A leader of Sudan's notorious Janjaweed will be the first suspect to be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity over the bloody Darfur conflict, international judges announced on Friday.
Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, also known by the nom de guerre Ali Kushayb, will face 31 counts before the International Criminal Court including murder, rape and torture, the Hague based court said in a statement.
"The Pre-Trial Chamber... unanimously, issued a decision confirming all the charges brought by the prosecutor... and committed him to trial," the ICC said.
Prosecutors in May told judges that Abd-Al-Rahman, an ally of deposed Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, was an "energetic perpetrator" of murders in the Darfur conflict in 2003-04.
The 70-year-old, who handed himself in last year after more than a decade on the run, denies the charges.
"The victims of the suspect's crimes are countless and their suffering immense. The pain inflicted on the victims of these crimes persists," outgoing ICC chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda told the court.
"The evidence shows Mr Abd-Al-Rahman was a knowing, willing and energetic perpetrator of these crimes. He played a crucial role, leading attacks, committing murders and ordering other murders," Bensouda added at a May 24 hearing to determine if there was enough evidence for a full-blown trial.
A three-judge bench at the ICC on Friday "found there are substantial grounds to believe that Mr Abd-Al-Rahman is responsible for 31 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity."
A trial date has yet to be set.
The United Nations says 300,000 people were killed and 2.5 million displaced in the Darfur conflict.
Fighting broke out in 2003 when black African rebels, complaining of systematic discrimination, took up arms against Bashir's Arab-dominated regime.
Khartoum responded by unleashing a notorious militia known as the Janjaweed, recruited from among the region's nomadic tribes.
Bashir, who ruled Sudan with an iron fist for three decades, was deposed in April 2019 following months of protests in Sudan, and is wanted by the ICC for genocide.
Abd-Al-Rahman fled to the Central African Republic in February 2020 when the new Sudanese government announced it would cooperate with the ICC investigation.
Sudan's transitional administration is still in talks with the court about options for trying Bashir and his aides.