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CRIME

Second arrest in killing of Swedish honeymooner

Police in South Africa have arrested a second man in connection with the murder of a Swedish newlywed on her honeymoon in Cape Town, national police Commissioner Bheki Cele said Thursday.

Second arrest in killing of Swedish honeymooner

Cele spoke to journalists shortly after 26-year-old Xolile Mngeni, the first suspect arrested in the case, made a brief appearance in a Cape Town court and had his case postponed.

Cele said police might arrest “one or two more” suspects as investigations continue, the Sapa news agency reported.

Mngeni and his co-accused, whose name was not released, are accused of abducting 28-year-old Swede Anni Dewani and her British husband Shrien Dewani on the outskirts of Cape Town last Saturday.

The hijackers released the 31-year-old husband, but his wife’s body was later found in an impoverished township neighbourhood southeast of central Cape Town.

Mngeni has been charged with murder and robbery with aggravating circumstances, prosecutors said.

According to the newspaper Die Burger, Mngeni has admitted the murder to police, citing several media. However, there is no official confirmation from the police.

Mngeni was charged on Wednesday with Dewani’s murder.

His case was postponed to November 25 to allow time for a public aid lawyer to be appointed to represent him.

Dewani, from Mariestad in central Sweden, had been in Cape Town celebrating her honeymoon with her new British husband Shrien when their car was hijacked by two armed men at an intersection.

The hijackers later released Shrien Dewani, but his wife’s body was later found in a impoverished township neighbourhood south of Cape Town.

Like Mngeni, the man whose arrest was announced Thursday is a 26-year-old resident of Khayelitsha, a poor area near where Dewani’s body was found, Cele said.

He said police have recovered two cell phones, a bracelet and a watch linking the hijacking to the two men already arrested.

He said the post mortem investigation did not uncover evidence of a sexual assault.

According to media reports, the post-mortem also showed that Anni Dewani died of a single gunshot wound to the neck and her body had been released to her family.

South Africa has one of the highest murder rates in the world, with an average 46 killings a day last year, according to official statistics.

Cape Town tourism officials have downplayed suggestions that Anni Dewani’s death represents an increased risk to visitors’ safety.

“There are thousands of incident-free tours and visits to the townships happening every year,” said tourism association chief Mariette du Toit-Helmbold in a statement.

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CRIME

Top-ranking Syrian military official to face trial in Sweden

The highest-ranking Syrian military official ever to be tried in Europe was set to face court in Sweden on Monday.

Top-ranking Syrian military official to face trial in Sweden

Sixty-five-year-old former Syrian brigadier general Mohammed Hamo, who lives in Sweden, stands accused of “aiding and abetting” war crimes during Syria’s civil war, which can carry a sentence of life in jail.

The war in Syria between Bashar al-Assad’s regime and armed opposition groups, including the Islamic State, erupted after the government repressed peaceful pro-democracy protests in 2011.

It has killed more than half a million people, displaced millions, and ravaged the country’s economy and infrastructure.

According to the charge sheet, Hamo contributed – through “advice and action” – to the Syrian army’s warfare, “which systematically involved indiscriminate attacks on several towns or places in the area in and around the towns of Hama and Homs”.

The charges concern the period of January 1st to July 20th, 2012 and the trial is expected to last until late May.

Prosecutors say that the Syrian army’s “warfare has included widespread air and ground attacks by unknown perpetrators within the Syrian army”.

The prosecution argues that strikes were carried out without distinction – as required by international law – between civilian and military targets.

In his role as a brigadier general and head of an armament division, he allegedly helped with the coordination and supply of arms to units, enabling the carrying out of orders on an “operational level”.

Hamo’s lawyer, Mari Kilman, told AFP that her client denied committing a crime but said she did not wish to comment further ahead of the trial.

Several plaintiffs are due to testify at the trial, including Syrians from the cities in question and a British photographer who was injured during one of the strikes.

‘Complete impunity’

“The attacks in and around Homs and Hama in 2012 resulted in widespread civilian harm and an immense destruction of civilian properties,” Aida Samani, senior legal advisor at rights group Civil Rights Defenders, told AFP.

“The same conduct has been repeated systematically by the Syrian army in other cities across Syria with complete impunity,” she continued.

This trial will be the first in Europe “to address these types of indiscriminate attacks by the Syrian army”, according to Samani, who added that it “will be the first opportunity for victims of the attacks to have their voices heard in an independent court”.

Hamo is the highest-ranking military official to actually go on trial in Europe, but other European countries have also tried to bring charges against even more senior members.

In March, Swiss prosecutors charged Rifaat al-Assad, an uncle of president Bashar al-Assad, with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

However, it remains unlikely Rifaat al-Assad – who recently returned to Syria after 37 years in exile – will show up in person for the trial, for which a date has yet to be set.

Swiss law allows for trials in absentia under certain conditions.

Last November, France issued an international arrest warrant for Bashar al-Assad himself, who stands accused of complicity in crimes against humanity and war crimes over chemical attacks in 2013.

Three other international warrants were also issued for the arrests of Bashar al-Assad’s brother Maher, the de-facto chief of the Fourth Division – an elite military unit of the Syrian army – and two generals.

In January of 2022, a German court sentenced former Syrian colonel Anwar Raslan to life in jail for crimes against humanity in the first global trial over state-sponsored torture in Syria, which was hailed by victims as a victory for justice.

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