News

Kenyan Court Clears Candidate to Run Despite Crimes Against Humanity Charges

By Hannah Stewart
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

NAIROBI, Kenya — The High Court of Kenya dismissed arguments on Thursday that Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta’s pending trial in the International Criminal Court for charges of crimes against humanity renders him ineligible for the presidential elections.

Uhuru Kenyatta (right) and running mate William Ruto are accused of fueling post-election violence in 2007. (Photo Courtesy of BBC News)

Kenyatta and his running mate, William Ruto, are two of four accused at the International Criminal Court of orchestrating tribal fighting that killed 1,200 people after the last vote in 2007.  Both men deny the charges.

Kenyatta, a former finance minister and the son of the country’s founding president, is running a close second to Prime Minister Raila Odinga according to opinion polls for the March 4 presidential election.

Odinga and Kenyatta lead largely ethnic-based coalitions with few ideological differences, and there was concern regarding how Kenyatta’s supporters might react had he been barred from the elections.

Similar ethnic rivalries fueled the fighting after the last presidential elections five years ago.  The violence marred the image of the east African country, the region’s most powerful economy and a key western ally in the war against militant Islam in the region.

In reaching their decision to decline the case, the panel of five judges said in an oral statement, “the High Court lacks jurisdiction to deal with a question relating to the election of a president.”  Moreover, the judges stated that, “this is an issue that is within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Supreme Court.”

The Principal Judge of the High Court, Mbogholi Msagha, further explained that the court lacked jurisdiction over the petitions filed by various legal and rights groups.  He stated that the petitioners should have requested the electoral commission exclude Kenyatta and Ruto the ballot.

Msagha also said that the court could not deny Kenyatta and Ruto their right to contest the poll because they had not been convicted.  He added that, “they are presumed innocent until proved otherwise.”

It is not immediately clear whether an appeal will be submitted to the highest court.  However, it is likely that, if elected president, Kenyatta’s first foreign trip abroad will be to appear in the Hague at a hearing scheduled for April.

Likewise, the Kenyan government is being sued for police brutality in the violence following the 2007 election.  The families of seven people shot dead and eight wounded survivors of the post-election violence filed a lawsuit this week to sue the Kenyan government.  The petitioners claim that the police fired the shots during a dispute over who won Kenya’s 2007 presidential election.

Four human rights groups are also part of the suit against the government.  Moreover, there have been warnings from various international human rights groups that the police are not ready to prevent electoral violence while refraining from human rights violations.  Advocacy groups have criticized the Kenyan police for decades of ineffectiveness, corruption, human rights violations, and impunity.

For more information, please see:

ABC – Kenyan Government Sued for Police Brutality – 15 February 2013

BBC News – Uhuru Kenyatta Free to Run After Kenya Election Ruling – 15 February 2013

Reuters – Kenyatta Cleared to Run in Kenya Vote Despite Charges – 15 February 2013

The Guardian – Kenyan Court Clears Way for Uhuru Kenyatta to Run in Election – 15 February 2013

Ecuadorian Terrorists, Fighting For The Preservation Of The Amazon

By Brendan Oliver Bergh
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

QUITO, Ecuador – The authorization for a Chinese company’s development of a large copper mine within Ecuador’s amazon province incited hundreds of protesters claiming that the mining would contaminate the water sources and force people from their lands. In today’s Ecuador, these people might be deemed terrorists.

Shuar tribes in the Amazon promise to fight mineral and oil expansion to the deat. (Photo Courtesy of Pachamama Alliance)

It’s becoming harder to identify exactly what a terrorists in Ecuador does. Years ago it was the bombing of civilians and diplomats for political and military leverage, today? It’s the protests and resistance to what the government calls development, but what the protesters characterize as the protection of the amazon.

The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador, in an attempt to halt the growing expansionism of Amazonian lands has stated numerous times, that the president had failed in his promise to defend the interests of Ecuador’s indigenous population, and is in fact prosecuting 189 Indian leaders on the grounds that they are terrorists despite his promises to support the people and their environmental interests. In a statement “The person that has infringed most on our rights in the past four years has been the president.”

In a special assembly held last year, the infamous “head shrinking” Shuar tribe of Ecuador declared “The Amazon does not have to pay for the external debt the government has with china.” When Canadian and Chinese mining companies came to strip mine swathes of land, they lived up to those words. In the last ten years indigenous tribes have begun taking militant action against those that would destroy the eco-integrity of the land. And for that work, they have been deemed to be committing terrorism by Ecuadorians President Rafael Correa.

With the growth of South American infrastructure and the move to total industrialization the demand for oil is growing. This growth has led to a quickening arrival of drills from China and Canada, and unfortunately for the indigenous tribes of the amazon rain forest, who live and rely on the ecosystem underneath the lush rain forest, are vast deposits of oil, metals and minerals.

Armed resistance and violence continues against mining camps, and have been met with state security forces and the strong arm of Correa who has made a hobby out of arresting activists and intimidating journalists who threaten his conjured image of the ecologically minded man-of-the-people.

As hostiles continue, the Shuar tribe echoed a call for resistance, “to get the gold, they will have to kill everyone of us.”

For more information, please see:

Salon – “To Get The Gold, They Will Have To Kill Every One Of Us” – 10 February 2013

Red State – Ecuador’s Hugo Chavez – 7 February 2013

Pachamama Alliance – Shaur Assembly Says: “The Amazon Does Not Have To Pay For The External Debt The Government Has With China” – 1 October 2012

Al Jazeera – Indigenous Resistance Is The New ‘Terrorism’ – 10 July 2011

 

“Attacks on the Press” in the Middle East

By Justin Dorman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) just released its annual assessment on how press freedom is being treated throughout the world; and, the results were not pretty. The report details both the censorship of information, as well as the treatment of individual reporters. A new edition to the report included a “risk list” of ten places where press freedoms were particularly bad in 2012. Three such countries, Syria, Turkey, and Iran, are located in the Middle East.

In no previous time have journalists’ lives been at greater risk. (Photo Courtesy of the Committee to Protect Journalists)

This past year was not the safest of years to be a journalist. Globally, the number of journalists who were imprisoned in 2012 reached an all time high. Two hundred and thirty two journalists were reportedly detained, which is an increase of fifty three for the year before.

Seventy journalists had died while actively reporting in the past year which is a forty-three percent increase from 2011. CPJ’s research has came up with the harrowing figure that over the past two decades, one journalist is killed while working, once every eight days. These figures only include the known dead. There are at least thirty-five more journalists who are currently missing.

At this moment, Syria is the most dangerous place in the world to be a journalist. In the past year, at least twenty-eight journalist have been killed, while another two are missing.

While not as many journalists have been killed in Turkey; in no other place have more journalists been imprisoned. Forty-nine journalists were jailed in 2012. Turkey’s government utilizes laws which restrict the press’ freedom of speech, in order to curtail dissent.

Only four less journalists were imprisoned in Iran, however, the likelihood of their mistreatment during detention was far greater than anywhere else. Reporters and editors faced torture, solitary confinement, and deprivation of medical care. Those who were formally detained generally were arrested under some anti-state charge.

CPJ deputy director Robert Mahoney stated that, “when journalists are silenced, whether through violence or laws, we all stand to lose because perpetrators are able to obscure misdeeds, silence dissent, and disempower citizens.”

He added, “the battle to control information is an assault on public accountability that cannot go unchallenged. Governments must prosecute perpetrators and stop those seeking to incapacitate public oversight by blunting critical and probing reporting.”

Not only does limitation on freedom of speech violate international human rights law in its own regard, but the continuance of these attacks on the press serve to continue the existence of impunity in the Middle East.

The CPJ has been releasing its annual report since 1990.

For further information, please see:

Guardian – Journalism Under Attack Across the Globe Imperils Press Freedom – 14 February 2013

Huffington Post – CPJ Attacks on the Press Report: Number of Journalists Imprisoned, Killed Spiked in 2012 – 14 February 2013

Washington Post – Glance at Attacks on the Press – 14 February 2013

CPJ – Attacks on the Press: Journalism on the Front Lines in 2012

WOZA Protesters Beaten and Detained During Anti-Constitution Demo

By Ryan Aliman
Impunity Watch, Africa

HARARE, Zimbabwe – Several members of the Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) were assaulted and detained after two consecutive protests against the new draft constitution.

More than 200 WOZA members gathered outside the police station as they demanded to be arrested in solidarity with their colleagues. (Photo courtesy of The Zimbabwean)

On February 13, WOZA members in Harare marched towards the parliament to stage a demonstration against the draft constitution.

Believing that the draft constitution is a “result of negotiations behind closed doors and a deal that suits the principals and the political parties in the inclusive government”, around 50 women filled the streets and rallied against its enactment. “… it was written for a current political climate and not for the future generation. A constitution is supposed to be written by the people because they should determine how they want to be governed. It is their role to give the rule to the rulers,” read some of the flyers the WOZA members were distributing during their march.

However, as they were approaching the parliament building, they were blocked by police officers. In an attempt to disperse the group, the police fired tear gas at the WOZA members. Afterwards, they arrested a number of protestors. Reports say that the police also used baton sticks, locally known as “sjamboks”, to beat up the detainees as they were being bundled into police vehicles.

The arrested WOZA members were eventually released without charge on the same day. But according to Dr. Tarisai Mutangi from the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, a number of women sustained major injuries from the assault.

The following day, members from the Bulawayo chapter held their annual Valentine’s Day protest. With the theme – One Love, the protest was set to be staged outside the police Headquarters in 9th Avenue, at Southampton House. It aimed to raise awareness about police brutality and to urge the police to respond to the group’s formal complaints about arbitrary arrests and the police’s use of indiscriminate violence against protesters. Although the march began smoothly and peacefully, as the members neared the venue, police officers started chasing them off with baton sticks. Once again, WOZA members were brought into custody without charge and released on the same day. However, according to WOZA leader Jennifer Williams, unlike the arrests the previous day, six of their male co-members and one female co-member remain in detention.

Amnesty International’s southern Africa director Noel Kututwa condemned the violent treatment of WOZA members by the police forces. “This most recent incident sounds yet another alarm bell for the exercise of internationally guaranteed rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly in advance of the referendum on a new constitution and elections later this year,” Kututwa stated. “Human rights violations by the police, including arbitrary arrests and raids at offices of human rights defenders, go against the calls for tolerance made by President Mugabe and Prime Minister Tsvangirai,” he added.

 

For further information, please see:

WOZA – 195 arrested during Valentines Day protest, 50 beaten, Bertha remains in custody – 15 February 2013

All Africa – Zimbabwe: Woza Valentine’s Day Protestors Beaten And Arrested in Bulawayo – 14 February 2013

Amnesty International – Zimbabwe: Eight women arrested after handing out teddy bears and roses in peaceful protest – 14 February 2013

The Zimbabwean – Police arrest and assault WOZA members – 14 February 2013

ZimEye – Woza Woman Strips Naked Before Police, 180 Arrested – 14 February

SW Radio Africa – WOZA women beaten & detained after anti-constitution demo – 13 February 2013

 

Zimbabwe Prepares for New Constitutional Reform

By Heba Girgis
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

HARARE, Zimbabwe—Recent reports from the country of Zimbabwe indicate the country’s intent in preparing to hold major constitutional reform in March of this year.

Threats of violence, however, surround the upcoming votes and elections. (Photo Courtesy of TRNS)

Zimbabwe’s constitutional affairs minister says that a referendum on a new constitution has already been “tentatively” set for March 16, 2013. Following this referendum, the country will partake in elections later in the year to end the country’s current shaky coalition government.

The nearness of this March vote, however, has raised some suspicion among activist groups that Zimbabwe voters will not have enough time to read and become informed on the stances of this new constitution, a document the government has slated for a print run of 90,000 copies for distribution to Zimbabwe’s six million registered voters. This plan was announced at a half day public awareness workshop for members of parliament.

The Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Eric Matinenga said, “On my way from Mvurwi (in Mashonaland Central) I learnt that the Office of the President was looking for me. I was then advised through the Minister who stood in for me at that meeting that the principals wanted to convey to me that tentatively the referendum will be held on the 16th of March.”

Matinenga hopes to have a two-day referendum in order to allow people to express their opinions. He commented further saying, “I am trying to gain audience with the powers that be and try to argue with them for a two-day referendum.” He also noted that this draft Constitution would be publicized, for “any document of this nature must be officially publicized.” This explains the 90,000 copies ready for distribution.

However, currently the voting is scheduled for just one day. Advocacy groups expressed concern that such a quick polling period prevents adequate voter education on the new rewritten constitution.

The new document was just completed on February 6, after three years of debates and disputes. Democratic reforms to the constitution were a key demand of the country’s regional mediators after the violent and disputed elections that took place in 2008.

Finance Minister Tendai Biti told members of Parliament that the United Nations had responded to the government’s request for funds in order to finance the referendum and to keep harmonized polls for the vote.

 

For further information, please see:

ABC News – Zimbabwe Sets March 16 Vote Date – 14 February 2013

AllAfrica – Referendum Date Set – 14 February 2013

Fox News – Zimbabwe Sets March 14 For Constitution Referendum Vote – 14 February 2013

TRNS – Zimbabwe and Kenya Brace for Major Elections – 14 February 2013