By Christina Berger
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

BELGRADE, Serbia— Human rights organization Amnesty International recently called on Serbia to stop forced evictions of Roma. Amnesty International released a report detailing two years of discrimination and forced evictions where Roma were removed to housing conditions that are inadequate in many cases.

The report, Home is more than a roof over your head: Roma denied adequate housing in Serbia, details the forced evictions of at least seven settlements of Roma in the capital Belgrade beginning in April 2009. Those evicted are often removed to metal containers in segregated settlements, while others are forced to live in poverty with inadequate housing in Southern Serbia.

Amnesty estimates that about a third of Belgrade’s Roma population live in informal settlements, which lack sanitation, basic services, and even a regular supply of water. Roma are not allowed to register as citizens of Belgrade and as a result are often denied access to employment, social security, health care, and education.

Sian Jones, Amnesty International’s Serbia researcher, said, “[i]nstead of halting forced evictions the Serbian authorities in Belgrade are carrying out more and more, driving Roma communities from their homes and forcing them to live in inadequate housing.”

Amnesty International urged Serbia to comply with their international obligations by ensuring the Roma have access to housing with sanitation within a reasonable distance of public facilities and employment, as well as access to legal remedies. Amnesty has also urged Serbia to make sure the Roma in Belgrade are free from future forced evictions, mainly by developing a legal framework to prohibit forced evictions in the future.

Many of these evictions that have occurred over the last two years are a result of plan enacted by the Belgrade Assembly in 2009 to put into place large-scale infrastructure projects funded mostly by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank. According to the Amnesty report, these plans would affect at least 50 of the 100 Roma settlements in Belgrade.

An estimated 500,000 thousand Roma live in Serbia, accounting for 7% of the Serbian population. Many Roma living in Belgrade originally fled Kosovo after the war in 1999. Others have been forcibly removed from Western European countries, after arriving there in search of work or international protection.

For more information, please see:

AP — Amnesty International urges Serbia to stop forced evictions of Roma in Belgrade — 9 April 2011

SOUTHEAST TIMES — Serbia is urged to stop forced evictions of Roma — 8 April 2011

UPI — Roma day marked by demands for rights — 8 April 2011

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL — Serbia urged to stop forced evictions of Roma — 7 April 2011

By Christina Berger
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

STRASBOURG, France — The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) recently ruled that Italy violated the ban on torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in deporting a man to Tunisia in 2009. The deportation took place despite the ECHR’s repeated requests at the time to stop the transfer due to the risk of torture the man faced once in Tunisia.

Ali Ben Sassi Toumi, a Tunisian man married to an Italian, was sentenced in Milan, Italy in 2007 to six years on charges related to international terrorism. His sentence was remitted and he was released in May 2009. Toumi was then detained in Italy while awaiting deportation. During that time, the ECHR communicated on three separate occasions the request to stay the transfer based on the opinion that Toumi was at a significant risk of being tortured once returned to Tunisia and deportation would seriously hinder the Court’s ability to rule on the protection of Toumi’s asserted rights.

Toumi applied for asylum in Italy, but was denied because he had been convicted of a serious crime. He was forcibly returned to Tunisia in August 2009, where he claims he was held and tortured for 10 days by the Tunisian authorities before being released under threat to keep his silence regarding his detention. Toumi’s Italian lawyer was denied access to him during that time.

The Italian government maintained that Toumi had only been held for three days while he was legitimately questioned in connection with an international terrorism case, and that he had not been subjected to ill-treatment, a version of events the Court found unlikely. In asserting this claim, the Italian authorities relied only on information provided by Tunisian authorities.

The Italian authorities claimed they had relied on diplomatic assurances by Tunisian authorities before deportation that Toumi would not face ill-treatment and he would receive a fair trial once returned to Tunisia. The ECHR reprimanded Italy in the judgement opinion for relying on such assurances given that “reliable international sources” indicated that claims of torture and ill-treatment were not properly investigated by Tunisian authorities, who were “reluctant to cooperate” with human rights organizations.

Julia Hall, Amnesty International’s expert on counter-terrorism and human rights in Europe, said in response to the Court’s ruling that the “Italian government completely disregarded the European Court’s authority and used dubious promises from the Tunisian authorities to justify its actions. People cannot be sent to countries where they risk being tortured or otherwise ill-treated, under any circumstances, and assurances from a government known to torture cannot serve as a guarantee of safety on return.”

For more information, please see:

AFP — EU rights court censures Italy for Tunisian’s deportation — 5 April 2011

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL — Italy violated torture ban during Tunisia deportation — 5 April 2011

ECHR PRESS RELEASE — Another removal of a terrorist from Italy to Tunisia notwithstanding the Court’s indications and the risk of ill-treatment — 5 April 2011

By Daniel M. Austin
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

OMAGH, Northern Ireland -On Saturday, April 2, Constable Ronan Kerr, 25, was killed when a bomb that had been placed under his vehicle exploded. Kerr, a Catholic officer, had completed his police training only three weeks before the attack.  Three individuals have been detained and authorities believe a weapons cache recently discovered is related to the bombing.  Although no group has claimed responsibility for the attack, it is widely believed the bombing was carried out by radical elements of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) seeking to disrupt the Catholic-Protestant peace process.

During the afternoon of April 2, an explosive device detonated in the Highfield Close area of Omagh. The bomb, attached to Mr. Kerr’s car, exploded as he was backing out of his driveway heading into work. Neighbors heard the explosion and tried rescue Mr. Kerr but were unable to save him. Police believe the bomb had been planted the night before.

On Wednesday, April 7, Scottish police arrested a 26 year-old suspect after a weapons cache was uncovered in Coalisland, Northern Ireland. The PSNI claim the weapons were found in a stolen vehicle and included: four rifles, ammunition, timer power units, detonators, incendiary bombs, components for rocket launchers and other explosive devices, and a quantity of explosives, possibly Semtex. The suspect is believed to have been working in Scotland when he was arrested but authorities have not given any details on the link between the weapons found and the suspect who was detained.

More recently two other suspects, a 33 year-old and a 40 year-old, both from Omagh have been detained by police. The 40 year-old was picked up on Thursday, and the 33 year-old suspect was taken into custody on early Friday.  Police plan on questioning them for the next five days. The names of all three suspects have not been released to the public.

Mr. Kerr is the second member of the of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) to be killed since PSNI was created from the Royal Ulster Constabulary in 2001 as part of the peace process between Catholics and Protestants. The other murder occurred in 2009.

Sectarian tensions are especially pronounced in the formerly Protestant-dominated PSNI due to an influx of Catholic officers. Since 2001, the percentage of Catholic officers has increased from 9 to 30 percent. This has led radical elements of the IRA to target these officers because their participation in the police force shows complicity with both Protestants and the United Kingdom, both sworn enemies of this group.

In 2005, most members of the IRA laid down their arms and denounced violence but a small fraction continue to fight. Since 2005 dozens of bombs have been set under police officers’ cars but few have detonated with such tragic consequences. Strikingly, most of the bombs planted did not detonate, while those that have exploded mostly wounded but did not kill their intended target.

Both the location and target of this attack are symbolic. In August 1998, Omagh was the site of the worst bombing in Northern Ireland. That attack killed 29 people and left hundreds injured when a car bomb exploded in a shopping district.  The 1998 attack was carried out by a group called the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA), an off shoot of the IRA.

The August 1998 attack was the deadliest incident of the Troubles, the name given to the three decades of violence between Protestants and Catholics. During the three decades, more than 3,500 people were killed. One of the major points of contention was Catholics wanted Northern Ireland to become part of the Republic of Ireland while Protestants wanted Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom. The sectarian violence was halted by an April 1998 peace agreement.

For more information, please see:

AFP — Third arrest in N.Ireland police murder probe– 07 April 2011

AFP — N. Ireland policeman killed in car bomb attack – 02 April 2011

BBC —Policeman killed in Omagh car bomb attack – 02 April 2011

CBC News — Car bomb kills N. Ireland policeman –02 April 2011

SKY NEWS — Second Arrest In Omagh PC Murder Probe – 07 April 2011

The Daily Mail —‘He had only just joined’: Catholic police recruit, 25, killed after being targeted by booby trap car bombers at his home in Omagh – 02 April 2011

Time —Tragic But Not Troubled: The Murder of a Northern Irish Policeman—02 April 2011

By Christina Berger
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

BELFAST, Northern Ireland — The British government has issued a formal apology to the family of a schoolgirl who was killed by the British army in Northern Ireland in 1976. The apology, coming almost 35 years after the incident, has acknowledged that the version of what happened as told by the solider involved is “unlikely.”

Majella O’Hare, a 12-year-old Catholic girl, was walking with school friends to church in county Armagh during the summer of 1976 when she was struck in the back by two bullets. Her father, who was the school caretaker, witnessed the shooting. Majella died in a helicopter on the way to the hospital.

The paratrooper who fired the shots, Private Michael Williams, claimed that he had fired the shots in response to an IRA sniper hiding in the bushes. The RUC conducted an initial investigation, and found that Williams was not returning fire at a gunman. The RUC recommended Williams be charged with manslaughter and prosecuted. Williams was prosecuted but he was acquitted by a senior Belfast judge.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland’s Historical Enquiries Team (HET) has been conducting investigations into more than 3,000 unsolved killings, many of which took place during the Troubles. The HET reinvestigated Majella O’Hare’s case and concluded that there was never any evidence to suggest there had been an IRA gunman present. Last summer, the HET’s director urged the army to apologize for killing Majella. This was in addition to campaigning for a formal apology which British Irish Rights Watch, a civil liberties group, has done for years.

The apology, signed by secretary of defense Liam Fox, was hand-delivered to Majella’s 88-year-old mother by the Northern Ireland secretary. The letter read in part: “I apologise for Majella’s death and offer you my heartfelt sympathy…both the initial investigation by the RUC and the more recent review have concluded that it was unlikely that there was a gunman in the area when the soldier involved opened fire and struck Majella, as he claimed. The soldier’s actions resulted in the loss of a young and innocent life, causing sorrow and anguish for those who knew and loved Majella. On behalf of the army and the government I am profoundly sorry that this tragic incident should have happened.”

This was only the second apology to ever be issued by the British government for army conduct during Northern Ireland’s Troubles. Last summer, a general apology was issued in response to a report that rejected the army’s defense for what happened on Bloody Sunday in 1972, when 13 Catholic demonstrators were killed. Groups like British Irish Rights Watch hope that this signals a change in the attitude of politicians and military figures, and in the future they might be more willing to acknowledge that what happened in certain cases was wrong.

Majella’s family has welcomed the apology, though they’ve noted it’s been a long time coming. “It’s good to get this apology,” Majella’s brother Michael said. “It’s not going to bring Majella back but at least it will set the record straight for history.”

For more information, please see:

IRISH TIMES — Apology but no new criminal case over 1976 shooting of girl in North — 29 March 2011

AP — British apologize for ’76 killing of Catholic girl — 28 March 2011

GUARDIAN — Ministry of Defence says sorry for killing of Majella O’Hare — 28 March 2011