[News] German Court sentences Gambian ‘death squad member’ to life in prison over crimes committed back in his country.

A German regional court on Thursday, November 30, sentenced a former member of a death squad from Gambia to life in jail over crimes committed back in his country. 

 

 

The court found the former soldier, Bai Lowe, 47, guilty of crimes against humanity, murder, and attempted murder for his role as a driver for the so-called “Junglers” military unit.

 

 

“The long arm of the law has caught up to Bai Lowe in Germany… as it will hopefully soon catch up to Jammeh himself,” said Reed Brody, a lawyer with the International Commission of Jurists who works with victims of the regime of former Gambian President Yahya Jammeh.

 

 

According to prosecutors, the Junglers unit was “used by the then-president of The Gambia to carry out illegal killing orders, among other things” with the aim of “intimidating the Gambian population and suppressing the opposition.”

 

 

Lowe was accused of involvement in crimes that took place between December 2003 and December 2006.

 

 

Among the crimes linked to him is the 2004 killing of journalist Deyda Hydara, a 58-year-old correspondent for the news agency AFP who was gunned down in his car on the outskirts of the Gambian capital Banju. 

 

 

Lowe was arrested in the north-central German city of Hannover in March 2021, more than a decade after he came to Germany as a refugee, according to German broadcaster Deutschlandfunk.

 

 

He arrived in Europe via Senegal in December 2012, saying he was seeking asylum as a political refugee who feared for his life under Jammeh.

 

 

He was detained on the charges in Germany in March 2021.

 

 

The evidence against Lowe includes a telephone interview he gave in 2013 to a US-based Gambian radio station, in which he described his participation in the attacks, according to police.

In a statement read out to the court, however, Lowe said he had merely repeated what other people had told him about the facts of the case to illustrate the cruelty of Jammeh’s government.

 

 

Jammeh ruled Gambia with an iron fist for 22 years but fled the country in January 2017 after losing a presidential election to relative unknown Adama Barrow.

 

 

He refused to acknowledge the results but was forced out by a popular uprising and fled to Equatorial Guinea.

 

 

“The long arm of the law has caught up to Bai Lowe in Germany… as it will hopefully soon catch up to Jammeh himself,” said Reed Brody, a lawyer with the International Commission of Jurists who works with Jammeh’s victims.

Lowe is one of three alleged accomplices of Jammeh to be detained abroad, alongside former interior minister Ousman Sonko, under investigation in Switzerland since 2017, and another alleged former Jungler, Michael Sang Correa, indicted in June 2020 in the United States.

 

 

The Gambian government itself said earlier this year it was working with the regional ECOWAS bloc to set up a tribunal to try crimes committed under Jammeh.