ICC to indict Sudan prez over Darfur

KATHMANDU, Feb 12: The Hague-based International Criminal Court has decided to indict Sudan President Omar Hassan al-Bashir for war crimes in Darfur and issue a warrant for his arrest, wire reports quoting UN diplomats and officials said Thursday.

"The ICC decided it wants him arrested," the Reuters quoted an unnamed UN diplomat as saying.

Last year, chief ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo asked the court´s judges to indict President Bashir for orchestrating what he described as a campaign of genocide in Sudan´s western Darfur region that killed 35,000 people in 2003 and at least 100,000 more through starvation and disease.

Sudan rejects the term genocide and says 10,000 people died in the conflict. U.N. officials say at least 2.5 million were left homeless and put the death toll as high as 300,000.

An ICC spokeswoman declined to comment on the issue and said the decision was in the hands of the judges, according to Reuters.

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