Diversity Macht Frei
February 22, 2017
This story was covered almost two years ago when the incident occurred (link). But the trial has now taken place and the verdicts were delivered yesterday. But I haven’t seen any reports of it at all in the English-language press.
To recap, some Muslim “migrants” were accused of throwing 12 other Christian “migrants” into the water because they refused to pray to Allah. The court sentenced them to 18 years in prison but did not accept they were motivated by religious hatred. What the hell does this mean? That Muslims can throw Christians into the water because they refuse to pray to Allah yet this is not religious hatred? Or did the court not accept that Christians were deliberately targeted? The reporting doesn’t make this clear.
They were accused of having killed their travelling companions because they refused to pray to Allah during the crossing of the Mediterranean to the Sicilian coasts: the assize court sentenced them to 18 years in prison – the prosecutor had requested life imprisonment – but the aggravating circumstance of religious hatred was not accepted, deconstructing the account of motive given by the witnesses. The sentence was imposed on six accused. Eight were acquitted.
…The trial resulted from the account of some migrants rescued off the coasts of Libya in April 2015. When they landed in Palermo they were questioned by the Mobile Squadron and recounted how during the trip some Nigerians and Ghanaians. were threatened with being abandoned in the water because they were Christians by around fifteen other Muslim “passengers”. The Muslims were then said to have passed from threats to action, throwing a dozen people in the water.
The defendants, charged with aggravated homicide, are Ivorians, Senegalese and Malians. The prosecutor’s case was accepted, based on the hypothesis of voluntary homicide, but the court did not believe there was a religious motive. 18 years in prison and a million and 200 thousand euro fine were imposed on Mohamed Kantina, Ousman Camara, Kabine Konate, Kulibali Uma, Morizio Mouri and Hamed Doumbia.
…The lawyers of the accused argued that the 12 migrants died through drowning because the dinghy had started to take on water and they fell into the sea.