Thirty-seven people – including three Americans, a Briton, a Belgian and a Canadian – have been sentenced to death for plotting to overthrow the president of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The men are accused of orchestrating attacks on the presidential palace and the home of an ally of President Félix Tshisekedi in May.
Christian Malanga, a Congolese-born US citizen suspected of being the ringleader of the plot, was killed in the attack along with five others.
A total of 51 people were tried in a military court, with the trial broadcast on national radio and television.
Malanga’s son, Marcel, one of the US citizens sentenced to death, previously told the court that his father had threatened to kill him if he did not participate.
His friend, Tyler Thompson, was also sentenced to death. The pair, in their 20s, had played football together in Utah.
His stepmother, Miranda Thompson in June told the BBC family “absolutely clueless” how I ended up in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“We were completely shocked by what was happening and the unknown. Everything we learned was what we found on Google,” she said.
The third American, Benjamin Zalman-Polun, has a business relationship with Christian Malanga.
Fourteen people were acquitted and released.
The death penalty has not been carried out in the Democratic Republic of Congo for about two decades – instead, those convicted are given life sentences.
The government lifted the moratorium in March this year, citing the need to weed out “traitors” from the country’s dysfunctional military. However, no executions have been carried out since.
The failed coup began in the capital Kinshasa early on the morning of May 19. Armed men first attacked the private home of parliamentary speaker Vital Kamerhe in Kinshasa and then advanced to the president’s official residence.
Witnesses said a group of about 20 attackers in military uniforms attacked the palace and a gunfight ensued.
A military spokesman later announced on state television that security forces had foiled “an attempted coup”.
Additional reporting by Emery Makumeno in Kinshasa
