Malian singer Rokia Traore, arrested in Rome last year in connection with a child custody case and then handed over to Belgium, will be released from a Belgian prison on Wednesday, local news agency Belga reported citing his lawyers.
Reuters could not immediately reach Rokia Traore’s representatives or confirm the release with local authorities.
Traore, 50, is one of Africa’s best-known singers and was a goodwill ambassador for UNHCR, the United Nations refugee agency, from 2016 to 2018.
Italian authorities handed over the Malian singer to Belgium last November, after Italy’s highest court rejected her appeal.
-In October 2023, she was sentenced in absentia to two years in prison in Belgium as part of her daughter’s custody battle.
She was first arrested in France in 2020 on the basis of a Belgian warrant, after failing to comply with a court ruling linked to the dispute between the singer and her former Belgian partner, Jan Goossens, over custody of their daughter.
A few months after her parole, she flew to Mali on a private flight, defying orders not to leave France until her extradition case was processed. His daughter lives in Mali.
