Carlos the Jackal gets second life sentence for bombings
Benoit Peyrucq / AFP - Getty Images
A court sketch Thursday of the Venezuelan leftist militant known as Carlos the Jackal.
By msnbc.com news services
PARIS -- A French court?on Thursday?convicted the Venezuelan-born terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal of organizing four deadly attacks in France in the 1980s and sentenced him to life in prison.
Carlos, whose real name is Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, is already serving a life sentence in a Paris prison for a triple murder in 1975. France does not have the death penalty.
In Thursday's verdict, the court found Ramirez guilty of charges he instigated four attacks in France in 1982 and 1983 that killed 11 people and injured more than 140 others.
Ramirez denied any role in the attacks. He sowed fear across Western European and Middle Eastern capitals during the Cold War, with believed links to hijackings and bombings for far-left and Palestinian terror groups.
Once one of the most wanted international criminals, the Marxist militant addressed the court in a five-hour monologue, alternately rambling, vitriolic and poignant, as he prepared to hear?his fate.
Ramirez, 62,?appeared resigned to a guilty verdict.
Death in prison, he said at one point, "is the role of a revolutionary."
"I am in prison ... condemned in a pre-decided case," he told the court, his voice rising in volume. "I am a living martyr."
Ramirez, a colorful figure recognizable at the height of his notoriety by his Che Guevara-style beret, sunglasses and Havana cigars, sealed his renown in a bloody hostage-taking of OPEC oil ministers in 1975.
During the Cold War he received backing from Soviet bloc and Middle Eastern countries, staging attacks throughout Europe for more than two decades before being captured in Sudan in 1994.
During the six-week trial, Ramirez appeared more like a master of ceremonies than a defendant, talking over speakers, interrupting judges, correcting lawyers, and occasionally beaming benevolently from his caged-in defendant's box.
He denied any specific involvement in the four bloody bombings in 1982 and 1983 on a Paris street, two trains and a Marseilles train station that wounded nearly 200 people and left 11 dead. Prosecutors say the bombings were Ramirez's answer to the police seizure of two of his gang, including his lover.
"There is nothing ... to connect me with these four attacks," he told the court, making a zero sign with his thumb and index finger.
Like a modern-day Scheherazade, Ramirez wove story after story, often smiling and waxing nostalgic about former comrades, and sometimes turning fiery to rail at the system.
His unrelenting discourse touched on a variety of topics, from prison life to Zionist strategy, Soviet passports, the French state, hashish and even the death penalty.
Ramirez broke down, his powerful voice wavering when, at the end of his speech, he read from what he said was the last will of fallen Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.
"I will continue the fight," he read from the text, before breaking off, overcome with emotion. A group of about a dozen youths in the courtroom audience raised their fists in the air, shouting encouragement at Ramirez.
"Salam Alaikum," or "Peace be with you," said Ramirez, who converted to Islam while in prison, before giving a final fist in the air to the crowd.
This story contains information from Reuters and The Associated Press.
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