Former US backed Chad dictator charged with war crimes

Former US backed Chad dictator charged with war crimes http://morallowground.com/2013/07/05/former-us-backed-chadian-dictator-hissene-habre-arrested-in-senegal-charged-with-war-crimes-genocide/
 Habré seized power in 1982 with CIA help and the backing of US President Ronald Reagan, who saw the tyrant as a bulwark against Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, Chad’s northern neighbor. Habré was one of many brutal dictators supported by the Reagan administration. In 1980, Libya invaded Chad. The US, along with France, provided Habré with large amounts of military aid and diplomatic support despite being aware of the regime’s horrific human rights violations.“[Habré] was… a bloodthirsty tyrant and torturer,” said one US official in 2000. “It was fair to say we knew who and what he was and chose to turn a blind eye.”The Reagan administration did much more than just ‘turn a blind eye.’ It provided DDS with training, intelligence, weapons and other aid despite being fully aware of the atrocities being committed.“The CIA was so deeply involved in bringing Habré to power that I can’t conceive they didn’t know what was going on,” Donald Norland, the US ambassador to Chad from 1979-1981, once said. “But there was no debate on the policy and virtually no discussion of the wisdom of doing what we did.”Bolstered by massive US and French aid, Habré’s forces enjoyed a large measure of battlefield success against the Libyans. This further endeared the dictator to Reagan, who invited him to the White House in 1987. Reagan declared it was “an honor and a great pleasure” to have the murderous dictator as his guest and hailed “the friendship between Chad and the United States [which] reflects our shared commitment to freedom.”Human rights advocates, as well as the Habré regime’s victims, were elated at the news of the ex-dictator’s arrest.“The wheels of justice are turning,” Reed Brody, an American human rights lawyer who has dedicated more than a decade of his life to bringing Habré to justice. “After 22 years, Habré’s victims can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel,” Brody told the Guardian.“This regime was completely inhuman– they were worse than animals,” Souleymane Guengueng, a former bookkeeper who was hung from his testicles while being tortured in one of the regime’s secret prisons, told the Guardian.
[ed notes: Israel, together with the CIA, supported Habré's forces and gave them Soviet-manufactured weapons. In 1983 it emerged from a number of sources that Israel had military advisors in Chad, and that they had gone there in August of that year together with 2,500 Zairois troops to support Habré's forces. Ariel Sharon, the "Butcher of Lebanon" and one of the main players in the oppression of the Palestinians, played an important role in the war in Chad as well. He had paid a visit to Chad in January 1983 just prior to leaving his post at the Ministry of Defense. According to Hallahmi's account, this visit by Sharon was an indication that Israel was ready to play a greater role in Chad.