Zoe's Ark six to appear in French court January 14

0 Comments | AFP, December, 2007

FRESNES, France (AFP) — Six French charity workers convicted of child kidnapping in Chad will appear January 14 before a court outside Paris to have their hard labour sentences adjusted, a prosecutor said Saturday.

Jean-Jacques Bosc, the prosecutor, rejected demands by family members for a new trial, saying the transfer of the six from Chad to France implied "an acceptance of the sentence pronounced by the Chadian justice as definitive."

The six members of L'Arche de Zoe (Zoe's Ark) returned to their native country late Friday, two days after a court in Ndjamena sentenced them to eight years of hard labour on charges of trying to abduct 103 African children.

On their arrival, the six were incarcerated in a prison in Fresnes, outside Paris, as prosecutors...