Guinea Ex-dictator Says Gave No Order In 2009 Massacre

Guinean ex-dictator Moussa Dadis Camara denied at a long-awaited trial on Tuesday that he had given any orders to initiate a 2009 massacre in which hundreds of people were slaughtered or raped.

Camara, 57, is on trial with 10 other officials of his regime over the killing of at least 156 people and rape of at least 109 women at an opposition rally.

He returned to the stand on Tuesday for the second day running in a trial that began on September 28, 13 years to the day after the slaughter by regime forces.

"I didn't give orders to anyone, Mr. Prosecuting Emperor," Camara said sardonically to the prosecutor.

Earlier in the trial, Camara's former aide, Lieutenant Aboubacar Sidiki Diakite, had accused him of preparing the massacre and of having said that day: "Power lies in the street. We have to counter them, to make them regret it."

Camara on Tuesday denied this.

"It's utterly false. It's not the truth," he said.

"A man who has had the courage to shoot you point blank... is he going to have any problems about (making up) allegations?" he asked, referring to an attempt by Sidiki Diakite to assassinate him.

He was asked why he had failed to intervene to stop the massacre, which continued over several days at a sports stadium in the capital Conakry where tens of thousands of opposition supporters had gathered.

"The carnage would have been even worse... I could not do it, and even if I had, I would have dangerously worsened the situation," he contended.

"I immediately took steps to arrest the main individual who was under my command," he said, referring to Sidiki Diakite.

"But he immediately understood. He got himself fully prepared... I couldn't arrest him because he was powerfully armed."

"I think, Mr. Prosecutor, that you should congratulate me," he said, an another apparently ironic flourish.

Had he or Sidiki Diakite died that day, he suggested, "this trial would never have taken place."

Camara did confirm, however, that members of the Red Berets, an elite unit of the armed forces, had taken part in the killing.

On Monday, Camara rejected any responsibility for the killings and said he was the victim of a plot, in a lengthy monologue that included references to philosophers Heraclitus and Immanuel Kant and the Egyptian pharaohs.

Camara, an unknown army captain, seized power in the West African state in December 2008 shortly after the death of its second post-independence president, General Lansana Conte, who had ruled for 24 years.

In December the following year, he was shot in the head by Sidiki Diakite and headed to Morocco for medical treatment.

Forced from power, he fled into exile in Burkina Faso, where he was indicted in July 2015 by Guinean magistrates for his alleged role in the massacre.

The former strongman returned to his homeland in September.

He was detained on September 27, a day before the trial began in a purpose-built court in Conakry.