Swiss Supreme Court Upholds 20-Year Sentence for Liberian Ex-Rebel Commander Kosiah

Switzerland's supreme court has upheld a 20-year jail sentence for former Liberian rebel commander Alieu Kosiah, but overturned his conviction for crimes against humanity.

The verdict is dated 28 September but was published on Friday. In a statement, the court said it had rejected an appeal by a high-ranking Liberian military official against his conviction for violations of the laws of war committed between 1993 and 1995 during Liberia's first civil war.

In 2021, Switzerland's Federal Criminal Court found Kosiah guilty of multiple atrocities. About 250,000 people died in Liberia's back-to-back civil wars between 1989 and 2003.

In 2023, the appeals chamber upheld his 20-year sentence for war crimes and, for the first time in Swiss history, also found Kosiah guilty of crimes against humanity.

The supreme court said he was acquitted of the crimes against humanity charge based on a strict application of the principle of non-retroactivity. The offence of crimes against humanity was introduced into Swiss law in 2011, so it could not be applied to acts committed before then, the court said.

His conviction for violating the laws of war was upheld, however, as was the maximum 20-year custodial sentence. Kosiah is now 51.

Switzerland recognises the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows it to prosecute individuals suspected of international crimes regardless of where those crimes were committed.

Kosiah settled in Switzerland in the late 1990s and was arrested in 2014.

The Swiss organisation Civitas Maxima, which works to bring perpetrators of international crimes to justice, said the decision makes final the first war crimes conviction ever handed down by a Swiss civilian court, and the first conviction anywhere of a Liberian for war crimes committed during the country's civil wars.

Civitas Maxima director Alain Werner, who represents victims in the case, said: 'Today the survivors of Alieu Kosiah's crimes have final justice.' But he expressed deep disappointment at the acquittal on crimes against humanity, saying what happened in Lofa between 1993 and 1995 is the very definition of a crime against humanity.

According to the case, Kosiah killed civilians and unarmed soldiers, and ordered lootings and other crimes.