BRIEF: Fiji Activists Arrested at Tibet Protest

SUVA, Fiji — Seventeen protesters were arrested yesterday outside of the Chinese Embassy in Fiji during a protest against Chinese human rights violations in Tibet.  The protest was organized by members of FemLink Pacific, Fiji’s Women’s Rights Movement, it’s Crisis Centre, and the Fiji AIDS Taskforce.  Among the seventeen people who were detained were a number of well known Fijian activists including human rights commissioner, Shameema Ali, academic Claire Slatter, Edwina Kotoisuva from the Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre, and a number of other well known activists in Fiji. 

While the interim government says that the protesters were arrested for not having a permit to assemble, Shameema Ali says that her members did not break the law by engaging in a peaceful protest.  Describing the protest, Ali said, ” Sitting in two and three at a time – no protesting and nothing serious at all, we have T-shirts which have Fiji-Tibet support group, and that’s all no words spoken, Free Tibet.”

The coordinator of FemLink Pacific said today that, despite yesterday’s arrests, their group would continue to protest Chinese human rights violations and Fiji’s interim government’s support for the Chinese government.  Those who were detained have now been released as of this writing.

For more information, please see:
Radio New Zealand International —  Fiji peace vigil group set to defy regime — 11 April 2008

Fiji Broadcasting Corporation Limited — Peace vigil show of support — 11 April 2008

Radio Australia — Tibet rights activists arrested in Fiji — 10 April 2008

Radio New Zealand International — Fiji police arrest women protesting over Tibet outside Chinese embassy — 10 April 2008

Radio Australia — Fiji police release anti-China protesters — 10 April 2008

54 Burmese Illegal Migrant Workers Suffocate to Death in a Seafood Truck in Thailand

By Ariel Lin
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BANGKOK, Thailand – 121 Burmese migrant workers crammed inside a 20 feet long and 7 feet wide seafood container while being smuggled into Thailand as illegal laborers on Thursday.  37 women and 17 men suffocate to dead in the back of the truck.  Another 67 people were still alive when Thai police officers opened the container.  Some Survivors were hospitalized and the others were held for questioning, according to Col. Kraithong Chanthongbai, the local police commander in Ranong Province, on Myanmar’s border.

Survivors told police that they each paid 10,000 baht (US$314) to be smuggled into Thailand.  One of the survivors, Saw Win, said that about 30 minutes into the trip workers pounded on the container, screamed for air and called the driver, who briefly turned on the air conditioning.  The air conditioning later went off, and they called the driver again 30 minutes later but his phone was off. They shouted and banged on the sides of the sweltering container until he stopped the truck about an hour later, unlocked the container and fled when he saw the state of the victims.

“Television reports showed police lifting bodies out of the truck and images of the cargo-like container empty except for a few pieces of clothing,”  AP reports. “The dead migrants—many wearing little more than T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops—were seen laid out on the floor at a storage facility of a local charity.”

The London-based human rights group Amnesty International said in a report in 2005 that workers from Myanmar “are routinely paid well below the Thai minimum wage, work long hours in unhealthy conditions and are at risk of arbitrary arrest and deportation.” These workers are typically brought into the country by large smuggling syndicates in difficult and often dangerous condition.

The deaths illustrated the increasing human trafficking activities across borders into countries as far apart in the world as the United States, Britain and Thailand.  In 2001, 58 illegal Chinese migrants died when they were crammed into a sweltering tomato truck on the way to England.  In a similar incident in 2003 in Texas, 19 Latin American migrants died from overheating and suffocation inside a trailer truck.

For more information, please see:

AFP – 54 Myanmar migrants die while being smuggled into Thailand – 10 April 2008

AP – 54 Myanmar Migrants Die in Thailand – 10 April 2008

New York Time – Migrants Perish in Truck to Thailand – 11 April 2008

Thai News Agency MCOT – Interior Minister calls for urgent probe of Myanmar migrant workers’ tragedy – 10 April 2008

USA Today – Thai police find 54 dead Burmese migrants in truck – 10 April 2008

Newspaper Columnist Murdered in Philippines

By Kristy Tridhavee
Impunity Watch Senior Desk Officer, Asia

MANILA, Philippines – A man on a motorcycle gunned down a Benefredo Acabal, a local newspaper columnist for the Cavite paper The Filipino Newsmen, on Monday, April 7th. According to police reports, Benefredo Acabal was shot five times in the head and body. He died on his way to the hospital. Benefredo Acabal is the first journalist to have been killed in the Philippines this year.

The Philippines is regarded as the most dangerous places for journalists afterIraq. Since 2001, when President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo came into office, 56 reporters have been killed. Between 1986 and 2001 there were 35 journalists killed.

Local police, however, are reluctant to connect Benefredo Acabal’s murder to his profession yet. Police Officer Lardy Ignacio said, “We’re still trying to establish the motive for the killing.” He added that it was too soon to say the murder was work-related.

Journalism in the Philippines creates dangers risk for reporters. There are many investigative stories about drug trafficking, gambling and other illegal activities, and underpaid reporters sometimes take bribes to report specific stories.

The Philippine government has been widely criticized for its inability to protect reporters, left-wing politicians, and students. Nearly a thousand persons have been murdered or disappeared in similar situations like Benefredo Acabal. But there have yet to be any convictions regarding past killings. The UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary, or Arbitrary Executions, Philippine human rights groups, and HRW have all pointed to strong evidence of military involvement in the disappearances and murders.

For more information, please see:

GMA News TV – Cavite Journalist Slain in Pasig Shooting Incident – 8 April 2008

Impunity Watch – No Convictions in Extrajudicial Killings in Philippines – 4 April 2008

Philippine Star – Another Journalist Killed in Pasig – 8 April 2008

Reuters – Gunman Kills Newspaper Columnist in Philippines – 8 April 2008 – 8 April 2008

Human Rights Watch: CIA Sent 14 Suspects to Jordan for Interrogation

By Ben Turner
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

AMMAN, Jordan – On April 8, Humans Rights Watch (HRW) released a report that said the CIA transferred at least 14 terror suspects to Jordan for interrogation after the September 11, attacks.

The 36-page report documents how Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID) served as a proxy jailer and interrogator for the US from 2001 until at least 2004.  The report alleges that the GID systematically tortured the prisoners, commonly using a torture method falaqa, a method by which the prisoners are given extended beatings on the bottoms of their feet.

“The Bush administration claims that it has not transferred people to foreign custody for abusive interrogation,” said Joanne Mariner, terrorism and counterterrorism director at Human Rights Watch. “But we’ve documented more than a dozen cases in which prisoners were sent to Jordan for torture.”

The report was based largely on firsthand information from Jordanian former prisoners who were detained with the non-Jordanian terrorism suspects and details eight previously unknown cases of rendition.  None are known to have been charged with a criminal offense.

One of the rendered prisoners, Ali al-Hajj al-Sharqawi, provided a handwritten note which he wrote while in Jordanian custody in 2002.  In the note, al-Sharqawi says that GID interrogators beat him “in a way that does not know any limits.”  The note continues, “They threatened me with electricity, with snakes and dogs …. [They said] we’ll make you see death . . . They threatened to rape me.”

The Jordanian government denied HRW’s allegations.  The Jordanian Minister of State for Information and Communications Nasser Joudeh said the report “was wrong, untrue and was based on individual allegations and conclusions based on non-objective grounds” Jordanian newspapers reported on April 9.

“Jordan is undergoing an intentional slander campaign by members of terrorism groups who were trained to provide rights groups with false information to undermine anti-terrorism efforts,” Joudeh said.

The CIA declined to comment on the report.  “The agency does not, as a rule, comment publicly on allegations of specific rendition activities,” spokesman Paul Gimigliano said.  Gimigliano did, however, defend renditions as a “lawful, valuable tool.”

“They have been used for years to take terrorists off the streets,” he said. “The United States does not transport individuals for the purpose of torture, and has no interest in any process that would produce bad intelligence.”

U.S. officials have acknowledged flying up to 150 of the most serious suspected terrorists secretly from one country to another, but have said they received diplomatic assurances from foreign authorities that they would not be tortured.

The HRW report said that at least five Yemenis, three Algerians, two Saudis, a Mauritanian, a Syrian, a Tunisian, and one or more Chechens from Russia were rendered to Jordan.  According to the report, five of them are now in U.S. custody in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

For more information, please see:
Associated Press – HRW: CIA Sent 14 Suspects to Jordan – 9 April 2008

Reuters – Jordan Denies Report on CIA Renditions – 9 April 2008

Human Rights Watch – US/Jordan: Stop Renditions to Torture – 8 April 2008

UPI – Report Alleges U.S. ‘Renditions’ to Jordan – 8 April 2008

Gains and Losses for People’s Charter and NCBBF

By Ryan Maness
Impunity Watch Senior Desk Officer, Oceania

SUVA, Fiji — The National Council for Building a Better Fiji and the People’s Charter for Change, Peace and Progess are at the foremost of Fijian politics today.  Amid the calls by foreign governments for Fiji to return to democratic elections, the interim government has insisted that before elections can take place underlying social and political problems must be addressed.  In order to address these problems the National Council was set up and the People’s Charter was announced.   In the last week, however, both the Council and the Charter have showed signed of progress, but also signs that difficult times may lie ahead.

Among the encouraging signs was the announcement by technical and support secretariat director John Samy who said that the was on schedule to be finalized before the end of this year.  Currently, the Council plans to have the People’s Charter completed by October and this date can only be changed if the the national council feels that it is necessary to do so.  In order to help bring about a national consensus on the Charter, the Council has also begun a national campaign to reach out to citizens in towns and villages across Fiji in order to explain the political and economic changes that have occurred in the last thirty years.  By explaining these differences, the Council also hopes to receive input from the people regarding how the citizenry wishes to have the government lead.

However, the progress of the Council is not without bumps in the road.  Five member of the Council all expressed similar sentiments today that the media should assist the Council in spreading news regarding the efforts of the Council.  Jokapeci Koroi, Desmond Whiteside Rajesh Kumar, Dewan Chand Maharaj and Lorraine Tevi all told reporters that they want the message of the People’s Charter to be spread on a grass roots level.  Committeeman Whiteside said that members of the Council’s working committees could not be relied upon to accurately relay information to the whole of the People and that the media will allow the People to hear what is being proposed and allow them to respond with what they want. 

There are also those, including deposed PM Lasenia Qarase, who have come to question the financial structure of the Council.  He has called upon the Council to publicly announce their budget sheets and spending reports in order that the interim government can live up to its promise to restore fiscal responsibility to the Fijian government.  Among the efforts that has raised eyebrows is a music video (viable below) commissioned by the Council, which depicts a man singing about the need for Fiji’s leaders to find a new way forward. 

The Council itself has said that it will not make these financial disclosures and that, in fact, it may be forced to ask for more money.  While recognizing that the cost benefit factor is important, Committeeman Whiteside said, “We have the opportunity right now to change that. If we get it right, we will be the model around the world. The cost will be immeasurable.”

 

For more information, please see:

 Fiji Times — Samy sets date for People’s Charter — 09 April 2008

Radio New Zealand International — National Council for Building a Better Fiji says it may need more funding from donors — 08 April 2008

Fijilive — NCBBF seeks media support — 08 April 2008

Fiji Broadcasting Corporation Limited — Media urged to assist NCBBF — 08 April 2008

Fiji Village — NCBBF Launches State of the Nation Document — 08 April 2008

Radio New Zealand International — Ousted Fiji PM calls for accountability of interim regime — 03 April 2008

Fijilive — NCBBF tight lipped on funds — 08 April 2008