[ad_1]
The fate of an alleged leader of the smuggling of people who claims to be a victim of a false identity is pending Friday. A verdict is expected in the context of a lawsuit against him in Italy.
Eritrean national Medhanie Yehdego Mered is accused of being the "general" of one of the largest global networks of migrant smuggling, with branches in Eritrea, Ethiopia, Libya, the United Arab Emirates and the United Arab Emirates. in Europe.
But the man on trial in Sicily, arrested in Sudan in 2016 and extradited to Italy, says that he is the carpenter Medhanie Tesfamariam Berhe.
Despite the differences in appearance between the two men and DNA evidence in support of the Berhe case, Italian prosecutors have always maintained their weapons and called for a 14-year prison term.
This is not the life sentence that one could expect for an alleged smuggler who has bloodshed in the brain, and evidence that prosecutors know that they have the wrong man, said the accused's attorney.
"They should have just said" we made a mistake, "AFP lawyer Michele Calantropo told AFP on Thursday.
His client, dressed in jeans and a green top, spoke softly with his interpreter at the beginning of the hearing in a huge bunker in Palermo, built in the 1980s for the maxi lawsuit against the Mafia.
The verdict is expected later Friday.
"Cynical and unscrupulous"
At the time, Italy, Sudan and Britain hailed the capture of the accused as the brilliant result of a joint operation that had dealt a blow to the government. smugglers' business.
Mered was found on a list of wanted people after being identified as being the man who arranged the boarding of migrants on a boat that sank off Italy in October 2013, making at least 360 dead during one of the worst disasters of this type in the Mediterranean.
Mered, "cynical and unscrupulous", "has continually reaped big profits while showing contempt for human life," according to a joint statement from Sudan, Italy and Britain announcing his arrest on Wednesday. May 24, 2016.
But images broadcast by Italian police of a lean, frizzy-looking, frail young man while he was descending from the handcuffed plane, sowed confusion and disbelief within of the Eritrean diaspora worldwide.
Those who had dealt with Mered said that it was not him. Berhe's family recognized him instantly.
According to American, Italian and Swedish investigative journalists, Mered spent part of 2016 in prison in Dubai for using a fake pbadport and now lives in Uganda.
The DNA evidence also suggested that the wrong man was behind bars: tests on Behre's mother showed that the accused was his son.
Further tests, conducted on the three-year-old Mered son living in Sweden, showed that the accused was not his father.
"Greater injustice"
In 2017, the "general" himself told a New York investigative journalist that the Italians had the wrong man.
Calantropo insists that the man behind the bars has only one point in common with the trafficker: his first name, Medhanie.
"They have nothing on him, he has not done anything," said Calantropo.
"If he is found guilty, I will do everything in my power to defend the truth, not only before the court of appeal and the Supreme Court, but also before the European Court of Human Rights." Man, "he added.
"It's one of the biggest injustices on the face of the earth."
Medhanie was the name indicated by the British National Crime Agency (NCA) in 2016 when he heard someone call him by that name calling the phone from the ####################################################################################### 39, an alleged upholsterer in Libya.
The man who made the calls was found and arrested in Khartoum.
"Admit mistakes"
But while prosecutors say that calls have been made to organize migrant trips, Calantropo says his client was just looking for relatives who were heading to Europe.
Prosecutors said that two Eritrean translators had told the police that the arrested man's voice corresponded to the recording of the "General" of 2014 captured by wiretap, although a recognition software standard voice does not produce any results.
They also provided proof that he had contacted Mered's wife on Facebook.
Berhe said that he had seen his picture, that he found her pretty and had tried to talk to her, but she had repelled him.
Members of the Sudanese secret service who arrested him said in the trial that he had insisted that his name was different.
They told the court that they had not informed their superiors because the name he had given resembled the one they had.
"I went to see him this morning, he cried without stopping for an hour and a half," said Calantropo.
"You can only imagine the stress he's been going through for three years.
"They were wrong, they should now recognize their mistakes," he added.
Source link
