Christmas Island Asylum-seekers May Face Criminal Charges

By Eileen Gould
Impunity Watch Reporter, Oceania

CANBERRA, Australia – Last week a fight between approximately 150 Sri Lankan Tamils and Afghan asylum-seekers broke out at Australia’s immigration detention facility on Christmas Island.

The two groups attacked each other with tree branches, pool cues and broom handles.  The fighting ended with injuries for some thirty-seven asylum seekers who required medical treatment.  Three individuals were flown to Perth to receive treatment for broken bones.

Australian Immigration Minister Chris Evans believes that the violence may be a result of frustrations amongst the Sri Lankan asylum over being held in custody.

“There hasn’t been too many problems but there has been some increased tension I think around the Sri Lankans, in particular being a bit concerned as we have had some people removed back to Sri Lanka – found not to be refugees, and obviously the spotlight on the groups that were intercepted in Indonesia,” Evans said.

Advocates for refugees claim that the facility’s overcrowded and cramped conditions created the outburst.  This combined with the slow pace of detainee processing is believed to be a significant factor in the fighting at Christmas Island.

Those individuals deemed responsible for the brawl have criminal charges brought against them.

Prime Minister Rudd noted that this may affect the status of certain refugee applications.  Whether or not a detainee may be granted a visa depends in part on whether the individual has committed a serious offense.

Approximately 1,000 asylum seekers are currently housed at Christmas Island.  The government plans to increase the facility’s capacity to 1,400 inmates.

Over the past year, many immigrants, particularly those from Sri Lanka, have tried to enter Australia.  Most of the immigrants are taken to Christmas Island to have their refugee status applications processed.

Australia takes in 13,000 refugees each year through official humanitarian programs.  A majority of asylum seekers, who arrive by boat, are eventually found to be in need of protection and may settle permanently in Australia.

Opposition officials in the government claim the Prime Minister administration has been ineffective in controlling the country’s borders.  Rudd claims that all asylum seekers will receive humane treatment but promises to take a hard-line approach to criminal gangs involved in people smuggling.

For more information please see:
Bloomberg – Australia to send team to Process Lankan Migrants, Herald Says – 24 November 2009

Monsters & Critics – Charges may follow asylum-seeker brawl, Australian Minister says – 23 November 2009

Voice of America – Australia Investigates Brawl Among Asylum Seekers in Camp – 23 November 2009

Mississippi Governor Draws Criticism Over Proposal

26 November 2009

Mississippi Governor Draws Criticism Over Proposal

By Stephen Kopko

Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

MISSISSIPPI, United States – Governor Haley Barbour has proposed to merge three of Mississippi’s historically black colleges into one beginning in the year 2011. The merger is part of the Governor’s plan to decrease costs amidst new budget negotiations.

Under the Governor’s plan, Alcorn State and Mississippi Valley State would be merged into Jackson State, the state’s largest historically black college. Alcorn State and Mississippi Valley state are located approximately one hundred miles from Jackson State. Their campuses would remain but under new names.

Governor cited many different reasons for merging the three colleges into one. Mississippi has eight colleges and universities for approximately two million, nine hundred thousand people. Barbour stated that the residents of Mississippi can not afford that many institutions of higher education. According to Barbour, the merger would save Mississippi around thirty five million dollars. The savings would come from cuts to administrative costs and eliminating academic duplication.

Many groups and state legislators are opposed to the Governor’s plan. The presidents of the historically black colleges are unanimously opposed to the proposal. Jackson State University president Dr. Ronald Mason stated that “Mississippi needs historically black colleges because we traditionally serve the underserved.” Some Mississippi state legislators stated that they will not support the proposal. They believe that all Mississippi universities should be subject to the same scrutiny in regards to cuts or mergers.  Representative Adrienne Wooten said, “I only know there are certain universities that are having to come forward and prove why they should remain open.”

The Obama administration has also questioned Barbour’s proposal. John S. WIlson, executive director of the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities believed that cost savings should not be a goal. According to Wilson, the goal of the state should be improving the campuses’ capacity to educate more students. Wilson also believed that the Governor’s proposal may hurt the White House’s goal of having the highest proportion of college graduates by 2020.

For more information, please see:

MSNBC – Proposal to Merge Black Schools Draws Fire – 22 November 2009

WJTV, Jackson, MS. – School Chiefs Oppose Merging Black Universities – 18 November 2009

AFRO – Proposal to Merge HBCUs Draws Fire – November 2009

Men Indicted for Alleged Ties to Hezbollah

By Brandon Kaufman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania– On Tuesday, four men were indicted by a grand jury in Philadelphia for an alleged plot to support Lebanese based Hezbollah through a number of illegal practices, including providing the group with hundreds of weapons.

The indictment filed Tuesday says two suspects sought to provide over a thousand machine guns to Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon.  The indictment states that two of the alleged plotters were to purchase the weapons in Philadelphia and then ship them to a port city in Syria where they would eventually be distributed to Hezbollah.  The two other indicted men were accused of trying to raise funds for the terrorist group with fake passports and counterfeit cash said U.S. Attorney Michael Levy.  According to Levy, “They were selling counterfeit visas.  They were trying to sell counterfeit U.S. currency as a way of raising money for Hezbollah.”  The FBI has said that an undercover agent thwarted the plotter’s plans.

In a released statement, Levy noted that the indicted men were seeking to support Hezbollah with some serious firepower.  He added that “the purchase of stolen goods- or what they believed were stolen goods- was a way of raising money by selling those items.  The purchase of machine guns is clearly buying military weapons, which can only be used in warfare.”

In addition to the four men indicted, eight others were charged with lesser offenses related to schemes to traffic in stolen or counterfeit goods.  In all, federal authorities have said that thirteen suspects are in custody, while eleven more were being sought in connection with the alleged plot to aid Hezbollah.

The indictment comes just a day after officials say they broke up a similar plot.  That plot was disrupted when undercover meetings in Philadelphia unearthed plans to send machine guns and anti-aircraft missiles to Syria.  Said Levy, “We have, in this case, charged a number of people who are basically part of a supply stream for a terrorist organization.  But this is just part of an ongoing fight we’re going to have for a long time.”

For more information, please see:

Associated Press- Feds: Philadelphia Plot to Buy Weapons for Hezbollah– 25 November 2009

Fox News- Grand Jury Indicts Four Men for Alleged Plot to Support Hezbollah– 25 November 2009

KYW Newsradio- Four Indicted in Philadelphia in Alleged Plot to Support Terrorists– 24 November 2009

Colombian Ex-General Jailed for Role in 1997 Massacre

By Sovereign Hager

Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BOGOTA, Colombia-Jaime Uscategui, a retired general, was sentenced to forty years in prison on Wednesday for his involvement in a massacre by right wing paramilitaries. A court ruled that Uscategui, who was a commander of the eighth brigade in 1997, was complicit in the murder of forty-nine civilians by paramilitaries.

In July of 1997, over 100 armed members of a right wing paramilitary groups entered the village of Mapiripzán, despite being officially banned from activity. The paramilitaries commenced a five-day killing spree, where civilians were tortured and murdered.

The military failed to stop the massacre or stop the paramilitaries at one of the many checkpoints on their way into the village. A pair of chartered planes full of right wing gunmen landed and were dispatched to oversee the mass killings form Uscategui’s area.

During the five-day massacre, the town’s judge, Ivan Cortes, repeatedly called Uscategui for help, with no response. Bodies were “hacked up and many were thrown into a river.” Hundreds of suspected leftist rebel sympathizers were killed during the 1990s.

The court overruled an earlier acquittal, finding that Uscategui abandoned the people and had knowledge that some of his officers were collaborating with paramilitaries. The forty year sentence is the highest ever to be imposed in Colombia on an officer of Uscategui’s ranking. Uscategui was also ordered to pay a fine of 10 million pesos.

The killings were committed predominantly by the Self Defense Forces of Cordoba and Uraba (ACCU), a paramilitary group organized by landowners. Another former army general, Rito Alejo del Rio, is in jail until a civilian court tries him on charges of murder for death squad killings during the mid-1990s.

Uscategui was initially arrested in 1999 and tried by a military court, where he was sentenced to forty months in prison for “omission.” A battalion commander who did not stop the Mapiripán massacre was convicted of murder in 2007 and sentenced to forty years in prison.

For more information, please see:

AP-Court Convicts Ex-General in Colombian Massacre-26 November 2009

The Guardian-Former Colombian General Jailed for Rule in Maripiripán Massacre-26 November 2009

BBC-Colombia Jails Death Squad General Over Massacre

Witnesses Are Threatened in Congolese Warlord Trial

By Jared Kleinman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Witnesses testifying against two Congolese warlords at the International Criminal Court have been threatened and the court does not have the resources to fully protect them, a senior investigator testified Wednesday.

The investigator spoke on the second day of the trial of Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo, who are accused of planning and directing a February 2003 attack on the village of Bogoro in Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) northeastern Ituri region. Hundreds of people were killed and many women forced into sexual slavery in that February 24th, 2003 attack.

Prosecutors plan to call 26 witnesses to testify and 21 of them will be given protective measures in court to shield their identity to try to prevent possible retaliation. The investigator testified Wednesday as the first witness to outline how her team built its case against Katanga and Ngudjolo. Her identity also was shielded.

Investigators and prosecutors at the tribunal give witnesses advice on how to protect themselves but the unidentified investigator and first witness said sometimes “these quite simply have been not enough.” She did not elaborate on whether any witnesses had suffered physical harm, but her comments showed the difficulties of building cases in conflict zones.

Katanga, the alleged commander of the group known as the Force de Résistance Patriotique en Ituri (FRPI), faces three counts of crimes against humanity and six counts of war crimes for a deadly assault on the village of Bogoro, in the province of Ituri. Ngudjolo, the alleged former commander of the rebel National Integrationalist Front (FNI), faces three counts of crimes against humanity and six of war crimes, and is alleged to have played a key role in designing and carrying out the Bogoro attack.

Among those crimes, the two men are accused of using children under the age of 15 in active hostilities, including as bodyguards and combatants, during the deadly assault on Bogoro. Ten child soldiers will be among the 345 people authorized to take part in the trial.

Katanga and Ngudjolo both have pleaded not guilty to three counts of crimes against humanity and seven war crimes including murder, rape, pillage, sexual slavery and using child soldiers in the slaughter. Defense attorneys have denied the two men were involved in the attack on Bogoro and instead blamed Ugandan forces that had been occupying Congo’s mineral-rich Ituri region where the village was located.

The prosecution says more than 1,000 fighters of Katanga’s Patriotic Resistance Force (FRPI) and Ngudjolo’s Nationalist and Integrationist Front (FNI) entered Bogoro on February 24th six years ago “with one communicated and agreed goal: to erase the village”.

The ICC is an independent, permanent court that tries persons accused of the most serious crimes of international concern – namely genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. This particular trial is expected to take several months.

For more information, please see:

Associated Press – Congo massacre witnesses were threatened – 25 November 2009

AFP- ICC Trial of Congolese Militiamen to Reveal ‘The Truth’ – 24 November 2009

PressTV – Congo Warlords Stand Trial – 24 November 2009

Reuters- Congo Warlords in the Dock At Hague Court – 23 November 2009

AllAfrica – International Criminal Court Trial of Two Former Leaders Opens Tomorrow – 23 November 2009