Former Comoros President Ahmed, Abdallah Sambi, jailed for life
Ahmed Abdallah Sambi, a former President of Comoros has been handed down a life sentence for high treason after being convicted of selling passports to stateless people living in the Gulf.
Sambi, who led the small Indian Ocean archipelago between 2006 and 2011, pushed through a law in 2008 allowing the sale of passports for high fees.
The scheme aimed at the so-called bidoon, an Arab minority numbering in the tens of thousands who cannot obtain citizenship. The former president was accused of embezzling millions of dollars under the scheme.
The prosecution said the cost was more than $1.8 billion, more than the impoverished nation’s GDP.
64-year-old Sambi, who is an arch rival of President Azali Assoumani, was sentenced by the State Security Court, a special judicial body whose rulings cannot be appealed.