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Between April 2012 and January 2013, the armed Islamist groups Ansar Dine and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) took control of Timbuktu, Mali. The current case concerns the acts committed by Mr. Al Hassan who was the chief of the Islamic Police and was involved in the Islamic Court’s work. At the time that Mr. Al Hassan was the Chief of the Islamic Police, he enforced discriminatory laws and committed religious persecution, among other crimes. Through his role in the Islamic Court, Mr. Al Hassan took part in the transfer of accused persons, and implemented the judgments and sentences handed down by the Islamic Court. 

On 26 June 2024, the ICC convicted Mr. Al Hassan of several of the charges brought against him of war crimes and crimes against humanity. During the sentencing judgement, the Court considered the mitigating circumstances of the minor actions taken by Mr. Al Hassan to assist the civilian population in 2012-2013 and his cooperation with the Prosecution at the investigation stage. Mr. Al Hassan was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment on 20 November 2024. The time which Mr. Al Hassan had spent in detention from 28 March 2018 to 20 November 2024, was deducted from his sentence. As such, Mr. Al Hassan will be serving his sentence for committing the war crimes of torture, cruel treatment, outrages upon personal dignity, sentencing without due process, and mutilation, as well as the crimes against humanity of torture, persecution, and other inhumane acts.

On 29 September 2016, Amin Mohamed was sentenced by an Australian court to 5,5 years’ imprisonment for attempting to travel to Syria and fight there. Mr. Mohamed, a New Zealander, was convicted by a jury in October 2016 for booking flights to Turkey, and receiving the contact details of a man who would assist him (and others) getting from Turkey to Syria with the intention of fighting in the ongoing armed conflict there. In this venture, Mr. Mohamed had been assisted by Hamdi Alqudsi, another man convicted earlier in 2016 for assisting seven would-be foreign fighters with travel to Syria. Mr. Mohamed was prevented from undertaking this travel in September 2013 due to the revocation of his passport and will likely face deportation to New Zealand at the end of his imprisonment.

On 8 May 1945, Germany unconditionally surrendered obliging all forces under German control to immediately cease hostilities. Twenty-one individuals, all German nationals, were tried and convicted by a United States military commission in China for violating the laws of war, namely by continuing to engage in, permitting or ordering military activity against the United States after the surrender of Germany. They were then transferred to a German prison and remained in the custody of the United States Army.

The twenty-one individuals, represented by Eisentrager, petitioned the United States District Court for the District of Columbia arguing that their continued detention violated the Constitution of the United States and they demanded a writ of habeas corpus, which is the right to be brought before a Court. The District Court denied the writ arguing that the petitioners were located outside of its jurisdiction. The present decision by the Court of Appeal for the District of Columbia reversed the decision of the District Court to hold that any individual is entitled to a writ of habeas corpus, an inherent common law right, where they have been deprived of their liberty by an act of the United States Government and their detention is in violation of the United States Constitution. 

On 8 May 1945, Germany unconditionally surrendered obliging all forces under German control to immediately cease hostilities. Twenty one individuals, all German nationals, were tried and convicted by a United States military commission in China for violating the laws of war, namely by continuing to engage in, permitting or ordering military activity against the United States after the surrender of Germany. They were then transferred to a German prison and remained in the custody of the United States Army.

The twenty one individuals, represented by Eisentrager, petitioned the United States District Court for the District of Columbia arguing that their continued detention violated the Constitution of the United States and they demanded a writ of habeas corpus, that is the right to be brought before a Court. The District Court denied the writ arguing that the petitioners were located outside of its jurisdiction. The Court of Appeal of the District of Columbia reversed the decision. In the present decision, the Supreme Court of the United States reversed the decision of the Court of Appeal to hold that foreign enemy nationals, not resident in the United States, have no right to a writ of habeas corpus. 

Anto Furundžija was the commander of a special unit of the Croatian Defence Council called the “Jokers.” He was brought before the ICTY for the commission of crimes against Bosnian Muslims who were interrogated at the headquarters of the “Jokers” in Nadioci (Bosnia and Herzegovina) in May 1993. During the interrogations, those detained were subjected to sexual assaults, rape, physical and mental suffering.

Trial Chamber II was satisfied that the elements of the war crime of torture have been fulfilled and it found Furundžija guilty of this crime as a co-perpetrator. Furthermore, Furundžija was also found guilty of aiding and abetting the war crime of outrages upon personal dignity, including rape. Although Furundžija did not personally commit the crime, his presence and actions aided and abetted the commission of rape. 

Furundžija was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment.