Friday, September 04, 2009
SADC: Press Zimbabwe to Implement Rights Reforms, by Marie-Êve Marineau
(Johannesburg) - Southern African leaders should press Zimbabwe's power-sharing government to end ongoing human rights violations and to implement legal reforms, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Heads of state from members of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are holding a summit meeting in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, on September 7 and 8, 2009.
The 20-page report, "False Dawn: The Zimbabwe Power-Sharing Government's Failure to Deliver Human Rights Improvements," highlights the transitional government's lack of progress in rights reforms in the six months since it was created. The former ruling party, Zimbabwe Africa National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), has demonstrated a lack of political will to effect change and wields more power than the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), the former opposition party and now a partner in government. Police, state prosecutors, and court officials aligned to ZANU-PF conduct politically motivated prosecutions of MDC legislators and activists, and fail to ensure justice for victims of abuses or to hold perpetrators of human rights violations to account.
"Southern African leaders should stop looking at Zimbabwe through rose-colored glasses," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "The region's leaders need to press Zimbabwe openly and publicly for human rights reforms to prevent the country from backsliding into state-sponsored violence and chaos."
At the summit meeting, heads of state are expected to assess Zimbabwe's compliance with a number of rulings by the SADC Tribunal on illegal land seizures in Zimbabwe. President Jacob Zuma of South Africa, the organization's current chairman, is also expected to brief leaders on the progress made by Zimbabwe's power-sharing government, which has been in place since February. The government was created by a SADC-brokered September 2008 agreement, which followed a period when ZANU-PF and its allies unleashed a campaign of violence to prevent an MDC electoral win.
In its new report, Human Rights Watch urged Southern African leaders to extract concrete commitments on human rights from the government of Zimbabwe and to tie them to specific benchmarks for progress within a clear time frame. The summit meeting's participants were also urged to raise concerns about Zimbabwe's failure to enact basic institutional and legislative reforms that would guarantee the rule of law as well as fundamental rights for Zimbabweans.
"SADC leaders should stand with the people of Zimbabwe by calling for urgent reforms to address the country's political and human rights crisis," said Gagnon. "Without these necessary changes, Zimbabwe's inclusive government will continue to be built on sand."
Link
Labels: Human Rights Watch, Marie-Êve Marineau, Zimbabwe
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
DR Congo: Brutal Rapes by Rebels and Army, by Noémie Cournoyer
(New York) - Rwandan rebel forces, government army soldiers, and their allies have raped at least 90 women and girls since late January 2009 in the volatile North and South Kivu provinces of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Human Rights Watch said today. The Rwandan rebel forces have also been implicated in the deaths of most of the 180 civilians killed during this period.
The United Nations Security Council will discuss on April 9 the latest report by the UN secretary-general on the peacekeeping force in Congo. Human Rights Watch called on the UN Security Council to press the Congolese government to remove human rights abusers from its armed forces and end rights violations, including attacks against women and girls.
The Rwandan Hutu militia called the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) attacked and burned dozens of villages and towns in Masisi and Lubero territories (North Kivu) as well as in Kalehe territory (South Kivu) in recent weeks, committing numerous deliberate killings, rapes, and acts of looting. Blaming government military operations, the FDLR deliberately targeted civilians, used them as human shields, and accused civilians of having betrayed them. According to witnesses and victims interviewed by Human Rights Watch, the FDLR have been implicated in the killings of at least 154 civilians since January 23.
"The FDLR are deliberately killing and raping Congolese civilians as apparent punishment for the military operations against them," said Anneke Van Woudenberg, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. "Both the fighters who commit such horrific acts and the rebel commanders who permit them are responsible for war crimes."
The FDLR were temporarily pushed out of their military positions in January and February 2009 following the start of a joint military operation against them by Congolese and Rwandan troops on January 20. Following the withdrawal of Rwandan forces on February 24, military action diminished and the FDLR reoccupied many of their previous positions.
Most recently, at least seven civilians were killed and 24 others wounded during FDLR attacks in Lubero and Walikale in early April. On March 20, 2009, the FDLR attacked Buhuli, North Kivu, and four other nearby villages, killing at least five civilians, including two women, an elderly man, a 7-year-old girl and 9-year-old boy. On February 13, the FDLR attacked the village of Kipopo, killing at least 13 people, who were burned to death in their homes.
In late February, the FDLR abducted at least a dozen women and girls from Remeka, in Masisi territory, North Kivu. Two women who escaped reported that FDLR combatants brutally killed nine of the women and girls when they resisted attempts to rape them. The fate of the others is unknown.
The Congolese army has also been implicated in numerous rapes. In March, Congolese soldiers raped at least 21 women and girls in southern Masisi and northern Kalehe territories. Many of the victims were violently gang raped while the soldiers were on looting sprees.
On March 24, four women from Ziralo, South Kivu, were returning from the market when they were stopped by a group of army soldiers at a makeshift barricade. The soldiers took the sacks of food the women were carrying and then said they were going to examine the women's vaginas for any hidden money. The soldiers took the women into the nearby forest and gang raped each of them for hours. One woman was six-months pregnant and was raped so brutally that she lost her unborn child.
The recent killings by the rebel group are in addition to those perpetrated by its forces on January 27, when FDLR combatants hacked to death dozens of civilians used as human shields at their military position in Kibua. One witness at Kibua interviewed by Human Rights Watch saw an FDLR combatant batter a 10-year-old girl to death against a brick wall.
According to the United Nations, an estimated 250,000 people have fled their homes since January, adding to hundreds of thousands of others who fled earlier waves of violence.
The Congolese army says it is preparing for the next phase of operations against the FDLR, this time expanding the operations to South Kivu. The army has added over 10,000 additional soldiers from former Congolese rebel groups, including the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), the Coalition of Congolese Patriotic Resistance (PARECO), and other local militia groups. The rapidly mixed brigades of former enemies have been sent to the front lines with no salaries, rations, or any formal training, increasing the likelihood of future human rights violations.
Serious abuses against civilians by government soldiers have already been reported. Army soldiers killed at least five civilians in Lubero territory in March, some while on looting sprees. In Ziralo, an elderly man was killed by soldiers while they raped his wife and looted his home.
The rapid integration process has included no formal vetting mechanism to stop those with serious records of past human rights abuses from being promoted and integrated into the Congolese army.
Bosco Ntaganda, wanted on an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for the war crime of enlisting child soldiers and using them in hostilities, was promoted to the position of general in the Congolese army in January 2009. In addition to the ICC charges, Ntaganda has been accused of commanding troops that massacred 150 civilians at Kiwanja in North Kivu province in November 2008.
Jean-Pierre Biyoyo was recently appointed a colonel in the Congolese army despite being found guilty by a Congolese military court in March 2006 of recruiting child soldiers. He later escaped from prison. Both Ntaganda and Biyoyo play an important role in current military operations.
The Congolese army will be supported by the UN peacekeeping mission in Congo, MONUC, in its military operations against the FDLR. MONUC says that its top priority is to protect civilians, but it is not clear how civilians will be protected against further attacks by either FDLR or Congolese army soldiers.
"Protection of civilians can only be taken seriously if known human rights abusers are removed from the ranks of the Congolese army," said Van Woudenberg. "The Security Council should seek an immediate answer from the Congolese government on when it will carry out such arrests and what it will do to stop further rape and killing by its troops before it gives any support to the military operations."
Link
Labels: Congo, Human rights, Human Rights Watch, ICC, Noémie Cournoyer
Friday, March 06, 2009
ICC: Bashir Warrant Is Warning to Abusive Leaders, by Marie-Êve Marineau
(New York) - The International Criminal Court's (ICC) issuance of an arrest warrant for President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan signals that even those at the top may be held to account for mass murder, rape and torture, Human Rights Watch said today. ICC judges granted the warrant for Bashir, its first for a sitting head of state, on charges of crimes against humanity and war crimes for his role in orchestrating Sudan's abusive counterinsurgency campaign in Darfur.
"With this arrest warrant, the International Criminal Court has made Omar al-Bashir a wanted man," said Richard Dicker, director of the International Justice Program at Human Rights Watch. "Not even presidents are guaranteed a free pass for horrific crimes. By ruling there is a case for President al-Bashir to answer for the horrors of Darfur, the warrant breaks through Khartoum's repeated denials of his responsibility."
The court did not confirm the three counts of genocide that were requested by the ICC prosecutor. Genocide requires evidence that the crimes were committed specifically "with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part," a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group solely on the basis of its identity.
"Proving genocide charges is always extremely difficult," said Dicker. "President Bashir is hardly off the hook, as he is sought for crimes against humanity and war crimes, including widespread rape, murder, and torture committed as part of a government plan."
Under the ICC Statute, the prosecutor is able to request an amendment of the warrant to include genocide if he obtains additional evidence to support the charge.
The ICC prosecutor requested an arrest warrant for Bashir on July 14, 2008. Following the prosecutor's announcement, Sudanese government officials made implicit and explicit threats of retaliation against international peacekeepers and humanitarian workers. On July 25, a Sudanese presidential advisor, Bona Malwal, stated in regard to peacekeeping forces that, "We are telling the world that with the indictment of our President al-Bashir we can't be responsible for the well-being of foreign forces in Darfur." President Bashir has also threatened to expel international peacekeeping forces if a warrant is issued.
The Security Council, its individual members, the UN Secretariat, the European Union, and the African Union have a critical role in promptly responding to any government-supported retaliation in Darfur following news of the warrant.
"The Sudanese government is obliged to maintain security in the country and the Security Council should act decisively to hold them to it," said Dicker. "Khartoum should not be allowed to use the arrest warrant as a pretext for stepping up its obstructionist policies that have hobbled peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts in Darfur."
The government of Sudan is required by a Security Council resolution to facilitate the deployment of the African Union/UN Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) and to cooperate with the ICC. Under international law, Sudan remains obligated to protect its own civilians and to provide full, safe, and unhindered access by relief personnel to those in need in Darfur. The arrest warrant does not change these obligations, nor does it have any impact on Khartoum's obligations to carry out the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement with the government of Southern Sudan.
"The Security Council and concerned governments should impose targeted sanctions against Sudanese officials responsible for any retaliatory violence, and consider other measures such as further banking restrictions or a widening of the arms embargo," said Dicker.
The ICC is an independent judicial institution. Sudan, though not a party to the Rome Statute creating the court, is subject to ICC jurisdiction through Security Council resolution. Having an official position as head of state does not provide immunity from criminal responsibility before the ICC.
Apart from the warrant against President Bashir, the ICC has issued two other warrants in relation to Darfur. On April 27, 2007, the court issued arrest warrants for State Minister of Humanitarian Affairs Ahmed Haroun and a "Janjaweed" militia leader, Ali Kosheib. The prosecutor has also requested arrest warrants for three rebel leaders in connection with attacks on international peacekeepers at Haskanita in October 2007. That request is currently under consideration by the court.
Sudan has so far refused to cooperate with the ICC. All the arrest warrants remain outstanding. Haroun continues in his official position as state minister of humanitarian affairs. On November 24, the Sudanese government arrested and tortured three human rights defenders in Khartoum for allegedly giving information to the ICC.
"Khartoum is required to cooperate with the court," said Dicker. "Because the ICC has no police force of its own, it needs strong support from governments to ensure that all those charged with crimes are arrested."
Background
In a March 31, 2005 resolution, the Security Council referred the situation in Darfur to the ICC prosecutor for investigation and prosecution. The decision was based on the recommendation of an international commission of inquiry, which found that violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law were continuing in Darfur and that the Sudanese justice system was unwilling and unable to address the crimes. Darfur is the first situation referred by the Security Council to the ICC.
Link
Labels: Darfur, Human Rights Watch, ICC, Marie-Êve Marineau, Sudan
Thursday, February 12, 2009
UN: Press Senegal on Habré Trial, by Noémie Cournoyer
(Geneva) – The United Nations Human Rights Council should ask Senegal to move forward on the trial of the exiled former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré, five African and international human rights groups said today. On February 6, 2009, the council will examine Senegal’s human rights record as part of its Universal Periodic Review (UPR) procedure.
Habré, accused of mass atrocities during his 1982-1990 rule, has been living in Senegal since 1990. A Senegalese court indicted him in 2000, but higher courts blocked the prosecution. Belgium sought his extradition in 2005 to put him on trial, but Senegal refused. In May 2006, the United Nations Committee Against Torture found that Senegal had violated the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and called on Senegal to prosecute or extradite Habré.
In 2006, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade accepted an African Union mandate to prosecute Habré in Senegal “on behalf of Africa.” But Senegal has not even begun the legal proceedings, said the Chadian Association for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (ATPDH), the Chadian Association of Victims of Political Repression and Crime (AVCRP), the African Assembly for the Defense of Human Rights (RADDHO), Human Rights Watch, and the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH).
“Senegal has mocked us for 18 years and now it is mocking the United Nations,” said Souleymane Guengueng, founder of the Chadian Association of Victims of Political Repression and Crime, and the lead petitioner in the case that led to the UN ruling. “The Human Rights Council needs to tell Senegal to comply with the UN ruling and bring Habré to justice.”
On September 16, 2008, 14 victims filed new complaints with a Senegalese prosecutor accusing Habré of crimes against humanity and torture, in an attempt to get the case started, but the Senegalese authorities have refused to act on the complaints. In November 2008, the Committee Against Torture met with the Senegalese ambassador in Geneva to express its frustration that Senegal had not complied with its ruling.
Senegal has said that it will not move forward until it receives full international funding for all the costs of the trial, which Senegal puts at €27.4 million over three years, including €8 million to reconstruct a courthouse. The rights groups noted that the European Commission, Chad, France, Switzerland, Belgium, and the Netherlands have already agreed to help fund the trial, but are still waiting for Senegal to present a detailed budget, and that the normal procedure is to fund such trials year by year.
“It’s not the money that is lacking for Hissène Habré’s trial, but Senegal’s political will,” said Dobian Assingar, a Chadian activist with the FIDH.
“For my country to say that it won’t start proceedings until it gets three-years of funding upfront seems a lot like blackmail,” said Alioune Tine, president of the Dakar-based RADDHO.
The Universal Periodic Review is the Human Rights Council’s most innovative and ambitious instrument, with reviews of the human rights situations in all 192 UN member states over a four-year cycle. The February 6 review will be Senegal’s first.
In its May 2006 ruling in the case Guengueng v. Senegal, the UN committee found that Senegal had violated the Convention against Torture twice, first by failing to prosecute Habré when the victims first filed their case in 2000, and then by failing to prosecute or extradite him when Belgium filed an extradition request in September 2005. The committee ruled that Senegal was “obliged to submit the present case to its competent authorities for the purpose of prosecution.” Failing that, it said, it should comply with Belgium’s extradition request, or with any other extradition request made by another country in accordance with the convention.
Background
Hissène Habré ruled Chad from 1982 until he was deposed in 1990 by President Idriss Déby Itno and fled to Senegal. His one-party regime was marked by widespread atrocities, including waves of campaigns against ethnic minorities. Files of Habré’s political police, the DDS (Direction de la Documentation et de la Sécurité), which were discovered by Human Rights Watch in 2001, reveal the names of 1,208 persons who were killed or died in detention. A total of 12,321 victims of human rights violations were mentioned in the files.
Habré was first indicted in Senegal in 2000, but then its courts ruled that he could not be tried there. His victims then turned to Belgium and, after a four-year investigation, a Belgian judge in September 2005 charged Habré with crimes against humanity, war crimes, and torture.
After Belgium made its extradition request, Senegalese authorities arrested Habré, in November 2005, but did not extradite him. The Senegalese government then asked the African Union to recommend how to try Habré. On July 2, 2006, the African Union, following the recommendation of a Committee of Eminent African Jurists, called on Senegal to prosecute Habré “in the name of Africa,” and President Wade said that it would.
Senegal has amended its laws and constitution to allow its courts to prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity, torture, and war crimes committed in the past. At the same time, however, it has appointed the former coordinator of Habré’s legal defense team, Madické Niang, as minister of justice – the government official heading the agency responsible for the organization of the trial.
Link
Labels: Human Rights Watch, Noémie Cournoyer, Senegal, UN
China: Human Rights Lawyer in Arbitrary Detention, by Anne Humphreys
(New York) – The Chinese government should immediately disclose the whereabouts of Gao Zhisheng, a leading human rights lawyer who disappeared two weeks ago, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Human Rights in China said today in a joint statement. The three organizations stressed that Gao was at immediate risk of severe torture and ill-treatment by the Chinese security services and called for his immediate release.
“We are intensely fearful for Gao Zhisheng’s safety at this time, given the security authorities’ long history of abusing him and his family,” said Sophie Richardson, Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “He has given detailed accounts of how he was tortured in police custody in the past and he may well be suffering more of the same right now.”
Lawyer Gao, who had been under constant police surveillance, along with his family, since receiving a suspended sentence for “inciting subversion” in 2006, was last heard from on January 19, 2009. According to reliable sources, he was subsequently detained by security forces and is being held at an unknown location.
“On February 9, the Chinese government will undergo a comprehensive review of its human rights record at the UN Human Rights Council,” said Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China. “Coming close on the heels of the scathing review by the Committee Against Torture in November 2008, arbitrarily detaining and torturing a leading rights advocate is no way to show human rights progress.”
In September 2007, Gao was detained for several weeks shortly after sending an open letter to the US Congress denouncing the human rights situation in China and describing his and his family’s treatment at the hands of the security forces.
Gao detailed his illegal detention in 2007 as well as severe and sustained torture at the hands of security agents – including violent beatings, repeated electric shocks to his genitals, and having lit cigarettes held close to his eyes over a prolonged period, which left him partially blind for days afterwards. After he was released, acquaintances described him as seeming to be “a broken man,” both physically and spiritually.
“China should immediately release Gao Zhisheng,” said Roseann Rife, Asia-Pacific deputy director at Amnesty International. “China should demonstrate that its takes its international obligations seriously, in this case specifically the obligations under the convention against torture, which the Chinese government voluntarily took on in 1988.”
In November 2008, the United Nations Committee Against Torture (CAT) reported in its “Concluding Observations” on China that it remains “deeply concerned about the continued allegations, corroborated by numerous Chinese legal sources, of routine and widespread use of torture and ill-treatment of suspects in police custody.”
Amnesty International, Human Rights in China and Human Rights Watch strongly urged concerned governments and intergovernmental bodies to call on the Chinese government to take all necessary steps to ensure Gao Zhisheng's safety and well being while in police custody and to release him at the earliest possible date.
Voted in 2001 as “one of China’s top ten lawyers” by a publication run by the PRC Ministry of Justice, Gao is a self-trained legal professional with a history of representing the victims of some of the most egregious and politically controversial cases of human rights abuses by the police and other government agencies. In October 2005, he wrote a series of three letters to President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao calling on them to halt the continuing torture and ill-treatment of detained Falun Gong practitioners and the ongoing persecution of underground Christians and democracy activists.
After his 2007 detention, Gao expressed fears that he would be tortured again if he was rearrested.
In June 2007, Gao received the Courageous Advocacy Award of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA). His memoirs, A China More Just, were published in English the same year.
Link
Labels: Anne Humphreys, China, Human rights, Human Rights Watch
DR Congo: Groups Fear for Civilian Safety, by Marie-Êve Marineau
(Goma) - A coalition of 100 humanitarian and human rights organizations today called on John Holmes, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, to insist that protecting civilians be a top priority of the joint Congolese and Rwandan military operation in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Holmes is due to arrive in Goma, the North Kivu capital, on February 7, 2009.
In a public letter to Holmes, the Congo Advocacy Coalition expressed alarm that the joint military operation has to date contributed to the flight of thousands of people from their homes in anticipation of violence, adding to the 1.2 million already displaced in earlier waves of fighting. The coalition further raised concerns about reprisal killings and the use of civilians as human shields by the rebel Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), as well as reports of rape and looting by all sides.
"Congolese civilians are always targeted when there are military operations and their fears of being killed, raped, or looted are very real," said Juliette Prodhan of Oxfam. "The Congolese and Rwandan forces and UN peacekeepers should do all that they can to ensure that civilians are protected during the joint operations and are not once again the targets."
On January 20, 2009, the Congolese and Rwandan governments began a joint military operation against the FDLR, an armed group based in eastern Congo, some of whose leaders are wanted on charges of genocide. While there have only been a few skirmishes so far, there is widespread anticipation that the fighting could intensify and spread in the coming days and weeks.
The coalition warned against a repeat of the unimaginable brutality suffered by Congolese civilians in Haut-Uele territory in northeastern Congo following the launch of a joint Ugandan and Congolese military operation to disarm the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a Ugandan rebel group based in Congo. More than 700 people were massacred by the rebels in less than one month. Minimal protection measures had been put in place to protect those at risk and to halt the killings.
The UN peacekeeping mission in Congo, MONUC, has a strong mandate to protect civilians but has been left out of military planning in both joint operations, in the Kivus and Haut-Uele. It is also still awaiting 3,000 reinforcements authorized almost three months ago. In its letter, the Congo Advocacy Coalition urged Holmes to insist that the peacekeeping mission be given a central role in civilian protection and relief in planning all military operations and that the mission has the resources it needs, as mandated by the UN Security Council, in order to effectively protect civilians and ensure humanitarian access.
The coalition also called on Holmes to urge parties to resume the political process needed to address the underlying issues driving the Congo conflict, such as exploitation of mineral wealth, lack of justice, and representation of minorities.
"All of the armed groups need to disarm," said Kubuya Muhangi, the president of CRONGD-North Kivu. "People in eastern Congo desperately want to go back to their homes and to be able to stay there without fear of having to run again."
The Congo Advocacy Coalition, made up of local and international nongovernmental organizations, was established in July 2008 to advocate for greater protection of civilians and respect for human rights in eastern Congo. Members of the coalition's steering committee include: ActionAid, ENOUGH Project, Human Rights Watch, Mercy Corps, Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), Oxfam, Conseil Régional des Organisations Non Gouvernementales de Développement (CRONGD) - North Kivu, Promotion et Appui aux Initiatives Féminines (PAIF) - North Kivu, Institut Congolaise pour la Justice et la Paix (ICJP) - South Kivu, and Association des Femmes Juristes du Congo (AFEJUCO) - South Kivu.
Other Signatories:
International NGOs:
Action Against Hunger/ Action Contre la Faim (ACF) - USA, American Bar Association (ABA) Rule of Law Initiative in DRC, Beati i costruttori di pace/ Blessed are the Peacemakers , CAFOD, CARE International, Centre Lokole/ Search for Common Ground, Global Witness, International Emergency and Development Aid (IEDA) Relief, Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) Great Lakes, Refugees International, Tearfund, Trocaire, War Child Holland
Congolese NGOs:
ACAEFAD, Action by Christians Against Torture (ACAT)/Sud Kivu, ACPS, Action des Chrétiens Activistes des Droits de l'Homme a Shabunda (ACADHOSHA), ADECOF/Sud Kivu, AFCD, AFCDI, AFECEF, AJERF, Africa Justice Peace and Development (AJPD), ALCM, AMALDEFEA, AMI-KIVU, ANAMEDAPED, APIBA, APRODEPED, ASADHO (Association africaine de défense des droits de l'homme) - Sud Kivu, ASALAK, Action Sociale pour la Paix et le Développement (ASPD), Association pour le Développement des Initiatives Paysannes (ASSODIP), AYINET/DRC, BDENA, Blessed Aid, CADRE, Collectif des Associations des Femmes Pour le Développement (CAFED), Campagne Pour la Paix (CPP), CCJT, CEDAC, CELPA/SK, Centre d'Appui pour le Développement Rural Communautaire (CADERCO), Centre de Recherche sur l'Environnement, la Démocratie et les Droits de l'Homme (CREDDHO), Centre de promotion socio-sanitaire (CEPROSSAN), Centre d'Etudes et de Recherche en Education de Base pour le Développement Integré (CEREBA), Coalition RDC pour la Cour Pénale Internationale (CPI), Collectif des Organisations des Jeunes Solidaires du Congo (COJESKI)/Sud Kivu, Collectif des Organisations des Jeunes Solidaires du Congo (COJESKI)/ Nord Kivu, COPARE, CUBAKA, DYJESKI, EFD, Encadrement des femmes indigènes et des ménages vulnérables (EFIM), Entraide des Femmes pour les Déshérités (EFD) - Uvira Sud -Kivu, Foyer Social de Mogo (FSM/Kabare), GAIDER, GAMAC, GRAM-Kivu, Group d'Etudes et d'Actions Pour un Développement Bien Défini (GEAD) /Nord-Kivu, Groupe de Voix de Sans Voix (GVSV), Groupe Féminine, HEAL Africa, Héritiers de la Justice, Humanitas, IGE/CCD, La Synergie des femmes pour les victimes des violences sexuelles (SFVS), Mamans Umoja, Martin Luther King Non-Violence Group, OCET, PAL, PAMI, Perspectives "Monde Juste", PIDP-Kivu, PRENAO, PRODES, Promotion de la Démocratie et Protection des Droits Humains (PDH), RADHOSKI-Sud Kivu, Réseau Provincial des ONG de Droits de l'Homme (REPRODHOC)/Nord-Kivu, RFDP, SAMS, SARCAF, SILDE, SJPR/EST, Solidarité pour la Promotion Sociale et la Paix (SOPROP), SYNECAT, UCODE, UPADERI, VOVOLIB (Voix de Sans Voix ni Libertés)
Link
Labels: Congo, Human rights, Human Rights Watch, Marie-Êve Marineau
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
US: Steps to End Torture Set a New Course, par Iba Bouramine
(Washington, DC) - US President Barack Obama's executive order to end the use of torture sets a new course for US counterterrorism policy, Human Rights Watch said today. Obama's decision to issue this order within two days of becoming president signals the high priority the new president places on establishing legal and effective counterterrorism policies.
"For years, the Bush administration claimed, ‘We do not torture,' yet approved methods like waterboarding, sleep deprivation, and prolonged exposure to cold," said Jennifer Daskal, senior counterterrorism counsel at Human Rights Watch. "President Obama's order rejecting such practices is a major step toward restoring America's moral authority around the world."
The executive order on torture issued today sets a government-wide single standard of humane interrogation, ends the use of secret CIA "black sites" for detention, and mandates that the International Committee of the Red Cross be granted access to all detainees held by the US outside of the ordinary criminal or immigration system.
Under the order, all government agencies are required to apply the Army field manual on interrogation - which has been used by the military since 2006 - without exception. The order also prohibits the reliance on any of the Bush Justice Department's legal opinions on interrogation or detention.
"This executive order makes meaningful the US commitment not to torture detainees," Daskal said. "President Obama has rejected the abusive practices of the last seven-and-a-half years."
The order also creates an interagency task force, led by the attorney general, to evaluate the interrogation practices allowed by the Army field manual, "and, if warranted, to recommend any additional or different guidance for other departments or agencies."
Human Rights Watch said that any new interrogation manual should apply a single standard across all government agencies. The manual should be public and include an exhaustive list of approved techniques that all follow the "Golden Rule" standard.
"Today, Obama made huge strides to put US counterterrorism policies on a legal and effective course," said Daskal. "He should now categorically reject the illogical claim that the standard for humane and effective treatment somehow varies across agency."
The order does not address the legality of what is known as rendition to torture - the practice of illegally transferring a person to a country where he or she faces torture or persecution - and instead leaves review of that practice to the task force as well. The best known case is that of Maher Arar, a dual Canadian-Syrian citizen arrested at New York's John F. Kennedy airport in September 2002, flown to Jordan, and then driven across the border to Syria, where he was detained in a tiny cell for almost a year and tortured repeatedly.
Human Rights Watch said that Obama repeatedly condemned the practice of rendition to torture on the campaign trail, and urged him to put an end to this illegal practice as well.
An executive order on Guantanamo, also issued today, sets January 2010 as a date certain for the prison's final closure, suspends the use of military commissions, and puts in motion a review of the detainees' files.
Another order creates an interagency task force to review detention and interrogation policies going forward. A fourth order mandates a review of the fate of Saleh al-Marri, a Qatari who was on the eve of trial for credit card fraud when he was declared an "enemy combatant" and transferred to a naval brig in South Carolina in 2003. He has been there ever since.
"At the end of the review period, we hope and expect that Obama will either return al-Marri to federal court or order his release," said Daskal.
Link
Labels: Human Rights Watch, Iba Bouramine, United States
DRC: ICC’s First Trial Focuses on Child Soldiers, by Renata Daninsky
(Brussels) - The International Criminal Court's (ICC) trial of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo, scheduled to begin on January 26, 2009 in The Hague, marks an important stage in efforts to establish responsibility for the use of children in military operations, Human Rights Watch said today. Another Congolese warlord sought by the ICC, Bosco Ntaganda, remains at large.
Lubanga, the former leader of the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) militia who operated in the district of Ituri in northeastern Congo, is charged with enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 as soldiers and using them to participate actively in combat between September 2002 and August 2003. Lubanga's UPC forces also carried out widespread killing, rape, and torture of thousands of civilians throughout Ituri, though to date the ICC has not charged him or any other member of the UPC with such crimes.
"This first ICC trial makes it clear that the use of children in armed combat is a war crime that can and will be prosecuted at the international level," said Param-Preet Singh, counsel in Human Rights Watch's International Justice Program. "Lubanga's UPC also slaughtered thousands, and those responsible should be held accountable for these crimes as well."
Lubanga's trial was originally scheduled to begin in June 2008. However, the judges of the trial chamber unanimously decided to stay the proceedings - suspending the trial - because the prosecution could not disclose a number of documents collected confidentially from information providers as permitted under the Rome Statute, causing concerns that Lubanga would not receive a fair trial. The prosecution worked with these information providers to address the judges' concerns, and in November 2008 the trial chamber allowed proceedings to resume.
The Ituri conflict and other conflicts in eastern Congo highlight the participation of non-Congolese forces. Ituri in particular became a battleground involving the governments of Uganda, Rwanda, and Congo. These governments provided political and military support to Congolese armed groups despite abundant evidence of their widespread violations of international humanitarian law. The ICC prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, has repeatedly stated that he will bring to justice those who bear the greatest responsibility for serious crimes.
"Getting to the root of the conflict in Ituri means that the ICC must go beyond local war lords like Lubanga," said Singh. "We look to the prosecutor to investigate those who supported Lubanga and other militias operating in Ituri, including senior officials in Kinshasa, Kigali, and Kampala."
The ICC is faced with the challenge of making sure that the proceedings are meaningful for the communities most affected by the crimes in Congo. Human Rights Watch said that the Lubanga trial is a unique opportunity that the ICC cannot afford to miss and should make every possible effort to communicate with people in Congo about important legal proceedings in The Hague. To be effective, justice must not only be done but also must be seen to be done. Human Rights Watch will be looking very closely at the court's performance to this end.
Bosco Ntaganda Still Sought by the ICC
Bosco Ntaganda, who collaborated with Lubanga as chief of military operations for the UPC, has also been charged with war crimes by the ICC but remains at large. He currently serves as the military chief of staff of the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP), a rebel group that is now collaborating with the Congolese and Rwandan national armies in military operations against a Rwandan armed group in eastern Congo.
On November 4 and 5, 2008, CNDP troops under Ntaganda's command killed an estimated 150 people in the town of Kiwanja, one of the worst massacres in North Kivu in the past two years.
In early January, Ntaganda claimed he was taking over leadership of the CNDP from its former head Laurent Nkunda, and on January 16 he declared that instead of making war on the Congolese national army, he would join its troops in fighting the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Rwandan armed group some of whose leaders participated in the genocide in Rwanda in 1994.
"Bosco Ntaganda is not a viable partner for the Congolese or any other government," said Singh. "He is a war crimes suspect sought by the ICC, and he should be immediately arrested, not celebrated as a partner for peace."
The Congolese government, a state party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC, is obligated to arrest Ntaganda. Yet no such attempt was made last week when Ntaganda was in Goma alongside the Congolese minister of the interior and other senior Congolese military officers.
Background
In addition to crimes related to child soldiers, Thomas Lubanga's UPC, which purported to further the interests of the Hema ethnic group in the Ituri region of northeastern Congo, has also been involved in ethnic massacres, torture, and rape during the Ituri conflict.
In March 2006, Lubanga was arrested and transferred to the International Criminal Court in The Hague on charges involving child soldiers. In January 2007, the judges of the ICC determined that there was sufficient evidence to move forward with a trial.
This trial is the first in which victims will be allowed to participate in international criminal proceedings. More than 90 victims who have been found eligible will participate through their legal representatives. While not parties, victims have certain rights in proceedings, provided their exercise is consistent with the rights of the accused and a fair trial. This may include the right to submit evidence pertaining to Lubanga's guilt or innocence and thus contribute to the search for truth.
The ICC has charged three other Congolese warlords with crimes related to child soldiers, including Bosco Ntaganda, mentioned above. Two others, leaders of militias of ethnic groups allied with each other but rivals of Lubanga's, are in custody. They are Germain Katanga of the Ituri Patriotic Resistance Forces (FRPI), a Ngiti-based group, and Mathieu Ngudjolo, of the Nationalist and Integrationist Front (FNI), a Lendu-based militia. Both are accused of using child soldiers in attacking civilians in Bogoro village in early 2003, among other war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder, sexual slavery, and rape.
Children are currently recruited and used in armed conflict in at least 15 countries and territories: Afghanistan, Burma (Myanmar), Central African Republic, Chad, Colombia, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), India, Iraq, Occupied Palestinian Territories, Philippines, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Thailand, and Uganda. In the DRC, at least five parties to the armed conflict are known to use child soldiers. These include the Congolese army (FARDC), the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, the National Congress for the Defense of the People, pro-government Mai Mai groups, and the Lord's Resistance Army.
In addition to the ICC's cases, the Special Court for Sierra Leone has charged all nine of its original defendants, including former Liberian president Charles Taylor, with the crime of recruiting and using children under the age of 15 as soldiers. To date, the Special Court has convicted four defendants of this crime; those convicted are serving prison terms ranging from seven to 50 years. The Special Court's trial of Taylor is ongoing.
Ituri is one of the areas worst-affected by Congo's devastating wars. A local armed conflict between Hema and Lendu ethnic groups that began in 1999 was exacerbated by Ugandan military forces and through linkages to the broader conflict in the Great Lakes region. As the conflict spiraled and armed groups multiplied, more than 60,000 civilians were slaughtered in Ituri, according to the United Nations. Competition for the region's lucrative gold mines and trading routes was a major contributing factor to the fighting. Foreign armies and local militia groups - seeing control of the gold mines as a way to money, guns, and power - fought each other ruthlessly, often targeting civilians in the process. In their battles for gold, armed groups such as Lubanga's UPC were implicated in widespread ethnic slaughter, torture, and rape.
Human Rights Watch has been documenting human rights abuses committed in Ituri since 1999. Human Rights Watch published detailed reports in 2001, 2003, and 2005, as well as dozens of news releases and briefing papers detailing the widespread atrocities by all armed groups.
Link
Labels: Children, Congo, Human rights, Human Rights Watch, Renata Daninsky
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Israel/Hamas: Civilians Must Not Be Targets, by Anne Humphreys
Israel and Hamas both must respect the prohibition under the laws of war against deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch expressed grave concern about Israeli bombings in Gaza that caused civilian deaths and Palestinian rocket attacks on Israeli civilian areas in violation of international law.
Rocket attacks on Israeli towns by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups that do not discriminate between civilians and military targets violate the laws of war, while a rising number of the hundreds of Israeli bombings in Gaza since December 27, 2008, appear to be unlawful attacks causing civilian casualties. Additionally, Israel's severe limitations on the movement of non-military goods and people into and out of Gaza, including fuel and medical supplies, constitutes collective punishment, also in violation of the laws of war.
"Firing rockets into civilian areas with the intent to harm and terrorize Israelis has no justification whatsoever, regardless of Israel's actions in Gaza," said Joe Stork, deputy director of Human Rights Watch's Middle East and North Africa division. "At the same time, Israel should not target individuals and institutions in Gaza solely because they are part of the Hamas-run political authority, including ordinary police. Only attacks on military targets are permissible, and only in a manner that minimizes civilian casualties."
Human Rights Watch investigated three Israeli attacks that raise particular concern about Israel's targeting decisions and require independent and impartial inquiries to determine whether the attacks violated the laws of war. In three incidents detailed below, 18 civilians died, among them at least seven children.
On Saturday, December 27, the first day of Israel's aerial attacks, witnesses told Human Rights Watch that shortly after 1 p.m. an Israeli air-to-ground missile struck a group of students leaving the Gaza Training College, adjacent to the headquarters of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in downtown Gaza City. The students were waiting to board buses to transport them to their homes in Khan Yunis and Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. The strike killed eight students, ages 18 to 20, and wounded 19 others.
A UNRWA security guard stationed at the college entrance told Human Rights Watch that he used his UN radio to call for medical help. He said the attack also killed two other civilians, Hisham al-Rayes, 28, and his brother Alam, 26, whose family ran a small shop opposite the college entrance. The guard said that the only potential target nearby was the Gaza governorate building, which deals with civil matters, about 150 meters away from where the missile struck. Another UNRWA security guard who also witnessed the attack told Human Rights Watch: "There wasn't anybody else around - no police, army, or Hamas."
The second incident occurred shortly before midnight on Sunday, December 28, when Israeli warplanes fired one or more missiles at the Imad Aqil mosque in Jabalya, a densely populated refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip. The attack killed five of Anwar Balousha's daughters who were sleeping in a bedroom of their nearby house: Jawaher, 4; Dina, 8; Samar, 12; Ikram, 14; and Tahrir, 18. "We were asleep and we woke to the sound of bombing and the rubble falling on the house and on our heads," Anwar Balousha told Human Rights Watch. The Balousha's three-room house is just across a small street from the mosque.
The two-story Imad Aqil mosque, named after a deceased Hamas member, is regarded by Palestinians in the area as a "Hamas mosque" - that is, a place where the group's supporters gather for political meetings or to assemble for demonstrations, and where death notices of Hamas members are posted. Mosques are presumptively civilian objects and their use for political activities does not change that. Human Rights Watch said that the attack on Imad Aql mosque would be lawful only if Israel could demonstrate that it was being used to store weapons and ammunition or served some other military purpose. Even if that were the case, Israel still had an obligation to take all feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians and ensure that any likely civilian harm was not disproportionate to the expected military gain.
In the third incident, at around 1 a.m. on Monday, December 29, an Israeli helicopter fired two missiles into the Rafah refugee camp. One struck the home of a senior Hamas commander; the other struck the home of the al-Absi family, about 150 meters away, killing three brothers - Sedqi, 3, Ahmad, 12, and Muhammad, 13 - and wounding two sisters and the children's mother. Ziad al-Absi, 46, the children's father, told Human Rights Watch that at around 10:30 p.m. on Sunday, armed Palestinians had gathered near their home, firing machine guns at Israeli helicopters. "I and the neighbors argued with the militants, told them this is a populated area and this will put us into peril," he said. According to al-Absi's nephew, Iyad al-Absi, 27, the fighters refused to leave. When their commander arrived at about 11 p.m. and ordered them to leave, they again refused. The fighters finally left at around 11:15, but only after an exchange of gunfire between the fighters and their commander. Al-Absi said that he and his family then went to sleep. He told his nephew and other relatives that there was no further armed activity in the area prior to the missile strike on his house, almost two hours later. Ziad al-Absi said the blast had thrown one daughter onto a neighbor's balcony. The children's mother is in hospital intensive care; the two daughters are also in the hospital.
Human Rights Watch noted that many of Israel's airstrikes, especially during the first day, targeted police stations as well as security and militia installations controlled by Hamas. According to the Jerusalem Post, an attack on the police academy in Gaza City on December 27 killed at least 40, including dozens of cadets at their graduation ceremony as well as the chief of police, making it the single deadliest air attack of the campaign to date. Another attack, on a traffic police station in the central Gaza town of Deir al-Balah, killed a by-stander, 12-year-old Camilia Ra`fat al-Burdini. Under the laws of war, police and police stations are presumptively civilian unless the police are Hamas fighters or taking a direct part in the hostilities, or police stations are being used for military purposes.
"Israel must not make a blanket decision that all police and police stations are by definition legitimate military targets," Stork said. "It depends upon whether those police play a role in fighting against Israel, or whether a particular police station is used to store weapons or for some other military purpose."
Some other Israeli targets may have also been unlawful under the laws of war. Three teenagers were killed in southern Gaza City on December 27, when Israeli aircraft struck a building rented by Wa`ed (Promise), a Hamas-affiliated organization that defends prisoners held by Israel. Israel justified its attack on Gaza City's Islamic University on grounds that laboratories were used to manufacture explosives, but this did not address why a second strike demolished the women's quarters there. Israel also attacked the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV, but did not provide a reason. Television and radio stations are legitimate military targets only if used for military purposes, not if they are simply being used for pro-Hamas or anti-Israel propaganda.
Human Rights Watch expressed grave concern about the seriously deteriorating humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, which was already dire prior to the latest attacks. A health expert with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Gaza said on December 28 that hospitals were "overwhelmed and unable to cope with the scale and type of injuries that keep coming in." The ICRC noted that medical supplies and medicines were already badly depleted as a result of Israel's prohibition of most imports into Gaza since Hamas took full internal control of the territory in June 2007. In a statement on December 29, the ICRC said that some neighborhoods were running short of water, owing to damage from attacks or fuel and power shortages. The statement also said that prices for food and basic commodities were reportedly rising fast. UNRWA had reported several days prior to the latest escalation of fighting that its stocks of essential commodities were extremely low.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which also monitors security matters in Gaza, Palestinian armed groups fired more than 100 rockets towards Israel on December 27-28; Haaretz, the Israeli daily, reported that on December 29 Palestinian armed groups fired at least 60 rockets into Israel. One of them killed a Bedouin construction worker, 27-year-old Hani al-Mahdi, and wounded 14 others in the coastal city of Ashkelon, north of Gaza; another fatally wounded 39-year-old Irit Sheetrit while she was driving home in the city of Ashdod, 35 kilometers from Gaza. The previous day, December 28, a rocket attack killed another Israeli civilian and wounded four in Netivot, some 20 kilometers east of Gaza City.
Human Rights Watch has long criticized Palestinian rocket attacks against Israeli civilians - most recently, in a public letter to Hamas on November 20 (http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2008/11/20/letter-hamas-stop-rocket-attacks ). The rockets are highly inaccurate, and those launching them cannot accurately target military objects. Deliberately firing indiscriminate weapons into civilian populated areas, as a matter of policy, constitutes a war crime. Rocket attacks have killed 19 civilians in Israel since 2005, including those killed to date during the current clashes.
Human Rights Watch has also criticized Israel's policy of severely restricting the flow of people and goods into Gaza, including fuel and other civilian necessities, saying that those restrictions amount to collective punishment against the civilian population, a serious violation of the laws of war (http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2008/11/20/letter-olmert-stop-blockade-gaza ). Israel continues to exercise effective control over Gaza's borders and airspace as well as its population registry, and remains the occupying power there under international law. The laws of war prohibit the occupying power from attacking, destroying, or withholding objects essential to the survival of the civilian population. Israel is also obliged to protect the right of Palestinians in Gaza to freedom of movement, to secure access to health care and education, and to lead normal lives.
Link
Labels: Anne Humphreys, Human Rights Watch, Israel, Palestine
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Central African Republic: Civilians Need Protection, by Iba Bouramine
(New York) - While the government and rebel groups take steps toward ending the civil war in the Central African Republic (CAR), civilians in the northwestern part of the country are being abused at the hands of a variety of armed groups, Human Rights Watch said in a briefing paper released today.
The 23-page briefing paper, "Improving Civilian Protection in the Central African Republic," released following a round of peace talks that began on December 5 in the capital, Bangui, urged the government to make civilian protection the highest priority and to adopt measures to protect civilians better in insecure areas in the country's lawless northwest. It also urged the United Nations and regional groups to support this effort.
"The people in this area are at the mercy of uncontrolled armed groups and gangs of armed bandits," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "The government should be making every effort to protect them, beginning with expanding military patrols and making clear that attackers will not get away with their crimes."
In 2008, Human Rights Watch documented attacks against civilians in the region by rebels from the Popular Army for the Restoration of the Republic and of Democracy (Armée populaire pour la restauration de la République et la démocratie, APRD) and by elements of the Chadian National Army (Armée Nationale du Tchad, ANT).
Human Rights Watch also documented violent abuses by loosely organized bandits, known as zaraguinas, who are a huge threat to civilians in the northern part of the country.
The government's regular Central African Armed Forces (Forces Armées Centrafricaines, FACA) has been ineffective in protecting civilians from these armed groups, largely because it lacks the capacity, but also because of the way it operates. Many units are confined to Bangui, and when they go to the danger zones, they do not conduct regular patrols and generally venture no further than a few kilometers from the towns in which they are based. In some instances documented by Human Rights Watch, government forces did not give civilians effective warning of impending military operations and used indiscriminate lethal force, killing civilians during military operations.
"The mere deployment of security forces that are poorly armed, badly trained, or are not strategically mobilized to safeguard civilians is clearly failing to achieve the necessary protection," Gagnon said. "If the government sends out well-trained, well-equipped soldiers beyond the capital and the immediate vicinity of army bases, it will be able to protect civilians more effectively."
Last year, the FACA assumed primary responsibility for security in the northwest from the government's elite Presidential Guard, which had summarily executed and seriously abused civilians while conducting counterinsurgency operations in the region from 2005 to 2007. Human Rights Watch reported on these abuses in a September 2007 report, "State of Anarchy: Rebellion and Abuses Against Civilians".
The withdrawal of most Presidential Guard units from the northwest reduced government attacks against civilians in the region. But the individuals known to be responsible for the worst human rights abuses during 2005-2007 have yet to answer for their crimes.
"The lack of accountability is one of the major impediments to protecting human rights and establishing the rule of law in the Central African Republic," said Gagnon. "The government is required to investigate and prosecute those responsible for rights violations, and failure to do so can lead to even more serious abuses."
While the government bears primary responsibility for improving civilian protection, regional and multinational organizations may be in a position to enhance those efforts. Both the United Nations and the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) have sent missions to the Central African Republic, including peacekeeping troops, which can augment government efforts to improve civilian protection in the northwest by conducting patrols in insecure areas.
The United Nations Peace-Building Support Office in the Central African Republic (Bureau d'appui des Nations Unies pour la consolidation de la paix en République centrafricaine, BONUCA) can help counter impunity by monitoring judicial proceedings and facilitating practical aspects of investigations such as transportation and forensics.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) can also support efforts to ensure accountability for international crimes by encouraging domestic judicial processes. If the government is unable or unwilling to hold those responsible for war crimes to account, the ICC may have jurisdiction.
Background
The country's current president, François Bozizé, came to power in 2003 after deposing Ange-Félix Patassé in a coup d'etat. Bozizé was elected president in 2005 elections that were considered free and fair but that excluded Patassé. Shortly thereafter, rebellion broke out in Patassé's home region in the northwest.
The main rebel group there, the Popular Army for the Restoration of the Republic and Democracy (Armée Populaire pour la restauration de la République et la Démocratie, APRD), largely consisted of elements of Patassé's Presidential Guard. A separate rebellion in the northeastern part of the country, led by the Union of Democratic Forces for Unity (Union des forces démocratiques pour le rassemblement, UFDR), consisted mainly of soldiers who helped bring Bozizé to power but later turned against him for failing to compensate them adequately for their support. A third group, the Democratic Front of the Central African People (Front démocratique du peuple centrafricain, FDPC), was led by Abdoulaye Miskine, a Chadian with close ties to the Libyan government.
On June 21, 2008, the Popular Army and the Union of Democratic Forces signed a peace accord that extended a general amnesty to all parties to the conflict (except individuals accused of war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity, or any offense within the jurisdiction of the ICC) and prepared the groundwork for an internationally mediated Inclusive Political Dialogue (Dialogue Politique Inclusif) between the government, former rebel factions and civil society groups. An opening round of peace talks was held in Bangui from December 5 to 20.
Link
Labels: Central African Republic, Human rights, Human Rights Watch, Iba Bouramine
Morocco: Suppressing Rights in Western Sahara, by Marie-Êve Marineau
(Rabat, December 19, 2008) - Morocco violates the rights to expression, association, and assembly in Western Sahara, Human Rights Watch said in a new report issued today, revealing stark limits to the progress that Morocco has made in protecting human rights overall. Human rights conditions have also improved in the Sahrawi refugee camps managed by the Polisario Front in Algeria, although the Polisario marginalizes those who directly oppose its leadership.
Human Rights Watch called on both Morocco and Polisario to take specific steps to improve the human rights situation in the territories under their de facto control, and on the United Nations Security Council to ensure regular human rights monitoring in both Western Sahara and Tindouf.
"The repression has eased somewhat, and today dissidents are testing the red lines," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "But Moroccan authorities - to their credit - ask us to judge them not against their own past record, but against their international human rights engagements. By that standard, they have a long way to go."
The 216-page report, "Human Rights in Western Sahara and in the Tindouf Refugee Camps," focuses on the present-day situation rather than on past abuses. Human Rights Watch documents how Morocco uses a combination of repressive laws, police violence, and unfair trials to punish Sahrawis who advocate peacefully in favor of independence or full self-determination for the disputed Western Sahara.
"The Western Sahara is an international problem that has been on the back burner for decades," said Whitson. "But through this conflict, the world can also understand and address the broader human rights challenges that remain for Morocco."
In Western Sahara, Moroccan authorities consider all opposition to their rule of the disputed territory as illegal attacks on Morocco's "territorial integrity," and use this as a basis to ban or disperse peaceful demonstrations and to deny legal recognition to human rights organizations. The problem goes well beyond repressive laws, however: police beat peaceful pro-independence demonstrators and sometimes torture persons in their custody, Human Rights Watch said. Citizens file formal complaints about police abuse that the justice system routinely dismisses without conducting serious investigations, reinforcing a climate of impunity for the police.
While Sahrawi demonstrations sometimes involve acts of protester violence that Moroccan authorities have a responsibility to prevent and punish, this cannot justify blanket bans on peaceful assemblies. Moroccan courts have convicted Sahrawi human rights activists of inciting or participating in violence based on dubious evidence, in trials that were patently unfair.
In preparing this report, Human Rights Watch interviewed scores of people living in Western Sahara as well as present and former residents of the Tindouf refugee camps. Both Moroccan and Polisario authorities received the Human Rights Watch delegation, imposed no significant obstacles on its work, and provided extensive answers to questions from Human Rights Watch that are reflected in the report.
In the Tindouf refugee camps, the Polisario Front allows refugees to criticize its management of daily affairs, but effectively marginalizes those who directly oppose its leadership. Residents are able to leave the camps if they wish to, including to resettle in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara. The fact that most take the main road to Mauritania rather than a clandestine route shows their confidence in being allowed to travel. Yet, those headed to Western Sahara tend to hide their plans, fearing both official obstacles and the disapproval of other camp residents if their final destination becomes known.
The population of the camps remains vulnerable to abuses due to the camps' isolated location, the lack of any regular independent human rights monitoring and reporting, and Algeria's claim that the Polisario, rather than Algeria itself, is responsible for protecting the human rights of the camps' residents.
"The refugees in Tindouf have, for more than 30 years, lived in exile from their homeland, governed by a liberation movement in an environment that is physically harsh and isolated," said Whitson. "Regardless of the current state of affairs, both the Polisario and the host country, Algeria, have responsibilities to ensure that the rights of these vulnerable refugees are protected."
Human Rights Watch said that the UN Security Council should ensure that the UN presence in the region includes regular human rights monitoring. Virtually all UN peacekeeping missions around the world include a human rights component and, with MINURSO forces operating in a peacekeeper capacity in Western Sahara, this region should be no exception. In this, France and the United States, as the permanent Security Council members with the strongest interests in this region, have a critical role to play.
Among its many recommendations, Human Rights Watch urges Morocco to:
- Revise or abolish laws that criminalize speech and political or associative activities deemed affronts to Morocco's "territorial integrity" and that are used to suppress nonviolent advocacy in favor of Sahrawi political rights;
- End impunity for police abuses by ensuring serious investigations into civilian complaints and, where warranted, charges or disciplinary measures against abusive agents;
- Allow independent human rights associations to follow the procedure for obtaining legal recognition; and
- Ensure that courts reach verdicts based on the impartial weighing of all relevant evidence. Judges and prosecutors should give effect to suspects' right under Moroccan law to demand medical examinations, and reject as evidence any statement that is established to have been made as a result of police torture.
Human Rights Watch urges the Polisario Front to:
- Take pro-active measures so that all camp residents know that they are free to leave the camps, including to settle in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara;
- Ensure that camp residents are free to challenge peacefully the leadership of the Polisario Front and to advocate options for Western Sahara other than independence; and
- Eliminate or restrict broadly worded articles of the Polisario penal code that, for example, criminalize the printing of publications or participating in demonstrations deemed "likely to disturb the public order."
Morocco has ruled Western Sahara de facto since its troops moved in following Spain's withdrawal from its former colony in 1976. Morocco officially refers to the region as its "southern provinces," but the United Nations does not recognize Moroccan sovereignty.
Morocco opposed as unworkable a UN-brokered plan for a referendum on the territory's future and has proposed autonomy for the Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty. Morocco has made clear, however, that the plan envisages no rollback of laws criminalizing "attacks on territorial integrity." Thus, Moroccan-granted autonomy will not give Sahrawis their right to demand independence or a referendum to decide the region's future.
"Sahrawis differ on how to resolve the conflict," said Whitson. "But wherever they live, authorities must allow them peacefully to express and act on behalf of those views. Any proposed solution for the Western Sahara that does not guarantee these rights is no solution at all."
Human Rights Watch takes no position on the issue of independence for Western Sahara or on Morocco's proposal for regional autonomy.
Labels: Human rights, Human Rights Watch, Marie-Êve Marineau, Morocco
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