Burundi’s ex-Premier appears in court for undermining national security

Alain Guillaume Bunyoni, a Burundi former Prime Minister arrested late last month has been charged for “undermining the internal security of the state, undermining the proper functioning of the national economy and illegal enrichment.”

A session held Monday extended Bunyoni’s pre-trial detention at Ngozi Prison in the north of the country.

The former Premier was charged on Friday before a three-judge high court in a closed session, a judicial source who spoke on condition of anonymity told AFP. The prosecution also indicted him for illegal possession of weapons and insulting the president.

The former Internal Security Minister Bunyoni was Prime Minister from June 2020 to September 2022, when President Evariste Ndayishimiye sacked him amid reports of an alleged coup plot.