UN urges Senegal to reverse Habre extradition

UN human rights chief Navi Pillay has urged Senegal to reconsider sending Chad's former dictator Hissene Habre back to his home country to face justice for alleged atrocities. 

AFP

She says extraditing Habre to Chad, which has sentenced him to death in absentia for the torture and killing of political opponents, may violate international law. She says there needs to be guarantees that Habre will not face torture or the death penalty and would be given a fair trial.

Habre ruled Chad from 1982 and fled to Senegal in 1990, when he was overthrown by incumbent President General Idriss Deby Itno.

A 1992 truth commission report in Chad said Habre had presided over 40,000 political murders and widespread torture.

In 2008, a court there sentenced him to death for crimes against humanity following a trial held in his absence.

The former dictator has spent two decades in exile in Senegal, which has announced it would sent him home on a private plane on Monday.

Habre, through his lawyer described on Saturday his pending repatriation as "kidnapping".

Human rights groups have also expressed alarm at Senegal's decision, announced on Friday, to deliver Habre into the hands of Itno.