Switzerland’s Federal Criminal Court has postponed the long-awaited war crimes trial of former Liberian rebel leader Alieu Kosiah due to the rapid spread of Covid-19

Switzerland’s Federal Criminal Court has postponed the long-awaited war crimes trial of former Liberian rebel leader Alieu Kosiah due to the rapid spread of Covid-19. The trial had been scheduled to take place from April 14-30 in Bellinzona, capital of Switzerland’s southern, Italian speaking canton of Ticino. It will be the first international criminal trial in a non-military Swiss court and “historic” according to Swiss group Civitas Maxima, one of the NGOs representing Liberian victims in the case. The Federal Criminal Court hopes to reschedule the trial between June and July 2020, according to a recent press release from Civitas Maxima and its Liberian partner, the Global Justice and Research Project (GJRP). They said the decision taken by the Swiss court was appropriate to “safeguard the health of all the trial participants, including the victims who reside abroad”, since Liberian witnesses are being called to testify in the trial. Kosiah, a former commander of the …