'Carlos the Jackal' on trial again

The well-known international terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal, is finally facing justice for four deadly attacks in France between 1982 and 1983.

PARIS, FRANCE (Catholic Online) - Carlos the Jackal is already serving a life sentence for a triple murder conviction from 1997. Originally from Venezuela, the 62-year-old man's real name is Ilich Ramirez Sanchez. He has proclaimed himself to be a professional revolutionary, and has been charged with staging attacks that have killed 11 people, and injured 140 others as well as being an accomplice to murder and destruction.

Ramirez continues to insist on his innocence. His lawyer and wife, Isabel Coutant-Peyre told reporters just before his trial began, "he's in a fighting mood as always." She also added that she felt there was "no reason" for the trial, and their French prosecutors were staging the trial for "propaganda or some other interests rather than the ones of justice."

Two Germans and a Palestinian, reputed accomplices of Ramirez are also being tried in absentia.
The trial is scheduled to last until December 16.

Despite his claims of innocence, Ramirez went on record to boast in a Venezuelan news interview, that he had committed more than 100 attacks and claimed more than 2,000 lives. When his interviewer questioned him about the deaths of civilian bystanders, Ramirez downplayed them by saying, "so out of 1,500-2,000 killed, they were not more than 200 civilian victims."

Ramirez is also the chief suspect in a couple of other high profile cases from the 1970s. Among them, the 1975 kidnapping of OPEC oil ministers, and the 1976 Palestinian hijacking of a French airliner to Uganda which ended when Israeli commandos moved in to rescue the hostages.

Previously Ramirez was suspected of being linked to the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, but experts now doubts his role in that attack. Regardless, he has identified himself with a number of socialist causes, and continues to make claims about the magnitude of his violence.

Ramirez as an extreme leftist, enjoyed some protection during the Cold War from eastern agencies and sympathizers. However, he was captured by French agents in 1994 in Sudan who promptly flew him to Paris to face trial. 

The French also claim that Ramirez's fingerprints are on a number of letters claiming responsibility for a spate of attacks which claimed several lives in the early 80s.

Most recently, Ramirez has been claiming abuse at the hands of his captors. After giving an interview to a French radio station he was placed in solitary confinement, and was on a hunger strike from October 18 to the 27th. Following that, his lawyers claimed the he was denied access to the resources needed to prepare for his trial, including over 100,000 pages of documents to which he should have been allowed access.

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It is unclear if these claims of "abuse" will influence his trial in any way.

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