Free French and Moland!

Today it was official that the boys will not appeal. There is no point; it will just be like going from one “trial” crazier than the previous. The prosecutor has said that they aren’t going to appeal; there shouldn’t be a need for that. Couldn’t be easy to get more than 11 death sentences and over 77 million dollars?

I must admit, I haven’t heard of anyone getting a stricter punishment. The penalty says much more about the seriousness of the court than anything else.

The Foreign Ministry has said the whole time that they will start negotiating once the verdict is enforceable. So they should start very soon. There is no doubt that they can achieve an atonement transfer if they want to. It will definitely be a question of will. What will Congo gain from these boys dying down there? Contempt and unwillingness, I’m sure they understand that. Congo is completely dependent on foreign help if the nation is ever going to get on its feet. They don’t achieve that by murdering foreign citizens from the donor countries, I actually think that they understand that. They have to understand that if they are going to negotiate larger aid for themselves, they have to act with decency.

Knut Moland June 14^th 2010