Sudan: former Darfur Janjaweed leader Hilal faces court-martial in Mogadishu

All Africa brings us a report on court-martials in the Republic of Sudan.

A military court in Khartoum resumed proceedings on Tuesday to try former janjaweed leader Musa Hilal, who was detained two years ago, along with hundreds of his supporters.

The Revolutionary Awakening Council (RAC) which was founded by Hilal, said in a statement on Monday that the Council was surprised to hear that morning that their leader and his detained followers were summoned to appear before the military court without warning.

Hilal was initially arraigned by the military court on April 30 2018.
The RAC statement questions how it is possible that a court martial will try Hilal and his comrades while they were detained during the regime of ousted President El Bashir.
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In May 2018, the Darfur Bar Association criticised the military trial of Hilal, "which is being conducted without taking into account the principles of a public trial". According to the Darfur lawyers at the time (prior to regime change), Hilal's "trial is a violation of the fair trial standards enshrined in the Sudanese Constitution and the law, which is casting doubts on its fairness and integrity, regardless of the acts attributed to Musa Hilal and his affiliates".

Here is a link to the Constitution of 2011. Section 152 has a number of interesting provisions. Section 19 discusses "Fair Trial." The Interim Constitution of 2005 had something similar to Section 19. Wikipedia has the following entry.

The temporary de facto Constitution of Sudan is the Draft Constitutional Declaration, which was signed by representatives of the Transitional Military Council and the Forces of Freedom and Change alliance on 4 August 2019. This replaced the Interim National Constitution of the Republic of Sudan, 2005 (INC) adopted on 6 July 2005, which had been suspended on 11 April 2019 by Lt. Gen Ahmed Awad Ibn Auf in the 2019 Sudanese coup d'état.

 When there is political and social instability--how often does the government resort to the military and military trials for those not normally considered a member of the armed services?

Is it ever appropriate to subject civilians to military justice proceedings? The U.S. had this question when Article 2, UCMJ, was amended and a number of civilians accompanying the military in Iraq faced court-martial. Is this an acceptable exception to a rule against prosecuting civilians at a court-martial?