Sri Lanka Rejects Execution Video Claim

By Michael E. Sanchez
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka- Sri Lanka has rejected UN claims that a video which shows extra-judicial killing by Sri Lankan troops is genuine.  On Friday, the government said that a video allegedly showing its troops killing blindfolded, naked Tamils during the civil war was a fabrication and dismissed as biased a U.N. investigation confirming its apparent authenticity.

U.N. Human rights investigator, Philip Alston, said on Thursday the footage was probably real, and called for a war crimes investigation into the final months of the war between the government and Tamil rebels that ended in May.

Sri Lanka’s Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe said on Friday, “We don’t accept his conclusions, and we believe his conclusions are highly subjective and biased…We believe he is on a crusade of his own to force a war crime inquiry against Sri Lanka.”  He said the government’s own investigation of the footage revealed it was filled with “discrepancies and shortcomings,” and accused Alston of not following proper procedures before announcing his conclusions about the footage.

The footage which appears to show the summary execution of Tamils by Sri Lankan troops, was shot by a Sri Lankan soldier using a cell phone in January 2009, according to Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, which released the footage.

While the government dismissed the footage as fake, Alston said reports by three U.S.-based independent experts on forensic pathology, video analysis and firearm evidence “strongly suggest that the video is authentic.”  These experts concluded the footage of the shootings showed the use of live ammunition, and there was no evidence that the images of two people being shot in the head at close range had been manipulated.

The U.S. State Department has accused the government and the rebels of possible war crimes in the killing of civilians during the final months of fighting, when government forces crushed the rebels and ended 25 years of civil war.

Rupert Colville, spokesman for U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, said on Friday “We believe a full and impartial investigation is critical if we’re to confront all the very big question marks that hang over this war…Obviously if the Sri Lankan armed forces and the Sri Lankan government has done nothing wrong, it will have nothing to fear from an international investigation.”  Sri Lanka however, has on numerous occasions rejected calls for international investigation of its conduct during the fighting as an infringement of its sovereignty.

The civil war on the island nation killed between 80,000 and 100,000 since 1983, and more than 7,000 civilians were killed in the last months of the war.

For more information, please see:

BBC News- Sri Lanka rejects UN Execution Video Claims– 8 January 2010

The Canadian Press- Sri Lanka Reject UN’s Conclusions on Video Purporting to Show Army’s Execution of Tamils – 8 January 2010

The New York Times- Sri Lanka Rejects U.N. Execution Video Report– 8 January 2010

Shelling in Mogadishu Kills 20

By Jared Kleinman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

MOGADISHU, Somalia – At least 20 people have been killed and more than 35 others wounded in north of the Somali capital Mogadishu, just as heavy shelling landed into several areas in the capital on Thursday afternoon.

The bombardment started after rebel fighters launched mortar attacks on the Somali presidential Palace, which was hosting a meeting between Somali president Sheikh Sharif Ahmed and traditional elders. African Union troops, which guard the palace, responded to the attack with heavy artillery shells that landed in Mogadishu’s northern neighbourhoods of Yaqshid and Shibi.

Mostly civilians were confirmed as casualties by the Mogadishu ambulance workers, who had hard time evading the shelling themselves in order to reach the wounded.

Reports say that most of the areas where the mortar shells affected were: Tokyo neighborhood, Sukba’ad, the second largest market in Mogadishu and Yakshid police station, all in the north of the capital.

Ali Muse, head of the emergency ambulance said that they took 19 wounded civilians including all parts of the people and added that they saw 11 dead bodies in the area as well.

The Somali PM called on international community not to organize another national reconciliation talks but instead to help his fragile government. The Somali government, which only control few blocks of Mogadishu, has been faced with daunting task of restoring peace and order in a country. The country has been marred by years of civil strife.

For more information, please see:

Garrowe Online- Shelling Rocks Mogadishu, 20 Dead – 7 January 2010

Shabelle Media Network – Heavy Shelling Kills 20, Wounds More Than 35 Others in North Mogadishu – 8 January 2010

Shabelle Media Network – Mortars Murder 1, Injuries 3 Others in Mogadishu – 8 January 2010

Iraq Bombing Targets Security Forces

By Bobby Rajabi
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

HEET, Iraq – Coordinated bombings on January 7 targeted the homes of four police officers in western Iraq. The bombings took place in the Iraqi town of Heet and killed seven individuals. Among the dead was the town’s anti-terror chief. The bombings wounded six individuals. Heet is located thirty five miles

The attackers alleged planted explosives around the bedrooms of the policemen in the town. According to Lieutenant Colonel Fadhil Nimrawi, the head of Heet’s emergency response unit, “at 3:00am, men planted bombs around the bedrooms of four houses belonging to members of the police force, including Major Wali al-Heeti, the head of Heet’s anti-terror department.”

According to Nimwari, the dead include Heeti’s wife and mother, child and three other police officers. The four houses targeted were in different neighborhoods across the center of the city. No vehicles were being allowed in or out of the town as part of the ramped up security.

Nimwari also said that several people had been arrested in connection with the attack, but did not specify how many. Security forces were still looking into other people they suspected of being involved in the bombings. According to Sheikh Muhammad Abu Wissam, a tribal leader, “there are terrorist cells there and they are benefiting from an security breach to carry out more attacks.

Violence has been rising in Iraq as the country prepares for a March general election. The attack comes a week after a double suicide blast in the provincial capital Ramadi killed twenty five people and severely injured regional governor Qassim Mohammed. The Anbar Province, where Heet is located, will have over half its seven thousand five hundred American troops withdrawn by the end of the month.

The BBC reports that Anbar province was once a hotbed of insurgency, but two years ago, local Sunni tribes and their followers turned against the militants, and joined common cause against them with the Iraqi government and American forces. The province remained relatively calm for some time, but it appears to be suffering from a number of revenge attacks by Islamist militants.

For more information, please see:

AFP – Anti-terror Chief Among Seven Killed in Iraq Blasts – 7 January 2010

BBC – Iraq Bomb Attack on Senior Police Kills Eight – 7 January 2010

New York Times – Blasts Strike at Officials in Iraq’s West – 7 January 2010

Reuters – Bombings Target Iraqi Army Commander – 7 January 2010

North Korea to Restrict Emerging Market Economy

By Hyo-Jin Paik
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

SEOUL, South Korea – Since North Korea’s recent implementation of a new monetary policy, there have been reports that the currency reform has exacerbated Pyongyang’s chronic problems of food shortages and price inflation.

A researcher in Seoul, Kay Seok, said, “The first public rallies we see in North Korea will not be about freedom or democracy, but…about livelihood.”

In fact, the currency reform has brought about such great public dissatisfaction that thousands of North Koreans began the New Year by holding a rally in the capital of the tightly controlled state.

Pyongyang’s new currency reform would slash two zeroes off its current currency, and the government has imposed limits on how much people can exchange the old currency for the new.  These changes have raised prices for essential goods that the impoverished North Koreans were already having trouble buying because of the existing inflation.

As such, the government is restricting people’s personal wealth, which has angered many North Koreans where there have been reports of people burning money.

In addition, North Korea has decided to stifle its rising merchant class by reclaiming state control over the economy.  For example, the North has decided to ban the use of foreign currency, and this move affects those who operate outside the country’s centrally planned economy, such as those who buy goods in Chinese yuan, US dollars or euros.

North Korean merchants who operate outside the state economy and earn large sums of money risk imprisonment.

Economists Marcus Noland and Stephan Haggard said, “The North Korean currency reform is an economically misguided initiative that will reduce the welfare of North residents…[H]eightened repression is a central feature of the new economic controls.”

Many view North’s new monetary policy as the country’s means to restrict and attacks its emerging market economy and the new businessmen, and a sign of North’s return to its version of socialism.

Park Hyeong-jung at the Korea Institute for National Unification said that the currency reform “has significantly strengthened the regime’s control over the economy and the people.”

Other experts in South Korea have also voiced concerns that this currency reform makes the North Korean regime collapse scenario more probable.
For more information, please see:

BloggingStocks – Inflation Surges on Wealth Destruction in North Korea – 7 January 2010

Jakarta Globe – N. Korean Crackdown On Merchants Risky – 7 January 2010

NPR – North Koreans Upset Over Currency Changes – 8 January 2010

Seven Killed in Drive-By After Coptic Christmas Eve Mass

By Meredith Lee-Clark

Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

 

NAGAA HAMMADI, Egypt – Clashes broke out between nearly one thousand Coptic Christians and local police in southern Egypt outside the hospital where the bodies of six Coptic Christians were held. The Christians and one Muslim security guard were killed as churchgoers left Christmas Eve midnight mass, welcoming the Coptic Christmas, which is celebrated on January 7. Ten others were reported wounded.

 

The shootings were believed to be revenge for the alleged rape of a twelve-year-old Muslim girl by a Christian man in November 2009. Since news of the alleged rape spread throughout the Nagaa Hammadi community, sectarian violence has gripped the southern Egyptian town. For five days after the alleged assault, Muslim residents ransacked the town, and set fire to Christian homes and businesses.

 

At the hospital where the bodies of the victims were being held, protestors threw stones at police and smashed ambulances. Police responded with tear gas, and witnesses reported the crowd shouted: “No to repression,” and “O blessed Cross we will defend you with our soul and our blood.”

 

The recent clashes are the latest in Upper Egypt (so-named because it is further upstream on the Nile River), an area that is known for its fierce tribal loyalties and practice of honor killings. In recent years, many Coptic Christians have reported increasing harassment by both residents and government officials. The Copts make up one of the oldest communities of Christians in the world, descended from Egyptians who converted during the first century A.D.

 

Mounir Megahed, director of Egyptians Against Religious Discrimination, said that sectarian violence has escalated in Egypt during the past year, with a new example coming nearly every week. Megahed also alleges that the Egyptian state is “soft on tackling the issue,” and that “they do not put people who commit these crimes to trials.” The most infamous of the violent outbreaks was the killing of twenty-one Christians in the southern Egyptian town of El Kosheh in 2000. Nearly ninety villagers were reportedly involved in the killing, but none were prosecuted, according to Megahed.

 

The lack of official attention to the sectarian violence in southern Egypt may also be rooted in cultural stereotypes and prejudices held by many Egyptians in the north. Salem Abdel Galil, the deputy minister for preaching at Egypt’s ministry of religious endowments said the violence was due to the “low standard of culture or education” in Upper Egypt, rather than any underlying religious intolerance.

 

For more information, please see:

 

Al Jazeera – Clashes After Egypt Copt Killings – 7 January 2010

 

BBC News – Clashes in Egyptian Town After Coptic Killings – 7 January 2010

 

The National – Egypt Fears Rise in Sectarian Violence After Church Killings – 7 January 2010

 

The Telegraph – Coptic Christians Clash With Egyptian Police After Mass Shooting – 7 January 2010

 

Voice of America – Attack on Coptic Christians in Egypt Leaves 7 Dead – 7 January 2010