[JURIST] Sudan's Khartoum North Court on Wednesday sentenced a Sudanese man to 17 years in prison on charges of spying, criminal conspiracy and passing on confidential military documents after he attempted to share information with the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] relating to the investigation of a Darfur [JURIST news archive] war crimes suspect. Mohamed Alsary Ibrahim was accused [JURIST report] of trying to get close to Ahmed Haroun, Sudan's state minister for humanitarian affairs, in order to obtain information for Sudanese-American contacts who would then give the information to the ICC. Haroun is accused [JURIST report] of committing war crimes against the civilian population in Darfur.

Earlier in January, Sudanese authorities detained [JURIST report] prominent political opposition figure and Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi in response to al-Turabi's calls for President Omar al-Bashir [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] to turn himself over to the ICC. In August, ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said Sudan is merely going through the motions with its planned probe [JURIST reports] into Darfur human rights violations. He said that Sudan does not have the political will to bring human rights offenders to justice, noting that an earlier Sudanese investigation into genocide claims was led by Haroun himself. The ICC issued a warrant for Haroun's arrest last year, but Sudan has refused to turn him over. In a controversial move in July, Moreno-Ocampo applied [JURIST reports] for an arrest warrant for al-Bashir on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes for atrocities committed in the country's Darfur region.