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A former Belgian diplomat, 93, should stand trial over alleged complicity in the 1961 murder of Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of what was then the newly independent Congolese state, a Brussels court has ruled.
Étienne Davignon, the only person still alive among 10 Belgians the Lumumba family accuses of involvement in the killing, is charged with participation in war crimes.
The decision, which follows a surprise referral by the Brussels prosecutor last June, can be appealed against. Davignon, a former vice-president of the European Commission, has denied the charges.
In a statement the Lumumba family welcomed what they called a significant step: “For our family, this is not the end of a long fight, it is the beginning of a reckoning that history has long demanded.”
Yema Lumumba, a granddaughter of the assassinated leader, told reporters: “The fact that all this time has passed does not mean it is done and we will never get to know the truth. It is also very important for the legal Belgian system to start confronting its own responsibilities regarding what happened during colonial times.”
The decision was also hailed by lawyers for the Lumumba family as setting a historic precedent in criminal justice for crimes allegedly committed under European colonial rule.
If the trial goes ahead, Davignon will be the first Belgian official to face justice over the assassination of Lumumba 65 years ago. In its decision, the court went beyond the prosecutor’s decision, extending the scope of the trial to cover Lumumba’s associates, Maurice Mpolo and Joseph Okito, who were murdered alongside him.
“This is a historic decision,” Christophe Marchand, a lawyer for the family, said. “This decision confirms that the passage of time cannot erase the legal responsibility for the gravest crimes.”
Lumumba was tortured and assassinated by firing squad in January 1961, alongside Okito and Mpolo, two other leading politicians. The murders were carried out by separatists in the Katanga region with the support of Belgian mercenaries.
Davignon had arrived in what was then Belgian Congo as a 28-year-old diplomatic intern on the eve of independence in 1960. He is accused of participating in war crimes on three counts, according to information provided by the court of first instance in Brussels: the illegal transfer of Lumumba and his associates from Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) to Katanga, the “humiliating and degrading treatment” of the men and depriving them of a fair trial.
Davignon, who went on to numerous senior political and business roles, was not present for the hearing at the Palais de Justice in Brussels.
Johan Verbist, Davignon’s lawyer, told the Guardian that it was too soon to comment on the decision, but he would “now analyse the possibilities for an appeal”.
His lawyer rejected claims of war crimes at a hearing behind closed doors in January and argued that reasonable time to judge the case had passed, according to sources cited in Belgian media.
A 2001 parliamentary inquiry concluded that Belgian ministers bore a moral responsibility for the events that led to the Congolese leader’s gruesome death. Belgium returned a gold-capped tooth to the Lumumba family in 2022 that one of the Belgians involved in the killing had kept as a macabre souvenir.
Belgium’s then prime minister, Alexander De Croo, reiterated his country’s “moral responsibility” for Lumumba’s murder at a ceremony to mark the return of the tooth.
“Belgian ministers, diplomats, officials and officers had perhaps no intention to have Patrice Lumumba assassinated,” he said. “No evidence has been found to support this.
“But they should have realised that his transfer to Katanga put his life in danger. They should have warned, they should have refused any assistance in transferring Patrice Lumumba to the place where he would be executed. Instead they chose not to see … not to act.”
Lawyers for the Lumumba family believe that if there is no successful appeal a trial could begin in January 2027.
While there have been previous successful reparations claims against former colonial powers, experts who support the Lumumba family believe it will be the first-ever criminal trial against someone who acted for the state over a political murder.
Speaking to the Guardian in 2025, Christophe Marchand said the case was unusual among former colonial powers. “There are very few cases where a former colonial state accepts to address the colonial crimes and to consider that they have to be tried in that same colonial state, even if it’s a very long time after,” he said.
