, a group of 35 JEM rebels kidnapped nine Chinese oil workers and a Sudanese driver at the Abu Dafra oil field. The bodies of 5 workers were found a few days later.
JEM strongly condemned the execution of the "freedom fighters" in Kober prison, stressing that "no JEM combatant had anything to do with the assassination of the Chinese in Abu Dafra".
Jibril Adam Bilal, the spokesman for the movement, told Radio Dabanga that the trial, in which the two were convicted, was politically motivated. "It was directed by the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS), and has nothing to do with the judiciary in the country."
He stressed the need to investigate and document "this crime committed against innocent people" by human rights organisations.
Source: radioabanga.org, Sept. 17, 2014
