A French court on Thursday sentenced a Belarusian mercenary and two Ivorian airmen to life in prison over the bombing of a French military camp in Ivory Coast in 2004, which killed nine soldiers. Yury Sushkin, the suspected pilot of the Ivorian airforce jet behind the strike and two suspected co-pilots, Patrice Ouei and Ange Gnanduillet, were tried in absentia, their whereabouts being unknown. emd/cb/jh/kjl