Human Rights Watch considers the Ugandan government itself to be the most egregious abuser of human rights in the country

TO BE NOTED: From Enough:

“Open Secrets” in Uganda

Posted by Maggie Fick on Apr 19, 2009

Human Rights Watch released a report last week condemning the practices of Uganda’s “Joint Anti-terrorism Task Force,” or JATT, a force operated by the Ugandan military’s intelligence branch. The JATT runs Kololo, a notorious illegal detention facility that HRW called an “open secret” in Uganda. The report describes many of the illegal aspects of the detention facility, including torture and enforced disappearances of people that the government suspects of “terrorist activities.” The report notes:

In recent years, the most serious human rights violations in Uganda have taken place in the long northern war between the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and the government, during disarmament initiatives in the insecure northeast and in the context of government harassment of political opponents. Even though most of the country currently enjoys relative stability, state-sanctioned abuses by security forces and impunity for those responsible continue. Research by Human Rights Watch, as well as other nongovernmental organizations, has found that torture and prolonged illegal detention remain among the most recurrent and intractable human rights violations in Uganda. [Emphasis mine]

In other words, now that the rapacious Lord’s Resistance Army have shifted their base of operations out of northern Uganda and the region is slowly returning to a state of relative peace, Human Rights Watch considers the Ugandan government itself to be the most egregious abuser of human rights in the country. HRW recommends that:

Donors to the Ugandan security efforts, such as the United States and United Kingdom, who are training and supporting Uganda's counterterrorism operations, should work to ensure that basic rights are afforded to all suspects. These donors should withhold counterterrorism-related funding to the Ugandan security forces until the Ugandan government investigates abuses by JATT and the Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence, or CMI, and prosecutes as appropriate those found to be involved.

As is the case with Operation Lightning Thunder (the recent Ugandan army-led joint military offensive against the LRA in northeastern Congo), the U.S. government’s support for the Ugandan government means that it bears some responsibility for Kampala’s actions—especially when Washington continues to provide direct support for Kampala’s military and counterterrorism operations.

N.B.: On a related note, see "A country adrift, a president amiss," an Economist article on Uganda from February."

documents serious human rights violations by the Eritrean government, including arbitrary arrest, torture, appalling detention conditions...

TO BE NOTED: From ReliefWeb:

"Eritrea: Repression creating human rights crisis

Source: Human Rights Watch (HRW)

Date: 16 Apr 2009

Host Countries Should Cease Forced Returns of Eritrean Refugees

(London, April 16, 2009) – Eritrea's extensive detention and torture of its citizens and its policy of prolonged military conscription are creating a human rights crisis and prompting increasing numbers of Eritreans to flee the country, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

The 95-page report, "Service for Life: State Repression and Indefinite Conscription in Eritrea," documents serious human rights violations by the Eritrean government, including arbitrary arrest, torture, appalling detention conditions, forced labor, and severe restrictions on freedom of movement, expression, and worship. It also analyzes the difficult situation faced by Eritreans who succeed in escaping to other countries such as Libya, Sudan, Egypt, and Italy.

"Eritrea's government is turning the country into a giant prison," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "Eritrea should immediately account for hundreds of 'disappeared' prisoners and open its jails to independent scrutiny."

Human Rights Watch called on the United States and European Union to coordinate with the UN and the African Union to resolve regional tensions and ensure that development aid to Eritrea is linked to progress on human rights.

The EU recently approved a €122 million assistance package to Eritrea despite concerns that development projects in Eritrea are carried out by conscript or prison labor in violation of international law.

Based on more than 50 interviews with Eritrean victims and eyewitnesses of abuses in three countries, the report describes how the Eritrean government uses a vast apparatus of official and secret detention facilities to incarcerate thousands of Eritreans without charge or trial. Many of the prisoners are detained for their political or religious beliefs, others because they tried to evade the indefinite national service or flee the country.

Torture, cruel and degrading treatment and forced labor are routine for conscripts as well as detainees. Detention conditions are appalling, with detainees typically held in overcrowded cells – sometimes underground – or in shipping containers that reach searing temperatures by day and are freezing at night.

Those who try to flee risk severe punishments and the possibility of being shot while crossing the border. The government also punishes the families of those who escape or desert from national service with exorbitant fines or imprisonment. Despite these severe measures, thousands of Eritreans are trying to escape their country.

Most refugees first flee to neighboring Ethiopia and Sudan, and then travel to Libya, Egypt, and Europe. Hundreds of Eritreans have been forcibly repatriated from Libya, Egypt and Malta in the past few years and have faced detention and torture upon their return.

Because of the risk of mistreatment faced by those who are returned, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has advised against deporting anyone to Eritrea, including rejected asylum seekers. Human Rights Watch called on all countries hosting Eritrean asylum seekers not to forcibly return them, given the risk of torture.

"Countries receiving Eritrean refugees need to make sure that they get the protection and assistance they need," said Gagnon. "Under no circumstances should Eritreans be returned to Eritrea, where they face almost certain detention and torture simply for having fled."

Eritreans celebrated when the country gained its independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after a bloody 30-year war. But the government of President Isayas Afewerki, who led Eritrea through much of its extraordinary struggle for independence, has steadily restricted democratic freedoms, particularly since a 2001 crackdown on political opposition and media.

Eritrea claims its prolonged mass mobilization is justified by security concerns stemming from a two-year border conflict with Ethiopia that cost tens of thousands of lives from 1998 to 2000. The government often blames the United States, the United Nations, and African states for the current political impasse, contending that they have failed to pressure Ethiopia to implement the border demarcation decision of an independent UN commission, which awarded a disputed area to Eritrea.

Eritrea has had tense relations or military clashes with all of its neighbors at one point or another, and the political stalemate between Eritrea and Ethiopia has contributed to regional instability. Each government has supported armed opposition groups against the other, and Eritrea's support for militant Islamist groups in Somalia has exacerbated the conflict in that country.

"Eritrea's human rights crisis is worsening and making the Horn of Africa ever more volatile," said Gagnon. "The US, European, and other governments need to coordinate their policies on the Horn to defuse regional tensions, and make human rights progress an essential benchmark for engagement with Eritrea."

Selected accounts from Eritrean refugees:

"I sacrificed my life for the prosperity, development and freedom of my country but the reverse is true… we did not spend 65,000 martyrs for this!"

– An elderly man who fought for the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) in the liberation struggle

"It's okay to do national service, it's fair to serve one's country but not always. It's not fair when it's indefinite."

– A young man who recently fled national service

"If someone is suspected of escaping then they are tied up – just hands or hands and feet, or ferro [with iron handcuffs]. ... Individuals decide what kind of punishment is given, there's no law. They do not have any crimes but [people are punished because] they hate the military or hate to be a soldier. That is the main reason. Because everyone in Eritrea hates to be in the army."

– A former army officer who explained how those suspected of trying to escape from the army were tortured

"First you do your military training then they hold you forever without your rights. The military leaders can ask you for anything and if you refuse their demands then you can be punished. Almost every woman in the military experiences this kind of problem."

– A female recruit who served as a conscript for 10 years and suffered repeated sexual harassment

"In Dahlak there is no time limit, you are waiting for two things: either someone is coming to transfer you or to kill you. When I left Dahlak I was 44 kilograms. My haemoglobin was nothing. I needed a stick to walk. We were living underground, the temperature was 44nC; it was unbelievable. There is no word to express the inhumanity."

– A former political prisoner detained on Dahlak Island in the Red Sea

"If one of the men escapes, you have to go to his home and find him. If you don't find him you have to capture his family and take them to prison. Since 1998, it's standard to collect a family member if someone flees. The administration gives the order to take family members if the national service member is not around. If you disappear inside Eritrea then the family is put in prison for some time and often then the child will return. If you cross the border, then [your family] pays 50,000 nakfa [US$3,300]. If there's no money then it can be a long time in prison. I know people who are in prison for six months."

– An officer formerly responsible for rounding up national service deserters

For more Human Rights Watch reporting on Eritrea, please visit:

http://www.hrw.org/en/africa/eritrea

© Copyright, Human Rights Watch 350 Fifth Avenue, 34th Floor New York, NY 10118-3299 USA"

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describes the lack of any effort by the authorities to investigate the killings and bring those responsible to justice.

TO BE NOTED: From Human Rights Watch:

“You Can Die Any Time”

Death Squad Killings in Mindanao

April 6, 2009

This 103-page report details the involvement of police and local government officials in targeted killings of alleged drug dealers and petty criminals, street children, and others, and describes the lack of any effort by the authorities to investigate the killings and bring those responsible to justice.

Read the Report

http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2009/04/06/you-can-die-any-time

© Copyright 2008, Human Rights Watch"

Mindanao (Philippines)

The island group of Mindanao is an arbitrary grouping of islands in the Southern Philippines which encompasses six administrative regions^[1]. These regions are further subdivided into 25 provinces, of which only four are not on Mindanao island itself. Some of the areas are semi-autonomous Muslim areas. The island group includes the Sulu Archipelago to the southwest, which consists of the major islands of Basilan, Jolo, and Tawi-Tawi, plus outlying islands in other areas such as Camiguin, Dinagat, Siargao, Samal. The Limunsudan Falls, with an approximate height of 800 ft, is the highest water falls in the Philippines located at Iligan City.

The six regions are:

• Zamboanga Peninsula (Region IX)
• Northern Mindanao (Region X)
• Davao Region (Region XI)
• SOCCSKSARGEN (Region XII)
• Caraga (Region XIII)
• Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM)

The major conurbation on Mindanao is Davao City, the country's largest city by area, with a population of approximately 1.3 million.

A map of Mindanao color-coded by regions. ARMM CARAGA Davao Northern Mindanao SOCCSKSARGEN Zamboanga Peninsula For the exclaves, see the text.

His conviction is part of a worldwide trend to hold heads of state accountable, as Human Rights Watch pointed out.

TO BE NOTED: From the Guardian:

"The lesson from Lima

The conviction of Alberto Fujimori for human rights abuses is part of a worldwide trend to hold heads of state accountable

Comments (12)

• 
• • Michael Reid
  • guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 April 2009 21.30 BST
  • Article history

When Alberto Fujimori abandoned five years of voluntary exile in Japan and flew to Chile in 2005, he was planning a political comeback. But his gamble backfired spectacularly when he was extradited to Peru. On Tuesday, after a 16-month televised trial, a Lima court found that he had known about and authorised the activities of an army death-squad which killed 25 civilians in two separate incidents in the early 1990s. The court sentenced him to 25 years imprisonment. Already serving six years for abuse of power, he faces three further trials for corruption.

This verdict is rightly being hailed as a landmark victory for the rule of law in Peru and Latin America. Fujimori is the first elected president in the region to be tried for human-rights abuses in his own country. By the account of many observers the trial, in a civilian court, was fair. Furthermore, Fujimori is still fairly popular. (His daughter, already a congresswoman, is a contender in the next presidential election in 2011.)

During his two terms as Peru's president, from 1990 to 2000, many hailed Fujimori as a saviour. As he told the court, when he took office he was "governing in hell". He ended hyperinflation, and opened up a fossilised state-dominated economy, launching two decades of rapid economic growth that has lifted millions of Peruvians out of poverty. He crushed the vicious insurgency of the Shining Path, a Maoist guerrilla group which, together with the army's dirty war against them, cost 70,000 lives.

But there was always a dark, cynical side to Fujimori, who governed as an autocrat. He gave the army free rein, using it to shut down Peru's Congress and its courts in 1992. He rigged an election to win an unconstitutional third term, only for his regime to implode shortly afterwards. That laid bare the machinations of Vladimiro Montesinos, his intelligence chief, who systematically bribed politicians, judges and media owners, while extorting kickbacks from businessmen and drug barons. Investigators found that more than $1 billion was stolen from public funds during Fujimori's rule.

His conviction is part of a worldwide trend to hold heads of state accountable, as Human Rights Watch pointed out. In Latin America, dictators may have largely departed, but in some places they have been replaced by elected autocrats who, like Fujimori, neuter their country's legislature and courts. The lesson from Lima is that the law may eventually catch up with them. Hugo Chávez, watch out."

“The Bush administration has consistently turned a blind eye to Colombia’s serious human rights violations,”

From Human Rights Watch, we continue our pattern of looking the other way at human rights violations where it suits us, especially in the disaster called the Drug War:

"(Washington, DC, January 12, 2009) – US President George W. Bush’s decision to award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to President Álvaro Uribe of Colombia is a disturbing example of the Bush administration’s disregard for serious human rights concerns out of zeal to show unconditional support to governments that it views as strategic allies, seven leading nongovernmental organizations said today.( PATHETIC )

The organizations include Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International-USA, Center for International Policy, Human Rights First, Latin America Working Group, Refugees International, and the Washington Office on Latin America.

Bush is giving the award to Uribe at a ceremony in the White House on Tuesday, January 13, 2009.

“The Bush administration has consistently turned a blind eye to Colombia’s serious human rights violations,” said the organizations. “Its selection of Uribe to receive this award only further tarnishes the Bush administration’s own reputation on human rights issues in the region.”

The groups pointed out that President Uribe has repeatedly taken steps and carried out policies that are damaging to human rights in Colombia.

Under President Uribe’s watch, there has been a dramatic increase in reports of extrajudicial killings of civilians by the Colombian Army. And while Uribe’s government has strongly confronted the abusive left-wing guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Uribe has failed to take a similarly clear stance against equally abusive drug-running paramilitary groups, who have massacred, raped, and forcibly displaced thousands of Colombians in recent decades. Fundamental flaws in a paramilitary demobilization process under Uribe have permitted many of the groups to continue to engage in abuses under new names. The president's verbal attacks on his country’s human rights defenders have been frequent and disturbing. And Uribe has often opposed efforts to break paramilitaries’ influence in the political system, including by making unfounded accusations against the Supreme Court justices who are investigating more than 70 members of the Colombian Congress for links to paramilitaries."

What a disgrace.

"Israel and Hamas both must respect the prohibition under the laws of war against deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians"

From Human Rights Watch:

Disregard for Civilians Underlies Current Escalation

December 30, 2008

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( TRUE ), while a rising number of the hundreds of Israeli bombings in Gaza since December 27, 2008, appear to be unlawful attacks causing civilian casualties( TRUE ). 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( TRUE ).

"Firing rockets into civilian areas with the intent to harm and terrorize Israelis has no justification whatsoever, regardless of Israel's actions in Gaza( TRUE )," 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( TRUE )."

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."