Unrest Escalates in Hebron

By Yasmine S. Hakimian
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

HEBRON, West Bank – On December 4, Israeli troops forcibly evicted nearly 200 Jewish settlers from a contested building in Hebron. The operation to remove the settlers took about one hour and involved at least 600 Israeli soldiers. At least 20 Israeli settlers and police were injured during the eviction.

According to the New York Times, evacuees were dragged out with four police officers per person. Palestinians watched from rooftops and windows while some settlers shouted at the troops, calling them Nazis. A few settlers had sewn yellow stars on their shirts. On a wall near the confrontation, Hebrew graffiti displayed, “There will be a war over the House of Peace.”

A cloud of black smoke covered much of the neighborhood as militant supporters of the colonists set Palestinian olive fields alight and torched two homes and a dozen cars. In several areas of the city, youths clashed with Israeli security forces, who responded with tear gas.

After the eviction, clashes erupted in numerous West Bank towns as settlers expressed their anger. According to B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group, settlers have shot and wounded three Palestinians. The Haaretz newspaper reported that settlers began to throw stones at Palestinian cars in Nablus, Ramallah and Hebron.

The contested building, which occupants had named the House of Peace, is on the road to the Cave of the Patriarchs, where Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their wives are said to be buried.  Muslims and Jews have coveted and fought over this site for centuries.

Ownership of the building has been in dispute. The settlers say that they bought the house from its Palestinian owner, but the owner claims he rescinded the deal. The Israeli Supreme Court ordered the occupants to clear the building until another court could determine ownership. The settlers refused to leave the house after the Supreme Court order.

Riyad al-Malki, the Palestinian Foreign Minister, accused the settlers of “waging war” on Palestinians and urged the United Nations Security Council to help. Robert Serry, the U.N. envoy for the Middle East, issued a statement demanding “an immediate end to the settler attacks and restraint and calm from all parties”.

The southern part of the West Bank is now designated as a closed military area in an effort to prevent further trouble from outside settlers. Now, only those who live there may enter. Within an hour of the order, cars were backed up in enormous lines at new military roadblocks.
 
For more information, please see:

Welt – Hebron Unrest Escalates as Palestinians React – 6 December 2008

BBC – Israeli West Bank Forces on Alert – 5 December 2008

Daily Star – Hebron Colonists Attack Palestinians After Eviction – 5 December 2008

Guardian – Jewish Settlers in Hebron Shoot Palestinian Men – 5 December 2008

Singapore Fines Wall Street Journal Asia

By Pei Hu
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

Singapore – The High Court of Singapore fined Wall Street Journal Asia, a subsidiary of Dow Jones & Co., the amount of $16,573 for publishing articles that criticized the judiciary. This is the largest amount issued by the Singapore court for such a case.

The ruling related to two articles published in June and July and a letter written by leading opposition leader and pro-democracy activist, Chee Soon Juan.  The Attorney General issued a statement saying the published letter alleges “that the Singapore judiciary is not independent” and it “further insinuated that the Singapore judiciary is biased and lacks integrity.”

The first editorial “Democracy in Singapore” was written by Chee, which commented about his lost defamation suit brought by Singapore’s Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, over an article that implied corruption on the part of the government.

The Attorney General further complained about another published letter to the editor that cited a report by the International Bar Association’s Right Institute on “human rights, democracy and the rule of law” in Singapore.

Among those listed as defendants were the newspaper’s publisher Dow Jones Publishing Company (Asia), Inc, international editor Daniel Herzberg and managing editor Christine Glancey. Judge Tay Yong Kwang found them guilty of “scandalizing the court.”

A Dow Jones Company spokesman said “Dow Jones is extremely disappointed with the ruling of the High Court and strongly disagrees with the court’s analysis that the editorials and letter to the editor constitute a contempt of court… contrary to what the attorney general has alleged. The Wall Street Journal Asia has not engaged in a ‘campaign’ of any sort against the Singapore judiciary. We will in the future continue to defend the right of The Wall Street Journal Asia to report and comment on matter of international importance, including matters concerning Singapore.”

Reporters Without Borders (RSF), an international media watchdog, has continually ranked Singapore as one of the lowest countries among freedom of press indexes. RSF condemned the ruling against The Wall Street Journal, “Another Dow Jones publication, the Far Eastern Economic Review, has also been prosecuted in Singapore … The way this company is being hounded by the government and the judicial system which takes its orders from Lee Kuan Yew and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong is utterly deplorable. We urge the Singaporean authorities to stop prosecuting foreign news media.”

For more information, please see:

APF – Singapore Attorney General Sues Wall Street Journal Asia – 11 September 2008

RSF – Wall Street Journal Asia Unjustly Found in Contempt of Court – 26 November 2008

The Wall Street Journal Asia – Singapore Court Fines Wall Street Journal – 26 November 2008

Yemen Working to Reduce Female Genital Mutilation 30% by 2012

By Lauren Mellinger
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

SANA’A, Yemen– On December 3, Yemen announced the implementation of a five-year plan to reduce the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) or female circumcision.  The practice of FGM operations occurs most often in coastal areas of the country.

According to Ali Hashim Al-Seraj, an expert on family and reproductive health issues, Yemen remains the last Gulf country where the rate of FGMs remains high.  The rates of FGM are highest in coastal areas of Yemen; in Hodeidah, 97% of girls are forced to undergo the procedure.  The practice is also frequent in Hadramout (96%), Aden (82%), Al-Maharah (96%), and Sana’a (45%).

Al-Seraj claims the rate of FGM operations in Yemen is comparable to Sudan and Egypt, two countries with the highest rate of FGM operations annually.  According to UNICEF Director of the Childhood Protection Program, Nour Al-Kasadi, FGM operations are generally more popular in areas that have high illiteracy rates and where there is a lack of awareness of the negative health effects of the practice.  In addition, coastal areas in Yemen have large numbers of African immigrants who come from countries where the practice is common.

Legislation that bans the procedure without a sufficient public education program regarding the dangerous consequences of FGM has proved to have little deterrent effect.  While the Yemeni government has taken measures in the past to reduce the practice of FGM operations, including banning the procedure from all hospitals and health centers in the country in 2001, this failed to reduce the practice.  Instead, it led to an increase in “back-alley” procedures, involving no sterilized tools and the absence of doctors or other medical experts to perform the procedure.  A study by the US Agency for International Development revealed that only 10% of FGMs carried out in coastal areas of Yemen are performed by trained medical personnel.

The new plan will focus on public education and involves coordination among the government, civil society organizations, and the media.  The goal is to raise public awareness of the negative health effects of the procedure.  In addition, according to Dr. Nafissah Al-Jaifi, Secretary General of the High Council of Motherhood and Childhood, support from religious leaders in the community is vital to the success of the program.

The plan has been well received internationally.  The United Nations Children’s Fund, which regards FGM as “one of the most persistent, pervasive and silently endured human rights violations,” has pledged to assist with both the implementation and assessment stages of the program once it is accredited by the Yemeni government.  According to UNICEF’s Yemen Representative Aboudou Karimou Adjibade, “We cannot let this harmful practice take its toll on the health and development of girls and women.  We are ready to accelerate the abandonment of FGM in one generation.”

For more information, please see:

Yemen Times – Yemen to Reduce the Practice of FGM by 30 Percent by 2012 – 5 December 2008

Yemen Times – Yemen National Plan to Accelerate FGM Eradication – 19 November 2008

Gulf News – Yemen to Fight Female Genital Mutilation – 27 June 2008

US Department of State – Yemen: Report on Female Genital Mutilation or Female Genital Cutting – 1 June 2001

UN and Human Rights Groups Alarmed with Nepal Disappearances

By Pei Hu
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

Kathmandu, Nepal –The UN and human rights groups have been concerned with the high number of disappearances in Nepal.  In August 2004, after Amnesty International reported that more than 378 people disappeared in 2003, the UN issued a warning to Nepal on the International Day of Disappeared. However, the situation did not improve. In December 2004, the UN has sent a fact finding team to Nepal to investigate the large number of political disappearances.

The four-member UN fact finding team will interview families of the disappeared and a detention facility.

Many of these disappearances are politically motivated. Amnesty International reported that most cases are from the Nepalese government who detained suspected Maoists. There are also cases of rebels abductions, extrajudicial killings, and tortures of suspected security forces. Since 1996, 9,500 people, many of them civilians, have reportedly died since the internal fighting between the security forces and Maoist rebels. Brad Adams, Asia Director at Human Rights Watch, said, “Disappearances were perhaps the worst aspect of a dirty and ugly war in Nepal … Yet so far no one has been held accountable.”

Human rights groups say that Nepal has the highest number of disappearances, about 1,400 cases since the conflict began, which surpasses Colombia in the most number of disappearances.  Amnesty International said, “The unprecedented number of ‘disappearances’ is one of the most pressing human rights issues facing Nepal. Only by tackling the culture of abuse, ending the impunity of security forces and putting in place comprehensive legal and institutional reforms can the government halt the slide towards a human rights disaster.”

The Nepalese government denies these allegations. Nepalese officials says about 1,000 people have been released after being held in custody and only 300 people are still currently detained.

Human Rights Watch and Advocacy Forum sent a letter to the Nepalese government that urged the government to pass a bill to hold perpetrators accountable and to provide appropriate compensation to families of the disappeared.

For more information, please see:

Amnesty International – Nepal: Alarming Rise in “Disappearances” Fueling Human Rights Crisis – 31 August 2004

BBC – Alarm over Nepal Disappearances – 31 August 2004

BBC – UN Probing Nepal Disappearances – 6 December2004

HWR – Nepal: Adopt a Bill on ‘Disappearances’ – 25 November 2008

Fiji Commission Sets Strict Rules for Foreign Missions

By Hayley J. Campbell
Impunity Watch Reporter, Oceania

SUVA, Fiji – The Fiji Human Rights Commission has instituted a set of strict conditions that must be met before foreign missions are allowed to review Fiji’s laws.

Establishment of the new policy follows allegations that Fiji’s interim attorney general, Sayed-Khaiyum,  threatened a group of lawyers planning to conduct a review of Fiji’s justice system. Last week, the London-based, International Business Association (IBA) claimed they received a letter from the interim-attorney-general which made clear that the interim government would not welcome the group and would take “appropriate steps” if IBA delegates came to Fiji.

While Mr. Sayed-Khaiyum denied these allegations, the interim government has barred the IBA in the past from reviewing Fiji’s justice system.

Dr. Shaista Shameem, chairperson to the Fiji Human Rights Commission, says that the new policy calls for “advance comprehensive terms of reference and information about the purpose of the visit as well as an opportunity to discuss findings before their publication.”

According to Dr. Shameem, the purpose of this policy is to protect the Commission’s intellectual property rights. Dr. Shameem argued, “While many foreign visitors and missions pontificated about the rule of law and good governance, they did not practice the basic and minimum principles of due process by discussing the findings with the relevant agencies of the State before publishing them or sending them to other international agencies for action.”

Dr. Shameem added that the Commission will no longer stand for, what they consider, are pointless questions.

For more information, please see:
Radio New Zealand International – Fiji interim AG denies claims he threatened IBA group – 26 November 2008

AFP – Fiji blocks International Bar Association visit – 26 November 2008

Fiji Times – FHRC refuses to meet with foreign missions – 03 December 2008

Radio New Zealand Interational – Fiji Human Rights Commission sets new terms to meet foreign teams – 03 December 2008

FijiLive – FHRC gets strict on foreign missions – 03 December 2008