News

Prominent Vietnamese Blogger Arrested for Anti-Government Comments

By Brian Lanciault

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

HANOI, Vietnam — Vietnamese police arrested Pham Viet Dao, a prominent internet activist and blogger, yesterday for “abusing democratic freedoms” according to the Ministry of Public Security website. Dao has long been an aggressive critic of the one-party, communist government.

According to Dao, internet bloggers are the new journalists of Vietnam. (Photo Courtesy of Associated Press)

Dao has historically been critical of the state-run media industry in Vietnam, stating in a seminar last year that social media must “make up for the shortcomings and handicapped official media in the country.” He stated that with the advent of the internet and its rapidly increasing popularity, “individuals and bloggers have become journalists.”

Dao is a former government official and long-time member of the Vietnam Writers Association. He ran a website that posted articles, written by Dao, that criticized government leaders and officials. Dao had recently been vocal on several sensitive issues, including the Vietnamese government’s handling of China’s policy regarding the South China Sea, and the troubled economy. Since Dao’s arrest on Thursday, the website has been inoperative and locked down by the government.

Over the last three years, perceived Chinese aggression in the South China Sea have sparked extensive protesting and rallying in Vietnam. Activists were initially tolerated by the government, however recent demonstrations, which more aggressively dissented against the government, have been shut down by security forces.

The government has also come under intense pressure facing a stagnant economy. According to one economist, Nguyen Quang A, Dao’s arrest was an attempt by the government to send a message to the country to “shut up” and to put an end to internet-based criticism of the regime. Dao’s arrest came just  after the arrest of another prominent internet activist, Truong Duy Nhat, on May 26 on similar charges. So far this year 38 bloggers have been arrested on charges of “abusing democratic freedoms” and some 46 activists have been detained and sentenced for similar “anti-state” activities.

One government minister has issued a statement regarding internet use and the recent crackdown on internet-based dissent. At an address to the National Assembly, Nguyen Bac Son, Minister of Information and Communications, praised the benefits of the internet in Vietnam, but warned against its negative effects as well, stating that “recently, opportunist elements in the country and the overseas hostile forces have abused the Internet to spread information that sabotaged the country, distorted the policy of our Party and state.”

Neither Nhat nor Dao have faced trial yet. Bloggers arrested on similar charges have received as much as twelve years imprisonment. The government says that no one has been jailed for peacefully expressing their views, only those that have broken the law.

For more information, please see:

Reuters — Vietnamese police arrest anti-government blogger — 14 June 2013

BBC News — Vietnam arrests prominent blogger for ‘abusing freedoms’ — 14 June 2013

Wall Street Journal —Vietnam Arrests Prominent Blogger — 14 June 2013

Times of India — Vietnam detains second blogger in weeks — 14 June 2013

 

Prosecutor of United Nations Rwanda Genocide Tribunal Urges Cooperation to Catch Fugitives

By Erica Smith
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

WASHINGTON, D.C., United States – At a press conference, Justice Hassan Bubacar Jallow, Prosecutor of the (ICTR) and the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunal urged UN member states “to live up to their obligations to cooperate with the [residual mechanism], and the tracking and the arrest of these fugitives.”

Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow (Photo Courtesy of UN Photo)

The ICTR is based in Arusha Tanzania and was set up after the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. The Rwandan Genocide saw the killing of at least 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus in a span of three months.

The tribunal has indicted 93 people, all of whom were arrested with the exception of nine men who are still on the run. The nine men are, Augustin Bizimana, the Minister of Defense of the interim Government ; Félicien Kabuga, who is believed to have financed the genocide; Protais Mpiranya, Fulgence Kayishema, Pheneas Munyarugarama, Charles Sikubwabo, Aloys Ndimbati, Ladislas Ntaganzwa and Charles Ryandikayo.

Justice Bubacar Jallow’s call comes as the mandates for the ICTR and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia are set to expire and the U.N. Security Council has urged the tribunals to conclude their work by the end of 2014. The Council set up the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) in December 2010 to take over any tasks left unfinished when the mandate for the ICTR expires.  The ICTR branch of the Residual Mechanism began functioning in July 2012.

Jallow confirmed that the trial phase of the tribunal’s work is completed and that the tribunal is currently focused on managing appeals. Five of the six remaining appeals will most likely be completed in 2014 before the mandate expires but there is one appeal that is not expected to conclude until July 2015.

Judge Vagn Joensen, president of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, has stated that a main concern for the tribunal is relocating seven people who were acquitted and three released after serving their terms. The ten individuals are currently in Tanzania in safe houses under the tribunal’s protection. “The ICTR is deeply concerned about the consequences of failing to uphold the fundamental right of freedom to live one’s life after being acquitted, and the importance of finding host countries for these persons before the Tribunal closes cannot be stressed enough,” Mr. Joensen said. “We call upon all Member States [… ] to assist with this persistent problem.”

There is no time limit on prosecutions and when the ICTR’s mandate expires the IRMCT can be activated at anytime to try the fugitives when they are apprehended and precautions have been taken to preserve evidence and testimony against the accused.

Mr Jallow confirmed that even though the tribunal’s mandate is drawing to a close the nine fugitives if apprehended will still face justice. “There is no time limit to the prosecution of these cases. Your hiding does not pay off. The mechanism will not relent,” Mr. Jallow said.

The Office of Global Criminal Justice  is offering up to a $5 million reward for information leading to the arrest or conviction of any of the nine men.

 

For more information, please see:

RTT News – International Cooperation Sought For Capturing Rwanda Genocide Fugitives – 12 June 2013

The Gazette – UN tribunals for ex-Yugoslavia and Rwanda won’t meet UN deadline to finish work before 2015 – 12 June 2013

All Africa – Rwanda: Despite Procedural Delays, UN War Tribunals Still Making Progress, Officials Tell Security Council – 12 June 2013

UN New Centre – Prosecutor of UN Rwanda genocide tribunal urges cooperation to catch roaming fugitives – 11 June 2013

 

 

Kurdish Protesters Hope the Occupy Gezi Movement Will Raise Awareness about the Turkish Government History of Violence towards the Nation’s Largest Ethnic Minority

By Kathryn Maureen Ryan
Impunity Watch, Middle East Desk

ISTANBUL, Turkey – A small but vocal minority of Kurds participating in the Occupy Gezi movement in Turkey since late May have been taking the opportunity to use the world’s attention on Turkey to raise awareness about the Turkish Government’s history of abuses against the Kurdish population.

Kurdish protesters demonstrate at Gezi Park, Istanbul. (Photo courtesy of Al Jazeera)

Kurds make up roughly twenty percent of the Turkish population and are a large minority in many of the country’s major cities including Istanbul. The Kurdish population of Turkey is indigenous to the eastern and southeastern regions of the country, near the borders with Syria, Iraq and Iran. However, a large percentage of Kurds have fled their indigenous homeland into major Turkish cities in search of employment after Kurdish villages have been destroyed as a result of warfare and large scale infrastructure projects.

The Kurdish population in Turkey has faced decades of persecution from the government, which has launched systematic campaigns to suppress the Kurdish language and cultural expression. Most recently, thousands of Kurdish villagers have been displaced from their homeland as a result of infrastructure projects connected to the Southeastern Anatolia Project (The GAP Project) which is one of the largest hydroelectric infrastructure projects in the world.

The goal of the GAP project is to capitalize on Tigris and Euphrates headwaters which run though the highlands of Eastern Turkey in order to produce hydroelectric power for industrial development. The project involved the construction of 22 major dams which led to the displacement of several predominately Kurdish villages in the region; this inflamed the tensions between the Kurdish people and the government of Turkey.

Emre Elmekci, a Kurdish protester in his mid-twenties hopes that the Occupy Gezi movement will help the Turkish majority and the world understand the persecution and violence that the Kurdish population has faced at the hands of the Turkish population.  According the Elmekci, the violence that has been occurring in the streets of majorly Turkish cities over the past few weeks is “like the state violence that the Kurds have been facing for decades.”

The Turkish government’s violent reaction to the Occupy Gezi movement, a movement that was a reaction to the Turkish government’s design to destroy Istanbul’s last public green space in order to serve economic interests by constructing a commercial shopping center, is similar to the government suppression and displacement of the Kurdish minority in order to support industrial interests in Turkey.

For more information, please see:

Al Jazeera – Protesters #OccupyGezi to Save Istanbul Park – 14 June 2013

Al Jazeera – Protesting Kurds Finding Solidarity in Gezi – 12 June 2013

Kurd Net – Turkey’s GAP Project is an Ethnic & Cultural Genocide against Kurds – 31 March 2010

Kurdish Herald – Turkey’s GAP and Its Impact in the Region – September 2009

 

Memoir and Documents May Link Minnesota Man to World War II Atrocities

By Ben Kopp
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

BERLIN, Germany – Following evidence that a former Nazi SS officer has been living in Minnesota since 1949, Polish prosecutors promised to assist the U.S. Department of Justice in their investigation of falsified immigration papers. As obligated, Germany may prosecute Michael Karkoc for war crimes as a Nazi with “command responsibility,” even if no country can prove Karkoc’s direct involvement in atrocities.

Michael Karkoc is accused of having led a company in World War II that committed war crimes on behalf of the Nazis. (Photo courtesy of the Associated Press)

While no current evidence demonstrates that Karkoc directly committed war crimes, evidence corroborates suggestions that Karkoc was present as the company leader when his Ukrainian company massacred civilians. Further, Nazi SS files mention Officer Karkoc’s involvement in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, where Nazis brutally suppressed a Polish rebellion.

In 1949, Karkoc denied his World War II military service to American authorities. However, records demonstrate that Karkoc worked as an officer and founding member of the SS-led Ukrainian Self Defense Legion. According to an SS payroll document, Karkoc was the highest-ranking officer of the company. Later, Karkoc was an officer in the SS Galician Division. Both organizations were blacklisted and their members forbidden from entering the United States.

While Germany plans to investigate with the possibility of future prosecution, Poland may also be a possibility because most alleged crimes were against Poles on Polish territory. Regardless, Karkoc would be unlikely to be tried in his native Ukraine, where such men are today largely seen as national heroes who fought for the country against the Soviet Union.

Members of his unit and other witnesses have told stories of brutal attacks on civilians. But Karkoc refused to answer questions. “I don’t think I can explain,” Karkoc said.

“It was all like a trance: setting the fires, the shooting, the destroying,” one of Karkoc’s men, Vasyl Malazhenski recalled in a 1967 statement. “Later, when we were passing in file through the destroyed village,” Malazhenski said, “I could see the dead bodies of the killed residents: men, women, children.”

In 1995, Karkoc published a memoir in Ukrainian. Karkoc wrote that he joined the German army in 1941, following the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. At that time, he fought on the Eastern Front in Ukraine and Russia, where he received an Iron Cross for bravery. In 1943, Karkoc helped found the Ukrainian Self Defense Legion. Also, Karkoc served as a company commander in the unit, which the SS managed until the end of the war. However, Karkoc does not discuss massacres of civilians.

As a hobby, a retired clinical pharmacologist researched Nazi war crimes. Through that research, he found Karkoc’s name among members of the SS Galician Division who emigrated to Britain. After an internet search revealed Karkoc’s Minnesota address, the pharmacologist informed AP.

One of Karkoc’s four sons born after the war stated that the story is “notably lacking in proof or evidence,” calling the AP’s story “sensationalist and scandalous.”

If finding the officers who committed World War II atrocities has been challenging to date, a greater difficulty presents itself in ensuring that Michael Karkoc is in fact Officer Karkoc.

For further information, please see:

Minneapolis Star Tribune – Son Disputes Report That Minneapolis Man was Ex-Nazi Commander – 15 June 2013

New York Times – Minnesota Man, 94, is Investigated for Nazi Ties – 15 June 2013

USA Today – Shock Lingers after Nazi Unit Leader Found in Minnesota – 15 June 2013

Associated Press – AP Impact: Commander of Nazi-Led Unit Lives in US – 14 June 2013

International Business Times – Minnesota Nazi: Michael Karkoc, 94-Year-Old Former Nazi-SS Commander, Found Living in Minneapolis – 14 June 2013

The Telegraph – Commander in Nazi SS-Led Unit Linked to Atrocities ‘Found Living in Minnesota’ – 14 June 2013