Africa-Press – Angola. Four of the five accused of vandalizing the Migration and Foreigners Service (SME) post in the Zango 4 neighbourhood, in the municipality of Viana, in Luanda, were sentenced Tuesday to one year in prison.
The four foreign citizens, three from Guinea Conakry and one from Sierra Leone, were also sentenced to expulsion from the country after serving their sentence, if they did not regularize their immigration status, and to pay 500,000 kwanzas each in court fees.
These are Bubakar Bari, Muktar Bari and Babacar Dialo (all from Guinea Conakry) and Abubacar Dialo (Sierra Leone).
The fifth person involved, Saliou So, from Guinea Conakry, was cleared because he was not involved in the protests, on the contrary, he had a pacifying attitude at the time of the incident.
According to the indictment, on June 30 of this year, the defendants tried to invade the SME post to demand the release of three expatriate detainees who had been arrested on the same day at the exit of a mosque in Zango 1.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office accused them of introducing them into a place closed to the public, attempting to release a prisoner in the attempted form, resisting an official and the crime of damage.
The judge in the case, Agnaldo Machado, upheld the accusation and condemned them to the aforementioned penalties, appealing to them to behave with dignity while serving their sentence, if they want to benefit from some pardon.
One of the defendants’ lawyers, Francisco de Sousa, said that there was no clarity or certainty about the involvement of the accused in the crimes attributed to them, but promised to pronounce on this matter in another forum.
The trial took place in the 10th Section of the Common Crimes Room of the Provincial Court of Luanda, in the Palace of Justice in Viana.
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