/ 4 April 2001

PEACEKEEPERS APPEAL AGAINST CONVICTION

TWENTY-FIVE Nigerian soldiers wounded during peacekeeping operations in west Africa and later convicted of mutiny and disobedience have appealed the judgement. A Nigerian court martial sentenced the soldiers to life imprisonment after finding them guilty of mutiny and acts of indiscipline after they staged a protest in the Egyptian capital Cairo, where they had been sent for medical treatment. The soldiers, some of them seriously wounded, staged the protest last August against what they claimed was poor medical treatment and non-payment of allowances to which they said they were entitled. – AFP