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| Kenyan deputy president must attend trial, international criminal court rules | Kenyan deputy president must attend trial, international criminal court rules |
| (about 14 hours later) | |
| The international criminal court has overturned a decision excusing Kenya's deputy president from attending his trial on charges of orchestrating deadly violence after his country's 2007 election. | The international criminal court has overturned a decision excusing Kenya's deputy president from attending his trial on charges of orchestrating deadly violence after his country's 2007 election. |
| The decision on Friday by appeal judges means William Ruto must appear at his trial, but can still be excused by judges on a case by case basis. "The presence of the accused must remain the general rule," said the court president, Sang-hyun Song. | |
| The ruling could deepen a rift between the court and African leaders who accuse it of unfairly targeting their continent. It could also set a precedent for Kenya's president, Uhuru Kenyatta, whose trial on similar charges is due to start next month. | |
| This month the African Union said it wanted the UN security council to defer the Kenya trials at the ICC for a year. The court, based in The Hague, has indicted only Africans in more than a decade of operation. However, while overturning the decision to issue a blanket excusal from trial for Ruto, the appeals panel left open the option for judges to let Ruto stay at home for parts of his case, but he would have to seek permission each time he wanted to miss hearings. | |
| In June judges said Ruto could skip most of his trial so that he could exercise his duties as deputy of head of state. Prosecutors appealed and Ruto has, so far, attended much of his case. | |
| The five-judge appeals panel acknowledged that trial judges have the power to excuse a defendant, but "interpreted the scope of its discretion too broadly" in giving Ruto what amounted to "a blanket excusal" from his trial, Sang said. | |
| Trial judges exercised their discretion last month when they adjourned Ruto's case for a week so he could fly home to deal with the aftermath of the deadly terror attack on an upscale shopping mall in Nairobi. | |
| Ruto, who is on trial alongside broadcaster Joshua Arap Sang, has pleaded not guilty to crimes against humanity for allegedly organising violence targeting his political opponents after Kenya's 2007 presidential vote. More than 1,000 people died in tribal clashes in December 2007 and January 2008. | |
| Kenyatta, who was elected president earlier this year, faces similar charges of involvement in attacks on his political rivals after the 2007 vote. He, too, insists he is innocent and he has asked judges to throw out the case, claiming it is built on false witness testimony. | |
| Judges preparing for his trial last week excused him from attending most of the hearings in a case that could take many months to complete. Prosecutors have yet to say whether they will appeal that decision. | |
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