{"id":2084,"date":"2022-02-09T10:35:59","date_gmt":"2022-02-09T10:35:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.qiraatafrican.com\/?p=2084"},"modified":"2022-02-09T10:35:59","modified_gmt":"2022-02-09T10:35:59","slug":"burkina-prosecutors-seek-30-years-for-blaise-compaore-over-sankara-murder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/2084\/burkina-prosecutors-seek-30-years-for-blaise-compaore-over-sankara-murder\/","title":{"rendered":"Burkina prosecutors seek 30 years for Blaise Compaor\u00e9 over Sankara murder"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Military Prosecutors in Burkina Faso on Tuesday requested a 30-year prison term for former President Blaise Compaor\u00e9, for the 1987 murder of his predecessor, revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara.<\/p>\n<p>A trial was launched into the killing last year after French authorities finally agreed to release military documents giving details of the circumstances of his death.<\/p>\n<p>The closely-followed trial is almost at its climax as the West African nation reels from its latest coup, following popular <a href=\"https:\/\/en.qiraatafrican.com\/2022\/01\/26\/burkina-faso-coup-crowd-celebrates-while-ecowas-has-been-blamed-for-unrest\/\">anger<\/a> over terrorist attacks.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors asked the military court, where he is supposed to stand trial, to find Mr Compaor\u00e9 guilty in absentia of an &#8220;attack on state security&#8221;, &#8220;concealment of a corpse&#8221; and &#8220;complicity in a murder&#8221;, accusing him of being the main sponsor behind the killing of Sankara and 12 of his colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>The prosecution is also seeking:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>30 years in jail for Hyacinth Kafando &#8211; who is suspected of having led the commando that murdered Thomas Sankara and his companions<\/li>\n<li>20 years in jail for Gilbert Diender\u00e9 &#8211; the main defendant present at the trial and one of the army commanders during the 1987 coup. He is already serving a 20-year sentence over an attempted military coup in 2015.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The trial was then adjourned until March 1 based on a request by the defence.<\/p>\n<p>The former president was Sankara&#8217;s close friend and denies any role in his death.<\/p>\n<p>Sankara was an army captain when he came to power in a coup in 1983 at the age of 33.<\/p>\n<p>The fiery Marxist-Leninist railed against imperialism and colonialism, often angering Western leaders but gaining followers across the continent and beyond.<\/p>\n<p>He and 12 colleagues were gunned down by a hit squad on October 15, 1987, at a meeting of the ruling National Revolutionary Council.<\/p>\n<p>Their assassination coincided with a coup that brought Sankara&#8217;s former comrade-in-arms, Compaore, to power.<\/p>\n<p>Compaore ruled for 27 years before being deposed by a popular uprising in 2014 and fleeing to the neighbouring Ivory Coast.<\/p>\n<p>Fourteen people stand accused in the trial, 12 of them appearing in court. Most pleaded not guilty.<\/p>\n<p>The prosecution also requested 30 years in jail for the commander of Compaore&#8217;s presidential guard, Hyacinthe Kafando, who is suspected of having led the hit squad. He is also being tried in absentia.<\/p>\n<p>It sought a 20-year sentence for Gilbert Diendere, one of the commanders of the army during the 1987 coup and the main defendant present at the trial.<\/p>\n<p>He is already serving a 20-year sentence over an attempted military coup in 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Military Prosecutors in Burkina Faso on Tuesday requested a 30-year prison term for former President Blaise Compaor\u00e9, for the 1987 murder of his predecessor, revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara. A trial was launched into the killing last year after French authorities finally agreed to release military documents giving details of the circumstances of his death. The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2085,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"Africa News","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"0","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[351,350,352],"class_list":["post-2084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-west-africa","tag-blaise-compaore","tag-sankara-murder","tag-thomas-sankara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2084\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}