Lesotho Elections Held Two Years Ahead Of Schedule to Combat Political Tension

By Kathryn Maureen Ryan
Impunity Watch, Managing Editor

MASERU, Lesotho – Polls opened in Lesotho’s elections on Saturday. The vote was called two years ahead of schedule under a political deal aimed at calming tensions between the country’s warring political factions. The deal was brokered by South Africa, which surrounds the small, mountainous landlocked country. Feuding parties in Lesotho’s ruling coalition faced off in Saturday’s elections in an attempt to restore stability six months after an attempted coup. Lesotho’s Prime Minister, Thomas Thabane, briefly fled the country to South Africa last August after soldiers occupied the police headquarters and surrounded his palace. Thabane accused his deputy Mothetjoa Metsing of working with the military in the attempted coup, an accusation which both Metsing and the military dismiss. The country of two million people has seen several coup attempts since the small landlocked country gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1966. Fears are growing that post-election unrest could further erode the country’s $2.3 billion economy, which was expected to expand by nearly 5 percent this year.

Voters queue to cast their votes in Maseru, Lesotho, Saturday, Feb 28, 2015. The small mountain kingdom has taken to the polls in early elections in the hope of restoring order after a coup attempt last year. (Photo courtesy of U.S. News and World Reports)

Despite high political tensions the Campaigning ahead of the elections has been largely peaceful but analysts say tensions were high before the parliamentary vote between Thabane’s All Basotho Convention (ABC) against Metsing’s Lesotho Congress for Democracy (LCD), as well as other smaller political parties. “The idea of these elections is to try solve a crisis but I think they might perpetuate one,” said Gary Staden, a political analyst. “My concern is any mess up like failure to deliver ballot papers is going to be interpreted as someone trying to rig the election and that could set off an unrest,” he added.

Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s Deputy President helped broker the political deal to bring elections forward by two years in an effort to restore stability in the country. There are now 23 politicians vying for the premiership and political analysis believe another collation formed by disparate political parties is likely. Deputy President Ramaphosa arrived in Maseru early this morning to help oversee the elections. A government spokesmen said “he is expected to witness democracy in action in Lesotho,” spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said. “During his visit today, deputy president Ramaphosa will be visiting four voting stations around Maseru.”

Many of the people of Lesotho hope the elections will bring peace and help ease political tensions in the small landlocked country. “I am expecting peace after this election. We are used to hunger and poverty,” a 77-year-old pensioner Mmamakgobe Makgobe said. However, there was little sign of optimism on the streets of the capital. “Why bother voting? I am not going to waste my time to vote because this election is all about Thabane and Metsing. It has nothing to do with what we want as voters,” said Dineo Motlou, a 22-year sales assistant at supermarket chain. Due to the remoteness of some of the country’s voting stations and communities a complete election result may not be realized for several days.  Commentators have been reluctant to project a winner in the absence of reliable opinion polls, instead choosing to wait for final results.

For more information please see:

BBC News – Lesotho Elections Under Way Aimed At Resolving Tensions – 28 February 2015

The Citizen – Ramaphosa in Lesotho for Elections – 28 February 2015

U.S. News and World Reports – Mountain Kingdom Of Lesotho Holds Early Election after Collapse of Coalition Government – 28 February 2015

Reuters – Lesotho Prepares For Early Vote in Bid to Ease Political Crisis – 26 February 2015

Bill Browder Statement on the Murder of Boris Nemtsov

“Last night Russia entered a new and dark phase in its slide toward
totalitarian dictatorship with the murder of Boris Nemtsov. Previously, the
Putin regime relied primarily on imprisonment and exile to silence its
critics. Now, they have started murdering them. I’m sure this won’t be the
last.

Boris Nemtsov was one of the few people in Russia who wasn’t afraid to
stand up to the corruption, illegitimatacy and impunity of the Putin regime
and for that he paid with his life. I will always remember how Boris went
around the world calling for justice for the murder of Sergei Magnitsky and
demanding Western sanctions against his killers. It is now our duty to do
the same for Boris.

I have no confidence in any Russian investigation into his death because
the Putin regime proved its incapacity to do this with the cover up of the
Magnitsky murder.

I can only hope that Boris Nemtsov’s legacy will ultimately bring about the
democratic change in Russia he worked his whole life to achieve.

May Boris rest in peace.”

Putin Critic Gunned Down a Stone’s Throw from Kremlin

By Kathryn Maureen Ryan
Impunity Watch, Managing Editor

MOSCOW, Russia – Outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin, Boris Nemtsov, a Russian opposition politician and former Deputy Prime Minister was shot dead just meters from the Kremlin in central Moscow late on Friday. Nemtsov, who was 55 years old, was shot four times in the back, the Interior Ministry said. A police spokeswoman on the scene said he had been walking on a bridge over the Moskva River with a Ukrainian woman. Russian President Vladimir Putin announced through a spokesperson he would be taking the investigation of the murder into presidential command, claiming it could have been a contract killing and a “provocation” on the ahead of a large demonstration that Nemtsov had was to lead in Moscow on Sunday.

PHOTO: Russian opposition Boris Nemtsov speaks during a rally against the intervention in Ukraine and a possible war in Crimea in Moscow, March 15, 2014 Nemtsov was reportedly preparing a report on Russian troops in eastern Ukraine before he was murdered in the streets of Moscow. (Photo courtesy of ABC News)

The gunmen, who remains unknown, fired at least eight shots, killing Nemtsov. Russian Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said an investigation is ongoing and witnesses will be questioned. “Witnesses to the killing are being questioned, and the crime scene is being carefully examined,” Markin said. A Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Putin was aware of the killing and called it a provocation. “Putin noted that this cruel murder has every sign of being a contract one which has solely provocative nature,” Peskov said. “The president has ordered the leadership of the Investigative Committee, the Interior Ministry and the Federal Security Service to form an investigative group and keep the investigation of this crime under personal control,” Peskov added, describing the presidential committee that is to be established to investigate the murder, a committee that will likely face criticism due to the potential biased involvement of the Putin regime.

Nemtsov was one of the organizers of large street demonstration in opposition of the Russian President in recent years. Nemtsov always marching at the front of the crowd and addressed the large crowds on stage. While he served as deputy prime minister under President Boris Yeltsin during the 1990s, Nemtsov fell out of Putin’s close circle and founded Russia’s People’s Freedom Party in opposition to the Putin leadership that dominates Russian politics and civil society. He was also the author of several reports on corruption in the Russian Federation, including attempts to estimate President Putin’s actual wealth as well as attempts to estimate the amount of money stolen during preparations for last year’s Winter Olympics in the resort town of Sochi.

Nemtsov had expressed concern that Vladimir Putin might want him dead because of his strong opposition to Russia’s actions in the Ukraine. The upcoming opposition march on Sunday was intended to protest against Russia’s war and occupation in eastern Ukraine where pro-Russian rebels have seized Ukrainian territory. According to Ksenia Sobchak, another prominent opposition figure in Russia, Nemtsov had been preparing a report on the illegal presence of Russian troops in Ukraine. The Kremlin strongly denies allegations by Kiev and the west that his regime has sent troops into the country.

For more information please see:

ABC News – Boris Nemtsov, Vocal Critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Shot Dead in Moscow – 27 February 2015

BBC News – Russia Opposition Politician Boris Nemtsov Shot Dead – 27 February 2015

The New York Times – Boris Nemtsov, Putin Foe, Is Shot Dead In Shadow of Kremlin – 27 February 2015

Reuters – Russian Opposition Leader Nemtsov Shot Dead In Moscow – 27 February 2015

Paris and London Condemn French Politicians’ Meeting With Assad

By Kathryn Maureen Ryan
Impunity Watch, Managing Editor

DAMASCUS, Syria – Despite a recent diplomatic trip to Syria taken by four members of the French Parlmement, which included a meeting with Syrian Presidents Bashar Al-Assad, a trip that was not authorized by the Office of the French President, both France and the United Kingdom have definitively stated that renewed diplomatic ties with the Assad regime are not wise or likely, both Paris and London see the recent visit to Syria by French Parliamentarian as country to the official polices of each respective country. With the advance of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) in both Syria and Iraq some European Union Leaders have stated that it may be time to re-establish lines of communication with Damascus because so far the four year civil war has failed to lead to the overthrow of Bashar Al-Assad’s brutal regime in Syria.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad meets with a French politicians led by Senate member, leader of the Senate’s French-Syrian Friendship Committee Jean-Pierre Vial on February 25, 2015. (Photo courtesy of Reuters).

In a column published in Arabic daily Al-Hayat as well as in France’s Le Monde, the French and British foreign criticized leaders who have sought a rapprochement with Assad by saying the regime leaders is using western fears about the advancement of ISIS, which has seized areas of northern and eastern Syria, to win back international support and some degree of legitimacy for his deadly regime. “Some seem sensitive to this argument,” Laurent Fabius and Philip Hammond wrote. “In reality, Bashar represents injustice, chaos and terror. We, France and Britain, say no to all three.” “For our own security, we must defeat Islamic State in Syria. We need a partner that can act against extremists. We need a negotiated political settlement,” Hammond and Fabius said.

“After 220,000 deaths and millions displaced, it is illusory to imagine that a majority of Syrians would accept to be ruled by the one who torments them,” Fabius and Hammond wrote. “To end their hopes of a better future in a Syria without Assad would be to radicalize even more Syrians, push moderates toward extremism and consolidate a jihadi bastion in Syria.”

In a rare show of political unity both current French president Francois Hollande and former President Nicolas Sarkozy condemned the trip, Sarkozy going as far as to refer to the MPs who made the trip as “clowns.” On Thursday President Francois Hollande condemned the French lawmakers for meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whom he calls a “dictator.” “I condemn this initiative. I condemn it because French lawmakers have taken it upon themselves to meet with a dictator who is the cause of one of the worst civil wars of recent years,” Hollande said while in the Philippines. Hollande argued that France cannot have a dialogue with a “dictator who has bombed his own people and who has used chemical weapons to destroy human lives, Syrian lives — the lives of children, women”.

Earlier French Prime Minister Manuel Valls also “condemned with the greatest strength” the decision by the French lawmakers to meet with Assad, whom he referred to as “a butcher”. “I want to condemn this initiative with the greatest strength,” Valls told French channel BFMTV. “For parliamentarians to go without warning to meet a butcher…. I think it was a moral failing.”

Like many western countries France cut ties with Syria after the regime began its brutal assault on members of the opposition which led to the country’s now four year old conflict. France cut diplomatic ties with Syria in 2012 and supports the moderate Syrian opposition, seeking the removal of Bashar Assad from power.

For more information please see:

The Daily Star: Lebanon – France, U.K. Dismiss Calls to Renew Relations with Assad – 28 February 2015

Reuters – France, Britain Dismiss Calls to Renew Relations with Syria’s Assad – 27 February 2015

The Independent: United Kingdom – Hollande and Sarkozy Round on ‘Clown’ MPs for Visiting Assad – 26 February 2015

The Local: France – Hollande Slams MPs over Talks with Syria’s Assad – 26 February 2015

ISIS Destroys Priceless pieces of History at Mosul Antiquities Museum

By Kathryn Maureen Ryan
Impunity Watch, Managing Editor

BAGHDAD, Iraq – New video released Thursday appears to show militants loyal to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) destroying Assyrian and Akkadian artifacts, smashing and scraping though artifacts dating back to at least the 7th century B.C.E. The ISIS supporters who took sledgehammers to ancient artifacts, from some of humanities earliest civilization, claimed they were ordered by the Profit to destroy all symbols of Idolatry. Instead these men are committing unjustifiable mass atrocities taking lives and attempting to destroy the histories of all people in the region who do not share their radical views. I’m totally shocked,” a professor at the University of Mosul’s college of archaeology said of the video, “It’s a catastrophe. With the destruction of these artifacts, we can no longer be proud of Mosul’s civilization.”

ISIS supports destroy cultural and historic artifacts dating back to at least the seventh century B.C.E.. (Photo courtesy of The International Business Times UK)

The video shows only the latest episode of cultural destruction in a spree of iconoclasm, the destruction of religious artifacts, and outright ethnocide committed by ISIS militants in Syria and Iraq. In May 2014, there were several reports of separate Assyrian artifacts, which have stood for a millennia or more, being excavated and destroyed by ISIS supporters. In July 2014, ISIS supporters destroyed the Tomb of the Prophet Jonah in Nineveh. Earlier this week, reports claimed ISIS burned 100,000 books and manuscripts from the Mosul library. This week ISIS militants in Syria overran Assyrian Christian villages, taking more than 250 Christians hostage and destroying homes and churches in their wake.

Lamia al-Gailani, an Iraqi archaeologist and associate fellow at the London-based Institute of Archaeology, said the militants had wreaked untold damage. “It’s not only Iraq’s heritage: it’s the whole world’s,” she said. “They are priceless, unique. It’s unbelievable. I don’t want to be Iraqi anymore,” she said, comparing the atrocity to the dynamiting of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Afghan Taliban in 2001.

In the video published by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant on Thursday which showed men destroying artifacts with sledgehammers and drills, saying they were symbols of idolatry. The men claimed they were ordered by the Profit to commit these acts of Iconoclasm saying, “the Prophet ordered us to get rid of statues and relics, and his companions did the same when they conquered countries after him.” While the militants claim their actions were motivated by a desire to destroy idolatry it seems the real motive for releasing this video was mere propaganda. ISIS itself does not destroy all artifacts its encounters, instead the illegal looting and selling of antiquities is a primary source of ISIS funding.

Acts of iconoclasm are not uncommon throughout history.  According to legend Abraham, the father of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, destroyed idols and there was a long history of icon-destruction in early Christianity. However, iconoclasm is now considered a crime against humanity in modern civilization, an act that destroys not only the culture and history of a single people but the collective history of humanity itself.

For more information please see:

The Atlantic – Erased: ISIS and the Destruction of Ancient Artifacts – 26 February 2015

The Guardian – Isis Destroys Thousands of Books and Manuscripts in Mosul Libraries – 26 February 2015

International Business Times UK – Iraq: Isis Take Sledgehammers to Priceless Assyrian Artefacts at Mosul Museum [VIDEO] – 26 February 2015

Reuters – With Sledgehammer, Islamic State Smashes Iraqi History – 26 February 2015