Between 1982 and 1990, during the rule of Hissène Habré, approximately 40,000 murders and more than 200,000 cases of torture and violence – among other human rights violations – were reported in Chad.
The Extraordinary African Chambers, a special tribunal created by the African Union that operated in Senegal, requested EAAF’s assistance. EAAF carried out a preliminary mission in 2013, and 39 bodies were exhumed and 5 were identified in Chad during a subsequent mission in 2014. These missions were supported by Human Rights Watch and a team of forensic specialists that included professionals from Argentina, Colombia, Canada, Spain, the United Kingdom, South Africa and France, who worked at various mass graves and analyzed the recovered remains.
In May 2016, Habré was sentenced to life in prison and his assets were seized for crimes committed under the dictatorship he led. The sentence was partly based on forensic evidence produced and presented by EAAF. This ruling is a milestone among truth and justice processes, as one of the first handed down by an entirely African court against a former de facto president from the continent.
