International war crimes judges Friday acquitted former Congolese vice president Jean-Pierre Bemba on appeal, overturning an 18-year sentence for war crimes committed in the Central African Republic (CAR). "Mr Bemba cannot be held criminally liable for the crimes committed by his troops in the Central African Republic," presiding judge Christine Van den Wyngaert told the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
"The Appeals Chamber in this instant reverses the conviction against Mr Bemba... and in relation to the remaining criminal acts it enters an acquittal," Van den Wyngaert said.
In 2016, the ICC's judges unanimously found Bemba guilty on five charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity for abuses committed by his troops during a five-month rampage in the neighbouring CAR. Bemba had sent his militia, the Congolese Liberation Movement (MLC), into the CAR in October 2002 to quash a coup against the then president, Ange-Felix Patasse. At his sentencing in 2016, trial judges blamed Bemba for failing to stop a series of "sadistic and cruel" rapes and murders as well as pillaging by his soldiers.