Three Americans were sentenced to death by a military tribunal in Kinshasa on Friday, along with 34 other participants in a failed coup this summer in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
21-year-old Marcel Malanga, 36-year-old Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, and 21-year-old Tyler Thompson were among 50 suspects for whom prosecutors sought the death penalty, though 14 were acquitted. Malanga is the son of coup architect Christian Malanga.
At the time of the attempted overthrow of DRC President Félix Tshisekedi in May, the American DRC Ambassador Lucy Tamlyn condemned the coup attempt and promised U.S. cooperation.
“We are cooperating with authorities in DRC to the fullest extent possible, as they investigate these criminal acts and hold accountable any American citizen involved,” she wrote in a post to X.
State Department spokesperson Matt Miller told NBC News that the U.S. would continue to monitor proceedings as the men appealed, noting that the U.S. wouldn’t pass judgment on the three’s guilt.
“We understand that the legal process in the DRC allows for defendants to appeal the court’s decision," Miller said.
The U.S. has not declared the three men wrongfully convicted.
The May 19 coup attempt targeted Economy Minister Vital Kamerhe and other Congolese officials after President Tshisekedi postponed a parliamentary election. It was quickly foiled by security forces, leaving six dead, including four coup participants. The central African country went through decades of civil wars and internal strife for decades before ratifying its constitution in 2006 and holding its first multi-party, free elections since 1960.
Minor skirmishes between political factions have continued in the decades since. Tshisekedi was elected to the presidency in 2018 and again in 2023, though detractors have refused to accept the latter election's results.
