Former Congolese militia leader Thomas Lubanga has pleaded not guilty to charges of using child soldiers at the International Criminal Court (ICC).

He faces six charges of recruiting and using hundreds of children aged under 15 to fight in DR Congo's brutal five-year conflict, which ended in 2003.

Opening the prosecution, Luis Moreno-Ocampo said Mr Lubanga had used the children to "kill, pillage and rape".

The case is the first to come to trial before the ICC in The Hague.

Its opening follows a seven-month delay, as judges and prosecutors at the world's first permanent war crimes court disputed confidential evidence.

Prosecutors say child soldiers were used to kill members of a rival ethnic group, or as Mr Lubanga's bodyguards.

Giving his opening statement, Mr Moreno-Ocampo said the prosecution would prove that between 1 September 2002 and 13 August 2003, Mr Lubanga "systematically" recruited children under 15 as soldiers.

" Lubanga's militia "recruited, trained and used hundreds of young children to kill, pillage and rape. The children still suffer the consequences of Lubanga's crimes," prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo told a three-judge panel in his opening statement. "They cannot forget what they suffered, what they saw, what they did."

"The children still suffer the consequences of Lubanga's crimes. They cannot forget what they suffered, what they saw, what they did. They were nine, 11, 13 years old."

Mr Moreno-Ocampo said some of the children were now using drugs to survive and some had become prostitutes.

The prosecution plans to call 34 witnesses - among them former child soldiers and ex-militia group members - in the course of the trial, which is expected to last several months.

It also plans to submit video footage allegedly showing Mr Lubanga in training camps in the company of recruits who appear to be under 15.

Mr Lubanga insists he was trying to bring peace to Ituri, a region in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo wracked by years of conflict between rival groups seeking to control its vast mineral wealth.

The trial of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, which opened on Monday 26 January 2009 before Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Court, will not only be the first in the history of the Court, but will also be the first one in the history of international law which will see victims participate fully in the proceedings.

In total, the judges have recognised 93 persons as victims for the purpose of participating in the case and the interests of these persons will be defended by eight legal representatives (lawyers).

Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, the first person to have been surrendered to the Court since its inception, is accused of having committed, as co-perpetrator, war crimes consisting of enlisting and conscripting of children under the age of 15 years into the Forces patriotiques pour la libération du Congo [Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo] (FPLC), and using them to participate actively in hostilities in Ituri, a district of the Eastern Province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), between September 2002 and August 2003.

His trial will be held before Trial Chamber I, composed of Judges Adrian Fulford (United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland), Presiding Judge; Elisabeth Odio Benito (Costa Rica); and René Blattmann (Bolivia). These independent magistrates will ensure that the trial is fair and expeditious and is conducted with full respect for the rights of the defense, the equality of arms and the principle of adversarial debate, having further due regard for the protection of victims and witnesses.

During the hearings, the Office of the Prosecutor will present all the evidence at its disposal, submitting to the attention of the judges a large number of the 1,671 documents which it has compiled in the case, as well as videos showing Mr. Lubanga in training camps in the company of recruits whose age seems to be below 15. It will also summon 34 witnesses, amongst whom former child soldiers and three expert witnesses. The Defense counsel will then have the opportunity to cross-examine the witnesses of the Prosecution. It should be noted that a large number of these witnesses (19 in total) are subject to procedural measures of protection and that they will accordingly testify with respect for their anonymity (their image and voice will thus be distorted).

As soon as the Prosecution has finished its presentations, probably in some months, the Defense team, led by Catherine Mabille, will present exculpatory evidence in its possession. In support of its theses, the Defense will call a (to this day unknown) number of witnesses. These will be examined by the Defense and cross-examined by the Prosecution.

Monday's hearing will start with the reading, by a Court official, of the charges against Mr. Lubanga. Judge Fulford will then satisfy himself, through the accuser's counsel, that the latter has understood the nature of the charges. He will further recall to the Defense that Mr. Lubanga has the opportunity to say at this stage whether he will plead guilty or not guilty, pursuant to 64 (8)(a) of the Rome Statute. The Court's Prosecutor, Mr. Luis Moreno Ocampo, will then take the floor for an opening statement (duration: 1.5 hours approx.). He will be followed by the eight legal representatives of the victims (duration: 20 minutes for each intervention). Finally the Defense counsel will also proceed with opening statements fr approximately three hours, which will most probably continue on Tuesday.

The trial of Mr. Lubanga is expected to take several months. At the end of the hearings, the judges of Trial Chamber I will give their decision within a "reasonable period of time". This decision will be pronounced in public: it will acquit or condemn the accused. 

The various parties to the trial will, if need be, be able to appeal the decision before the Appeal Chamber of the Court.

Snap short of the Thomas Lubanga Dyilo

Lubanga was born on 29 December 1960 in Djiba in the Ituri Province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He is of the Gegere ethnic group, a sub group of the larger hema tribe.

Lubanga who spent most of his time in neighboring Uganda, studied at the University of Kisangani and has a degree in psychology. He is married and has seven children.

During what has come to be known as the Second congo war, after the one which toppled Mobutu Tsese Kuku, Lubanga was a military commander and "minister of defence" in the pro-Uganda Congolese Rally for Democracy-Liberation Movement (RCD-ML). In July 2001, he founded another rebel group, the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC). In early 2002, Lubanga was sidelined from the military control of the RCD-ML and he split from the group. In September 2002, he became President of the UPC and founded its military wing, the Patriotic Force for the Liberation of the Congo (FPLC).

Under Lubanga's leadership, the almost exclusively Hema UPC became one of the main actors in the Ituri Conflict between the Hema and Lendu ethnic groups. It seized control of Bunia, capital of the gold-rich Ituri region, in 2002, and demanded that the Congolese government recognize Ituri as an autonomous province.

Lubanga's luck first run out on 13 June 2002, when he was briefly arrested while on a mission to Kinshasa, but he was released ten weeks later in exchange for a kidnapped government minister.

The USA based Human Rights Watch has accused the UPC, under Lubanga's command, of "ethnic massacres, murder, torture, rape and mutilation, as well as the recruitment of child soldiers". Between November 2002 and June 2003, the UPC allegedly killed 800 civilians on the basis of their ethnicity in the gold mining region of Mongbwalu. Between 18 February and 3 March 2003, the UPC is reported to have destroyed 26 villages in one area, killing at least 350 people and forcing 60,000 to flee their homes. Human rights organisations claim that at one point Lubanga had 3,000 child soldiers between the ages of 8 and 15. He reportedly ordered every family in the area under his control to help the war effort by donating something: money, a cow, or a child to join his militia.

The UPC was forced out of Bunia by the Uganda Army, after what has been alleged to have been a conflict between Ugandan Army officers and him over the sharing of the war spoils in March 2003. Lubanga later moved to Kinshasa and registered the UPC as a political party, but he was arrested on 19 March 2005 in connection with the killing of nine Bangladeshi United Nations peacekeepers in Ituri on 25 February 2005. He was initially detained in one of Kinshasa's most luxurious hotels but after a few months he was transferred to Kinshasa's central jail.

The ICC trial

In March 2004, the Congolese government authorized the ICC (ICC) to investigate and prosecute "crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court allegedly committed anywhere in the territory of the DRC since the entry into force of the Rome Statute, on 1 July 2002." On 10 February 2006, a Pre-Trial Chamber of the ICC found that there were reasonable grounds to believe that Lubanga bore individual criminal responsibility for the war crimes of "conscripting and enlisting children under the age of fifteen years and using them to participate actively in hostilities", and issued a sealed warrant for his arrest.

On 17 March 2006, Lubanga became the first person ever arrested under an ICC arrest warrant, when the Congolese authorities arrested him and transferred him into ICC custody. He was flown to the Hague, where he has been held since 17 March 2006. As of January 2009, he is one of four individuals being detained by the ICC, including two rebels who fought against Lubanga in the Ituri conflict

Lubanga's trial, the ICC's first, has aroused several controversies. The trial was halted on 13 June 2008 when the court ruled that the Prosecutor's refusal to disclose potentially exculpatory evidence had breached Lubanga's right to a fair trial. The Prosecutor had obtained the evidence from Several sources including the UN on the condition of confidentiality, but the judges ruled that the Prosecutor had incorrectly applied the relevant provision of the Rome Statute and, as a consequence, "the trial process has been ruptured to such a degree that it is now impossible to piece together the constituent elements of a fair trial". On 2 July 2008, the court ordered Lubanga's release, on the grounds that "a fair trial of the accused is impossible, and the entire justification for his detention has been removed". An ICC Appelant Chamber agreed to keep him in custody while the Prosecutor appealed. Late in 2008, the Prosecutor made all the confidential information available to the court. The Trial Chamber reversed its decision and ordered that the trial could go ahead.

In A Capsule

Full names: Thomas Lubanga Dyilo

Date of birth: 29 December 1960

Place of birth: Jiba, Utcha Sector, Djugu Territory, Ituri District, Orientale Province, Democratic Republic of the Congo

Nationality: Congolese

Ethnicity: Hema

Family: Son of Mr Mathias Njabu and Ms Rosalie Nyango ; married to Ms

Matckosi and father of six children

Charge Sheet Facts

• Enlisting and conscripting of children under the age of 15 years into the Forces patriotiques pour la libération du Congo [Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo] (FPLC) and using them to participate actively in hostilities in the context of an international armed conflict from early September 2002 to 2 June 2003 (punishable under article 8(2)(b)(xxvi) of the Rome Statute);
• Enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 years into the FPLC and using them to participate actively in hostilities in the context of an armed conflict not of an international character from 2 June 2003 to 13 August 2003 (punishable under article 8(2)(e)(vii) of the Rome Statute).