Inspired by a psychic, the foreign mercenaries had the goal of establishing ‘a private military company for worldwide missions’
Two former German military officers have been sentenced by the Stuttgart Regional High Court to 18 and 14 months in prison for attempting to train a group of mercenaries to be sent to the war in Yemen.
The two ex-military officers attempted to create a 100 to 150-member mercenary group made up of both ex-military and active soldiers, according to local news.
According to the plan, the mercenaries were to force peace negotiations between Ansarallah and the Saudi-backed government in Yemen.
The German Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office found the verdict to be important. The court made it clear that Germans are liable to prosecution if they take part in military combat abroad, the public prosecutor’s representative said after the decision, according to RT.
The two men, aged 53 and 61, were arrested last year in Munich after unsuccessfully trying to contact the authorities in Saudi Arabia, which they saw as a potential investor.
According to Schwaebische news, the duo’s plan was not only driven by the bare hope of making money and monthly wages of up to 40,000 euros but a whole “bundle of motives.”
The court’s prosecutor described the attempted set-up as a “terrorist organization” and said besides money, the accused were inspired by “messages from a fortune teller that they understood as binding instructions for action.”
The court stated that one of the defendants tried contacting Saudi officials to obtain financial and military assistance, while the other tried recruiting former and current soldiers.
SWR news reported that on the first day of the hearing in early June, the judge had already made it clear that a suspended sentence could be envisaged after all the preparations and planning hadn’t progressed very far. Both men appeared in court and were released on bail after 10 months in prison.
On the other hand, according to a statement by the Yemeni defense minister on 31 May, the Saudi-led coalition is taking advantage of the conditions of a UN-brokered ceasefire to bolster and re-organize its mercenaries in Yemen.
Defense Minister Mohammed al-Atifi claims that the re-organization of regional militants seeks to increase armed confrontation with the Yemeni armed forces and allied popular committees after the expiry of the truce.
Saudi Arabia has consistently violated the UN-brokered ceasefire agreement which started on 2 April. By 9 April, the Saudi-led coalition had committed 1,647 violations of the ceasefire.