Somalia Frees Journalist Held For Reporting Rape
By Ryan Aliman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa
MOGADISHU, Somalia – Freelance journalist Abdiaziz Abdinur was finally released from imprisonment last Sunday.
Also known as “Koronto”, Abdinur was arrested last month for interviewing a woman who alleged she had been raped by Somali soldiers. He and the alleged rape victim were brought into custody without warrant and were sentenced to a year in jail for “offending state institutions”.
On Sunday, however, the Somali High Court announced that the charges against Abdinur had been dropped. High Court Chairman Aideed Abdullahi Ilkahanaf told the press that the justices found “no evidence to support his charges.”
Abdinur was relieved upon hearing the court’s decision. “I’m happy to be free,” Abdinur told reporters after thanking the international community and journalist organizations for urging the Somali government to free him. “I’m very happy that I got my freedom back, I thank those who worked in this process that helped my release including my lawyers,” he added on his way out from court.
Abdinur’s case fueled worldwide outrage from various governments and human rights groups.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was “deeply disappointed” by Abdinur’s arrest. The U.S. State Department, meanwhile, said his imprisonment “the wrong message to perpetrators of sexual and gender-based violence”.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) described it as “a direct assault on press freedom” in the country especially since it is in the process of recovering from civil war and dictatorship.
Condemning the government’s decision to convict Abdinur, Africa director at Human Rights Watch Daniel Bekele reminded Somali authorities that “silencing rape victims and journalists will not end sexual violence, but just reinforce Somalia’s climate of impunity.”
After announcing Abdinur’s release, Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon Saaid acknowledged the “deep-seated problems” with both the armed forces and judicial system. He said that his administration shall implement measures to safeguard the independence of the local media. He hopes to put an end to the threats, arrests, and attacks several journalists have been subjected to. According to him, the local media plays a critical and constructive role “during the hard times of the country.”
But the Prime Minister also reminded the press of their responsibility. He told reporters that they, in turn, “should be professional and work in the line of the ethics of the media and journalism” as they receive protection from the government.
“Somalia is returning to normalcy and peace, the local media should prioritize how to pacify the country and lead harmony within the Somali people,” Prime Minister Shirdon said.
For further information, please see:
All Africa – Somalia: Somali Prime Minister Vows Protection of Independent Media – 17 March 2013
Al Jazeera – Somali journalist held over rape report freed – 17 March 2013
BBC News – Somalia frees rape row journalist – 17 March 2013
Reuters – Somali court frees reporter jailed for interviewing rape victim – 17 March 2013
Shanghai Daily – Somalia court frees rape reporting journalist – 17 March 2013
Police in India Arrest Local Tribesmen Suspected of Raping a Swiss Tourist
By Irving Feng
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
Local Indian police arrested five or six young men who allegedly gang raped a Swiss female tourist on Friday, bringing into question India’s commitment to providing adequate safety to women within its borders.
The Swiss woman, age 39, was vacationing with her husband when the gruesome crime occurred. She and her husband were engaged in a 250 kilometer (roughly 155 miles) biking adventure tour from Orchha to Agra to visit the Taj Mahal when they stopped to camp near Sewda road.
They set up camp in a forested area, and the suspected perpetrators invaded their camp area during the night. The men beat the woman’s husband with wooden sticks, and some of the men sexually assaulted and brutally raped the woman in front of her husband while he was tied up to a tree.
The suspects were reportedly carrying a firearm at the time of the assault. Police say that the attackers also stole some of the pair’s valuables including cellular phones, laptop computer, and around 10,000 rupees ($185).
The young men suspected of committed the crime were all members of a local tribe known as the Kanjar from the village of Jharia in the Datia district. Police checked the criminal history of the men and found their records to be clean. Their ages ranged from 20 to 25.
The couple has made it safely to the Swiss embassy in New Delhi. The Swiss Ministry for Foreign Affairs released a statement to the press indicating that there is an extreme interest in rectifying the situation for their two citizens, and a course of action will be implemented in due time.
The Swiss government had recently issued a travel warning last month to all tourists travelling to India regarding the alarming number of rapes and other sexual attacks occurring throughout the country. Other countries may be prompted to release similar warnings to their general publics in the near future.
This newest incident involving a foreign victim comes at a time when sexual crimes in India are on the rise. The National Crime Records Bureau suggests that roughly one woman is raped every 20 minutes in their country.
After last December’s brutal rape and murder of a physiotherapy student in Delhi, protestors took to the streets to demonstrate and called for the perpetrators to be sentenced to death. India’s legislature has recently implemented harsher punishments for the crime of rape, increasing the prison terms from seven to ten years to a maximum of 20 years.
For further information, please see:
BBC – Six held over India rape of Swiss woman – 18 March 2013
The Times of India – 5 arrested for Swiss woman’s gang-rape – 18 March 2013
The Huffington Post – Five Men Arrested In Gang-Rape Of Swiss Woman In India – 17 March 2013
Reuters – Six arrested for gang-raping Swiss tourist in India: police – 17 March 2013
SNHR: More Than 80,000 Killed Since Uprising Against Bashar Al-Assad
More than 80,000 people have been killed since Syria’s uprising against Bashar al-Assad began in March 2011, according to a statistic made by SNHR ( Syrian Network for Human Rights )
The revolution victims has been documented carefully by name , date and location of death , verified by photo or video , and all circumstances surrounding their death
The UN commissioned reports for documentation the killing in Syria , depends on SNHR as one of the most important sources of information at all , because of the high credibility and semi-permanent communication between SNHR and Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights
SNHR doesn’t issue any statistical without supplying files contain very precise details of each death case fully identified by the name of the victim , as well as the date and location of death
Since Syria’s uprising began in March 2011 to10-3-2013 , SNHR documented at least killing of 80159 people, including :
7783 Children
7045 Women
2189 tortured to death
7483 armed rebels
(On the following link to the official website of SNHR , you can find all names and details of the victims )
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9Bj18tlYYKBQ0lSb1VXTTI1OVE/edit
Proportion of women and children to the total number of victims accounted as follows :
80195 ÷ ( 7783+7045) = 5,4
Targeting women and children is one of the international standards to identify the percentage of targeting civilians in wars. This percentage should not exceed 2%, but in the Syrian case, it reached 5.4%, The Syrian government exceeded twice the recognized percentage in wars , and in other months exceeded three times , which is a strict evidence of targeting civilians by Alassad troops
Distribution of recorded death by Syrian Province :
Damascus and countryside : 16111
Homs : 14331
Aleppo : 10769
Idlib : 10538
Daraa : 7169
Hama : 6386
Dier Alzoor : 5463
Damascus : 5112
Lattakia : 1473
Raqqa : 836
Al -Hasaka : 569
Another nationalities ( mostly Palestinian live in Syrian ) : 565
Quneitra : 558
Tartous 338
Swaidaa : 121
It is significant to mention that if we could work freely and move around without prosecutions the actual number will be more than that in thousands , we couldn’t document hundred of massacres and killing cases for many reasons including procedures repeatedly and systematically made by Alassad troops like communications disconnect and blockade areas for many days , not to mention that the cases like family buried the victims in mass graves as a fear of spread diseases and epidemics .
All of that because the Syrian government has prevented any of the human right organization to perform their duty on its territory
SNHR doesn’t document Alassad troops murders of Shabiha , security , military and intelligence loyal to Alassad for lack of mechanism to verify them , cause of the ban practiced by the government on SNHR and arresting its members
We have tried repeatedly to communicate with some families of the victims , they reply with abuse , insults and accusations of treason
Results and Recommendations:
Alassad troops with its act of killing systematically more than 80000 Syrian citizens committed thousands of crimes against humanity and war crimes according to articles 7 and 8 of ROME STATUE OF INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT,
Murder;
(b) Extermination;
(c) Enslavement;
(d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population;
(e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law;
(f) Torture;
(g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
(h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender as defined in paragraph 3, or other grounds that are universally recognized as impermissible under international law, in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court;
(i) Enforced disappearance of persons;
(j) The crime of apartheid;
(k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.
1- 2- Crimes against humanity , according to article 8 War Crimes of ROME STATUE OF INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT :
a) Grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, namely, any of the following acts against persons or property protected under the provisions of the relevant Geneva Convention:
(i) Willful killing;
(ii) Torture or inhuman treatment, including biological experiments;
(iii) Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health;
(iv) Extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly;
(v) Compelling a prisoner of war or other protected person to serve in the forces of a hostile Power;
(vi) Willfully depriving a prisoner of war or other protected person of the rights of fair and regular trial;
(vii) Unlawful deportation or transfer or unlawful confinement;
b) xxii) Committing rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, as defined in article 7, paragraph 2 (f), enforced sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence also constituting a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions;
Therefore We demand the Security Council and the United Nations and Member States to work at a maximum speed to take all safety procedures for protecting to protect civilians in Syria, and they are taking responsibility with the Syrian regime in droop for supporting Syrian people and the protection of civilians ,where they have to comply with the responsibility of ethical, legal and accelerate steps toward reference all those involved in the those massacres to the international Criminal Court.
On the other hand, there are groups of armed rebels committed war crimes condemned in the strongest terms and have been recorded and documented and will be prosecuted criminals and offenders who committed, but remain within the framework of individual attacks unsystematic and non-extensive as we did not record single incident indicates a partisan political or ideological or sectarian or tribal attack
The SNHR holds Bashar Alassad as the Syrian president and the commander of the Armed forces , the hole responsibility of all acts of murders , torture and massacres that have occurred in Syria.
Assad is primarily responsible for ordering these acts, and we consider all officials of the Syrian government , which leads the security and army operations as a direct partner of this crimes , and the same for the Iranian government and Hezbullah participate actively killings and holds them legal judiciary and responsibility , as well as all financiers and supporters of the system and who is committing massacres an almost unstopped daily basis, systematic in day or night, and we hold them all reactions and consequences, and that may be issued from the Syrian people, especially relatives of the martyrs and their families .
Syrian Revolution Digest: Friday, 15 March 2013
Two Years Later!
Two years after the beginning of the Syrian Revolution, the fate of the regime, the delusions of its leaders and their domestic, regional and international supporters notwithstanding, has been sealed, the fight now is for control of the country: heart, soul and body.
Today’s Death Toll: 144 martyrs, including 13 women, 12 children and 22 under torture: 59 in Damascus and Suburbs, 28 in Daraa most of them of torture at Hamida checkpoint,18 in Homs, 15 in Aleppo, 12 in Hama, 9 in Idlib, 2 in Deir Ezzor, and 1 in Latakia (LCCs).
Points of Random Shelling: 319 points. Aerial bombardments counted in 11. Scud bombing counted in 2 points. Shelling using Surface-to-Surface missiles counted in 4 points. Shelling using cluster bombs recorded in Sarmeen and Salqeen. Mortar shelling counted in 123 points. Artillery shelling counted for 121 points. Rocket shelling counted in 57 points (LCCs).
Clashes: 135. Successful operations include seizing munition depots in Khan Toman, Aleppo (LCCs).
Rallies: 245. Deir Ezzor 63, Aleppo 49, Hama 35, Damascus and Suburbs 33, Idlib with, Raqqa 11, Daraa 9, Homs 8, Hassakeh 4, Tartous 2 and Lattakia 2 (LCC).
News
CIA begins sizing up Islamic extremists in Syria for drone strikes The strategy is part of the agency’s secret contingency planning to protect the U.S. and its allies as the violence there grows. Some militants in Syria are seen as closely linked to Al Qaeda… The Counterterrorism Center, which runs the CIA’s covert drone killing program in Pakistan and Yemen, recently shifted several targeting officers to improve intelligence collection on militants in Syria who could pose a terrorist threat, the officials said… President Obama has not authorized drone missile strikes in Syria, however, and none are under consideration.
U.N. Calls Lag in Syria Aid Worst Funding Crisis in Recent Memory Halfway into an appeal for $1.5 billion to cover the cost of aid to Syrians in the first six month of the year, United Nations officials say they have received barely one-fifth of the money. “That math just doesn’t work,” said Radhouane Nouicer, the United Nations’s regional humanitarian coordinator, in a statement from the Jordanian capital, Amman, on Friday. “It translates into less food, fewer blankets, fewer medicines, less clean water.” The sluggish pace of money that has been pledged is only part of the problem. The rising violence in Syria has accelerated the flow of refugees, making the need more severe, United Nations officials say.
Opposition source: Syrian rebels get U.S.-organized training in Jordan A senior rebel spokesman, who did not want to be named discussing a sensitive matter, would not comment on the nature of the personnel conducting the training, such as whether the personnel were military troops or contractors. But he said that 300 fighters had already completed the course and crossed border into Syria on Thursday. The training was said to include the use of anti-tank and anti-aircraft weaponry, the latter aimed at the particularly vital part of the regime’s military might, which has thus far kept rebels often in check.
From every direction, arms for Syria France is pushing hard, it seems, for Western powers to arm Syria’s rebellion. If they get their way, they’ll be joining an already crowded playing field… Saudi Arabia and Qatar are already arming the rebellion, and Iran and its partner Hezbollah in Lebanon have been sending arms and men to fight alongside President Bashar al-Assad’s troops. Now Britain and France want to open the door to direct arming of the rebels themselves.
The Destruction of a Nation: Syria’s War Revealed in Satellite Imagery On the world map, Syria remains a country. On the ground, it has devolved into a battlefield warred over by sectarian fiefdoms, guerrilla outfits, extremist militias, criminal gangs and a regime clinging grimly to its dwindling sources of power and legitimacy.
Arab nations urge Damascus to cooperate with UN probe rab countries on Friday tabled a resolution lamenting the spiralling violence in Syria and demanding that the regime cooperate with a UN probe into rights violations in the war-torn country… The resolution — submitted to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva by Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates and posted on the council’s website — called for the UN investigators to be granted “immediate, full and unfettered access throughout the Syrian Arab Republic.”
Austria fears for its Golan observers, wants Syria arms ban kept Austria, fearing for the safety of its peacekeepers on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, said on Friday it opposed a French push to lift a European Union ban on arming Syrian rebels battling President Bashar al-Assad. Austrian Defence Minister Gerald Klug also demanded United Nations guarantees that the observers can be rotated and get supplies via Syria, amid growing concerns about their security.
EU fails to agree on sending arms to Syria rebels Leaders at a European Union summit on Friday failed to agree on whether they should send arms to Syrian rebels on the second anniversary of the uprising that has escalated a full-scale civil war. An EU embargo prohibits any arms from being sent to Syria, whether to the rebels or to the Assad government. That embargo is scheduled to remain in effect until May, when it will either be renewed or allowed to expire.
Syria opposition in new bid to name premier “The Coalition is to meet on March 18-19 in Istanbul. So far, the meeting is going ahead, and it is to choose the head of government. Consultations are continuing,” Samir Nashar told AFP. The Coalition posted on its Facebook account a list of 10 candidates.
Remembering the Start of Syria’s Uprising Gen. Salim Idriss, the leader of the Syrian opposition’s military wing, marked the second anniversary of the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad on Friday with a brief address posted on YouTube in Arabic and English. In his statement, General Idriss said: “As you all know the Syrian revolution started peacefully. The only thing the Syrian people asked for was freedom, justice and reform. The regime of Bashar al-Assad responded with violence, torture, killings, massacres and bombing of our cities. Today nobody is safe anymore, men and women, elderly people and children.”
Special Reports
Did Climate Change Spark the War in Syria? The current conflict in Syria illustrates how climate change can cause societal, civil and even political unrest, say the co-founders of the Washington D.C.-based Center for Climate and Security, Caitlin Werrell and Francesco Femia, in an article on Grist. A recent series of essays (pdf) by the Center argues that the “Arab Spring is a textbook example of the link between climate change and social instability.”
Alawite heartland on Syria’s coast remains loyal to Assad regime It is not clear whether the consensus on the regime is as rock solid as presented by the families bearing the cost of its war. But with the martyrdom cult fusing ideas of country, regime and community, and an enemy at the gates, the logic of sacrifice grinds on.
Between devils and angels in Damascus and Caracas Both the Chavez and Assad regimes have “antagonistic relationships with the US”, but the similarity ends there… Syrians should look to Palestinian civil society’s grassroots Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions model as one way in which a people suffering from oppression can uphold its moral claims despite the politicking of official bodies. Wouldn’t it be a feat if one of the Syrian delegations trotting around Paris or Istanbul had travelled instead to Caracas to convince Venezuelan oil or dock workers to take a stand in solidarity with Syria’s people by protesting shipments to the Syrian military?
My new paper, prepared for a briefing in Washington, D.C. that took place on January 15, 2013, is now out and is titled “Syria 2013: Rise of the Warlords.” It should be read in conjunction with my previous briefing “The Shredded Tapestry,” and my recent essay “The Creation of an Unbridgeable Divide.”
Video Highlights
Rebels from Ahrar Al-Sham and other Islamist groups affiliated with Syrian Islamic Front take control of loyalist headquarters in Khan Touman, Aleppo Province, and confiscate major arms and munition storage facilities http://youtu.be/3ReL0LaOHqg , http://youtu.be/e9oFu4JQK9Q , http://youtu.be/KAMzc3RvFUg Rebels celebrate their victory by removing all posters of Assad http://youtu.be/ltByZdePeF8 Rebels used their own tanks in storming the premises http://youtu.be/rVWGNkk0R8E
Rebels affiliated with the Syrian Islamic Front declares the consolidation of their hold over the village of Jousiyeh in Homs Province, close to the borders with Lebanon http://youtu.be/8TQMXFwYlnk
Rebels in Ruknaddine Neighborhood, Damascus City, ambush a car carrying an officer in the Republican Guard and three assistance, they claim to have killed them all http://youtu.be/Lpy4z1GW-4o
Activists catch a major explosion on camera. They believe it’s caused by a Scud missile. It’s not clear where the explosion happened http://youtu.be/QGMPtxlwuGk
Islamists rebels from Liwa al-Islam, storm a loyalist militia in the town of Adra, Damascus Suburbs, manned by members of Al-Jaish Al-Sha’bi, an entity designated as a terrorist group by the U.S. Treasury Department http://youtu.be/0wSJ5OakVjQ
Defectors in Aleppo from the air force form a new brigade dedicated to repairing and maintaining the various planes and helicopters that came under rebel control so that they can be used in the future for various humanitarian and military operations http://youtu.be/291j-Yifeeg Most of the planes that came under rebel control require serious repairs to become operational again, as they had been sabotaged by loyalists before abandoning their positions or bombed while on the tarmac by the regime after the fall of the various airports to rebels.
Protesters in Houleh, Homs Province, remain defiant even as they come under fire while commemorating the second anniversary of the revolution http://youtu.be/XhmLfmyuAXw