Former Senegalese prime minister, Aminata Touré, has asked the International Criminal Court to open an investigation into police repression of protests this week organised by supporters of opposition leader Ousmane Sonko, which has left 15 dead in 48 hours.

“After the Senegalese Ministry of the Interior confirmed nine deaths in the protests on 1 June, I made a request to the chief prosecutor of the ICC, Karim Khan, to make a preliminary investigation into the alarming situation in Senegal and about these losses of human lives,” Touré stated on her social media handles.

The latest demonstrations occurred after a Senegalese court sentenced Sonko to two years in prison on Thursday for “corruption of youth”, as part of a trial for alleged rape and death threats against a woman, charges of which he was eventually acquitted. Subsequently, violent clashes broke out in the capital, Dakar, and Ziguinchor where Sonko is mayor.