Africa

Guinean colonel arrested in Liberia after being sentenced to life in prison for a 2009 massacre

September 18 (EUROPA PRESS) –

Guinean Colonel Claude Pivi, sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the massacre in September 2009 in the African country and who escaped in November 2023 after an attack on the prison where he was held, has been arrested in a town in Liberia located near the common border.

Sources cited by the Guinean news portal Guinée News have indicated that Pivi was arrested on Tuesday during a routine check, after which photographs of him in the custody of the Liberian authorities have circulated on social networks, although they have not commented on the matter.

Pivi managed to escape in November 2023 after an assault on the main prison in Guinea’s capital, Conakry, carried out by a commando led by one of his sons, who remains on the run. Former President Moussa Dadis Camara and Moussa Thiegboro also escaped, although both turned themselves in hours later.

The colonel was sentenced on July 31 to life in prison for his role in the 2009 massacre, which left more than 150 people dead and more than 100 women and girls raped and subjected to other forms of sexual violence during the repression of a demonstration in which participants were calling on Camaray — who led the country for almost a year following a 2008 coup following the death of Lansana Conté — not to run in elections the following year.

Guinea is ruled by a military junta, the National Committee for Reconciliation and Development (CNRD), following the September 2021 coup against then-President Alpha Condé, after months of political crisis in the country over Condé’s decision to amend the Constitution to run for a third term and his victory in the 2020 presidential election.

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