By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Appeal Judges at International Criminal Court (ICC) on Monday rejected the award of $30 million in compensation for child soldiers and other victims of war crime perpetrated by the convicted Congolese militia leader Bosco Ntaganda.
The court instead sent the case back to a lower court for a new ruling on the record compensation amount.
The appeal judges said the lower court failed to give the number of victims who were to be compensated and added that it was “not discernible” how the lower court had arrived at the sum of $30 million.
Ntaganda was sentenced to 30 years in prison in 2019 for murder, rape and other atrocities committed when he was military chief of the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) militia in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in 2002-2003.
In March last year, a lower court ruled that Ntaganda should pay reparations of $30 million to his victims, the highest such amount ever ordered at the ICC.
