About the film
For the first time in history, a former child soldier is on trial for war crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. His defence lawyer has a difficult task – to prove that the Ugandan is both a perpetrator and a victim.
When Dominic Ongwen was nine years old, he was kidnapped by the Lord’s Resistance Army, notorious for its brutality. The still-wanted guerrilla leader Joseph Kony forced him to become one of the primary warriors for the establishment of a theocratic regime in Uganda. After 30 years, Ongwen confesses to an international tribunal to raping women, murdering children, burning villages, and attacking refugee camps. Ugandan defence lawyer Kristpus Ayana went to his home village to gather testimony. He entered a world of spirituality utterly alien to the lawyers in The Hague. Can the justice system comprehend that the former child soldier did not act of his own free will but under the influence of long-term intimidation and brainwashing?