French Polynesian Nuclear Test Veterans Denied Compensation

By Angela Marie Watkins
Impunity Watch Reporter, Oceania

PAPEETE, French Polynesia – French Polynesia’s Nuclear Workers’ Association, Moruroa E. Tatou, is dismayed that the Papeete labor court has thrown out compensation claim cases by eight former test site workers. This morning, the court found that under local law the complaints cannot be ruled on.

However, the court found that the Atomic Energy Commissariat had failed in its obligation as an employer to provide security and awarded 11,000 US dollars to each of the three children of a deceased local veteran.

French Polynesians who have had their claims for compensation for the effects of nuclear testing rejected say they won’t give up their bids for redress.

John Doom, of Moruroa E. Tatou, says eight people who took their cases to French Polynesia’s industrial relations tribunal were unsuccessful.

He says the three surviving workers have leukemia, and they and the five widows will consult with lawyers over how to continue with their bids.

“We will not give up anyhow, we will continue this fight and represent again the three who were not accepted, and these three have leukemia,” said Doom.

For more information, please see:
New Zealand International Radio – Former Moruroa workers fail in nuclear testing compensation bids – 26 June 2009

New Zealand International Radio – French Polynesian test veterans dismayed at Tahiti court decision – 26 June 2009

Radio Australia – French Polynesia rejects nuclear compensation – 26 June 2009

Journalists Arrested Daily in Iran

By Meredith Lee-Clark
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

TEHRAN, Iran – The BBC, Newsweek, and the Washington Times are among several western news organizations that have recently announced that their correspondents in Iran have disappeared or been detained, allegedly as a result of the Iranian government’s crackdown on media freedom.

Reporters Without Borders, an international organization that advocates for freedom of the media, condemned the disappearances, along with the arrests of several Iranian journalists.  The organization also reported that the entire editorial staff of Kalemeh Sabz, a newspaper owned by opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, was arrested by plain clothes agents from the office of Tehran’s prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi.  Mortazavi has previously come under international scrutiny due to implications of torture, illegal detentions, and the coercion of false confessions.

“Iran is in the midst of a violent and arbitrary crackdown on reformist protesters that has already claimed lives and has led to over a thousand arrests,” said Sarah Leah Whitson of Human Rights Watch.  “The role of Mortazavi in the crackdown suggests that the authorities are preparing to bring trumped-up charges against its opponents.”

Some Iranian reporters have begun to publicly advocate for media freedom.  On June 23, 180 Iranian journalists wrote an open letter to Iran’s government and the public, protesting the “deplorable and critical” state of Iran’s media and calling upon the government to abide by the Iranian constitution and to allow reporters to do their duty.  As of June 25, the Committee to Protect Journalists estimated that approximately forty journalists and media workers had been arrested by the Iranian government since the election on June 12.  One media outlet has declared that Iran is now the world leader in imprisoning journalists.

President of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Pottering, said that he planned to visit Iran, on an invitation of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi.  Ebadi told Reporters Without Borders that she has urged Pottering and the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon, to condemn Iran’s media repression and to investigate human rights abuses against journalists.

For more information, please see:

Committee to Protect Journalists – More Journalists Arrested in Iran; CPJ Seeks Their Release – 25 June 2009

Reporters Without Borders – Confessions, Arrests and a Campaign Against the Media – 25 June 2009

Washington Times – Washington Times Reporter Arrested in Iran – 24 June 2009

Human Rights Watch – Iran: Violent Crackdown on Protestors Widens – 23 June 2009

IFEX – Three More Journalists Detained, BBC Correspondent to be Deported – 22 June 2009

Formal Arrest Made in China of Prominent Activist

By Hyo-Jin Paik
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BEIJING, China– Liu Xiaobo, one of China’s most prominent political activists, was formally arrested after being held for six months in a secret Beijing location.  Liu was taken from his home and held by the police without formal notification to his family until yesterday.

Liu XiaoboLiu Xiaobo (Source: BBC)

The police took Liu away one day before the publication of “Charter 08,” a document he co-authored with 300 other intellectuals calling for a new constitution, human rights, elections, freedom of speech and religion in China, and to end the Communist Party’s control over the military, courts and the government.

Beijing’s public security bureau claimed Liu is being arrested for “spreading of rumours and defaming of the government, aimed at subversion of the state and overthrowing the socialism system in recent years.”

Despite Chinese government’s allegations, there has been global support for Liu’s release.  Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi wrote to China’s president asking for the release of Liu and other “prisoners of conscience.”

In addition, Amnesty International said, “This use of state security charges to punish activists for merely expressing their views must stop.  This is another act of desperation by a regime that is terrified of public opinion.”

Charter 08, published on the 60th anniversary of the promulgation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, also called for the abolition of a Chinese criminal code that allows imprisonment for “incitement to subvert state power,” which is the crime Liu is accused of committing.

Fighting back tears, Liu’s wife said, “I am so worried about him.  I don’t know how many more years he will be imprisoned now.”  She was allowed to see Liu during a supervised visit back in March where she noticed that he looked thin and pale.

The charge against Liu carries maximum of 15 years in jail, and Liu’s arrest is the highest-profile arrest of Chinese activists since last year.

For more information, please see:

AP – China arrests dissident who championed reforms – 24 June 2009

BBC – China activist formally arrested – 24 June 2009

CBS News – Chinese Media Says Dissident Liu Xiaobo Arrested – 24 June 2009

China Digital Times – Chinese Dissident Liu Xiaobo Formally Arrested – 23 June 2009

China Digital Times – Dissident Writer Liu Xiaobo Held in Secret after Sentence Ends – 9 June 2009

French Polynesian Court Rules For Nuclear Test Veteran

By Angela Marie Watkins
Impunity Watch Reporter, Oceania

PAPEETE, French Polynesia – French Polynesian court has ruled in favor of three children of a deceased nuclear weapons test veteran who sought compensation for the effects of the tests.

The court found that the Atomic Energy Commissariat had failed in its obligation as an employer to provide security and ordered that each claimant be paid 11,000 US dollars.

The Nuclear Workers’ Association Moruroa E. Tatou has expressed disappointment at the low compensation sum. However, today’s decision coincided with the French parliament beginning debates on a landmark bill for compensating the victims of nuclear tests carried out in French Polynesia and Algeria over more than three decades.

About 150,000 civilian and military personnel took part in 210 nuclear tests carried out in the Sahara desert and the Pacific between 1960 and 1996, many of whom later developed serious health problems.

The government unveiled a bill on compensating the test victims in March, after decades of denying its responsibility for fear the admission would have weakened its nuclear program during the Cold War.

Under the bill, which is to be put to the vote on June 30, a nine-member committee of physicians, led by a magistrate, will examine individual claims for compensation.

Defense Minister Herve Morin told the lower-house National Assembly that the bill, thirteen years after the end of the tests in the Pacific, will allow France to serenely close a chapter of its history.

For more information, please see:

New Zealand International Radio – French Polynesian Court rules in favour of nuclear test veteran’s children – 25 June 2009

New Zealand International Radio – France begins debating nuclear compensation bill – 25 June 2009

Australian News – French debate nuclear test compo – 26 June 2009

Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb Responsible for Increasing Violence in Algeria

By Ann Flower Seyse
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

ALGIERS, Algeria–  On June 23, five parliamentary police were killed by insurgents, and two more were kidnapped in the Khenchela province of Algeria. This attack follows the June 19 ambush, which killed eighteen officers and one civilian. Additionally, the attack this month follows the murder of British hostage Edwin Dyer, and the killing of five paramilitary gendarmes and the shooting of nine Algerian soldiers.

“AQIM,” or al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has claimed responsibility for the attacks in early June, and the large ambush on June 19. This group is an independent group of Islamic militants that waged a civil war against the Algerian government in the 1990s, which killed well over 100,000 civilians. In 2006 the group joined Osama Bin Laden’s terrorist organization under the name al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

AQIM regularly targets government forces, though the number of  attacks in the past month have significantly increased  from the past few years. Before the June 19 attack, the Algerian ruling elite had been discussing a plan to reduce violence by granting amnesty to some al Qaeda militants. The plan would have extended the offer of amnesty to higher officials. Algeria was basing the plan off of a similar plan that was used in Saudi Arabia to end a three year insurgency there by al Qaeda.

Farouk Ksentini, the President of the National Advisory Commission for the Promotion of Human Rights in Algeria, stated that general amnesty would be a good way to reduce the recent violence, in an interview before the June 19 attack. However, this theory was not welcomed among some Algerians, who would prefer the militants to go to trial and be judged for their actions.  Even in Saudi Arabia, the rate of recidivism for those granted amnesty is high.

Presently, it appears as though Algeria is not focused on a plan for granting amnesty.  On June 23, following the most recent ambush, Algeria deployed 10,000 soldiers to hunt for the perpetrators of the June 19 attack. The troops have reportedly recovered many weapons, and have arrested several people.

For more information, please see:

Media Line- Algeria Deploys 10,000 Soldiers to Hunt Al-Qa’ida Bombers – 23 June 2009

Reuters- Algerian Insurgents Kill Five Police: Reports– 23 June 2009

AFP – Al-Qaeda Claims Algerian Ambush: SITE – 21 June 2009

Dallas Morning News-  19 Die as Militants Ambush Algerian Police Convoy – 19 June 2009

AP –  Militants Kill at Least 19 in Algeria – 18 June 2009

Reuters- ANALYSIS-Algeria Mulls New Amnesty to Weaken al Qaeda– 17 June 2009