Sudan’s Bashir defies South African court and returns home

June 22, 2015 Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has defied South Africa’s court which wanted him held back in the country for war crimes, and has returned to Sudan. Al-Bashir arrived in Khartoum on June 15 to a hero’s welcome with hundreds of people at the airport to greet him. He was in South Africa for an African Union summit.

The Pretoria High Court are handling a petition by the Southern African Litigation Centre, a rights group that wanted to force South African President Jacob Zuma’s government to arrest Bashir and hand him over to the ICC which had indicted him also for crimes against humanity.

South Africa is an ICC signatory and therefore obliged to implement arrest warrants. The president of the northern country was able to go home because the ruling ANC in South Africa had previously accused the ICC of being biased, especially against African leaders, and decided this time that Africa’s will, would override the West.