ICC Office of the Prosecutor Weekly Briefing May 2012 Issue 122
Syrian Network for Human Rights: Special Report on 27 May Massacre in Hama
Massacre in Hama
After the Al-Houla massacre, divisions of the Syrian Regime army marched north and raided the city of Hama. The troops were reinforced with many armoured vehicles and snipers who were already positioned on high buildings. In the attack 33 victims were killed, including 7 kids and 5 women. More than 90 people were wounded.
Districts that came under fierce shelling by armoured vehicles and artillery shells were: Athaheryea, Masha’a Al-Arba’een, some quarters of Aleppo Road, and Masha’a Al-Furousia (Janoub Al-Mal’ab). When the residents of the abovementioned districts tried to flee, regime’s snipers targeted them, so scores of people were wounded, some of whom are now suffering from critical injuries. The number of the wounded was at least 90 people. At least 50 of the wounded received medical care in a makeshift hospital. This included those with critical injuries, most of whom were women and children.
WARNING: SOME OF THE VIDEOS BELOW CONTAIN GRAPHIC IMAGES
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcvd0RncHlM&feature=youtu.be
The victims and the wounded are shown following the massacre.
The makeshift hospital where the wounded are being treated.
For further information, please see;
Syrian Network for Human Rights – Special Report Hama Massacre – 27 May 2012
Mounting Accusations Plague Brazil’s Top Officials
By Margaret Janelle Hutchinson
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America
Brasília, Brazil – Gilmer Mendes, a judge on Brazil’s high court, is accusing former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (“Lula”) of pressuring him to set aside a planned trial of the biggest scandal of his administration.
The scandal erupted during President Lula’s first term in 2005 and caused a number of top officials in the governing Worker’s Party to resign. In 2007, the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF) accepted the complaint against 40 politicians suspected of involvement in the alleged scheme reported by then Congressman Roberto Jefferson (PTB), which became known as “mensalão” or “big monthly allowance”. Jefferson said lawmakers accepted base periodic payments in exchange for voting with the interests of President Lula’s government.
Over the weekend Judge Mendes told Veja magazine that Mr. da Silva, 66, asked him in April in Brasília, the capital, to postpone the trial, set for August. Judge Mendes said the pressure at the April meeting in Brasília included an insinuation by Mr. da Silva that Judge Mendes could be linked to another scandal, this one involving an opposition senator, Demostenes Torres, and his ties to a businessman, Carlos Augusto Ramos (better known by his nickname, Carlinhos Cachoeira or “Charlie Waterfall”), who is accused of running illegal gambling operations. The former president confirmed that the meeting in Brasília took place, but has adamantly denied the validity of Mendes’s accusations.
These mounting accusations of corruption at the highest levels cast a shadow over the current presidency of Dilma Rousseff. Ms. Rousseff is also of the Worker’s Party and was endorsed by President Lula as his successor. Scandals have forced seven cabinet ministers to resign in the past year, including Ms. Rousseff’s chief of staff. Ms. Rousseff issued a statement on Wednesday rejecting any threat of an “institutional crisis” between the judiciary and executive branches over the feud.
The president of the STF, minister Ayres Britto responded to the dispute between Judge Mendes and Mr. da Silva during a plenary session, stating that, “The judiciary is immune to such dissent. I have said repeatedly that we are experienced in coping with situations of all kinds. We did not lose the focus that it is our duty to judge the whole process – including the monthly allowance – with objectivity, impartiality, and serenity, ultimately aware of the evidence in the file.” Mr. Britto also expressed that the trial should take place as soon as possible.
Two judges on the 11-member court are expected to retire soon, so if the trial is delayed, Ms. Rousseff’s nominations to fill the vacancies could influence the outcome, raising concerns over the Workers Party’s influence over the trial.
For further information, please see:
Primeira Edição – Lula já se encontrou com cinco ministros do STF em 2012 – 31 May 2012
Jornal do Brasil – Ayres Britto reafirma que não existe crise institucional por causa do Mensalão – 30 May 2012
The New York Times – Brazil’s Political Class Jolted by Claim That Ex-Leader Pressed a High Court Judge – 30 May 2012
The Washington Post – Supreme Court justice accuses former Brazilian president Silva of pressure to set aside trial – 29 May 2012
Syrian Revolution Digest – Wednesday 30 May 2012
THE COMMENTARY IN THIS PIECE DOES NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF IMPUNITY WATCH.
*WARNING VIDEOS MAY CONTAIN GRAPHIC IMAGES*
Abandoned!
Symbolic gestures cannot save us from real slaughter. Words of sympathy do not shield us from mortar rounds. Sanctions do not stop marauding gangs of thugs and killers. In Syria, our sense of abandonment is as areal as the war being waged against us.
Wednesday May 30, 2012
Death toll: 39.
News
Op-Eds & Special Reports
What the Hell Should We Do About Syria? FP asked five smart observers to offer their solutions for the quagmire in Damascus.
Obama & the Russians
… the Syrian revolution is as much about ending an apartheid-patronage system as it is about creating democratic state, yet Russia relies for its own commercial and military interests on preserving the former. Syrian dissident Ammar Abdulhamid, freshly returned from Moscow, smartly observes:
What the “regime” means to the Russians is Alawite control of security and military apparatuses. If regime survival under this formula is not possible, than the powers-that-be in Russia would not be too opposed to the fragmentation of Syria so long as coastal areas remain under Alawite control, which is the likely outcome in this case. To ensure getting their desired outcome, the Russians will continue propping up the regime by supplying it with arms, which they claim are not meant to be used against protesters but against future western intervention, and by continuing to be a stumbling block in the way of any meaningful UN-led action or condemnation.
So Russia will, in the end, accept nothing less than the balkanization of Syria. So much for the insistence of countless Security Council statements that the country’s “sovereignty” and “territorial integrity” be preserved.
The administration hopes that it is possible to appeal to the better angels of Moscow’s nature and that Houla compels them to change their position on Assad. Instead, the Russians are sending more arms to the regime. It’s hardly surprising, then, the Russians won’t even admit that Assad is behind the massacre. Russian deputy U.N. ambassador Alexander Pankin “rejected the idea that the evidence clearly showed Damascus was guilty.” … Moscow is simply playing the spoiler and thereby enjoying the sort of international prestige that it has not been afforded since the end of the Cold War. The Russians are not going to engineer a coup against Assad, or in any way work to resolve the issue, because it is precisely the conflict that has given them influence in Syria—the conflict, that is, and Obama, who for no good reason has handed Moscow the reins.
Video Highlights
In Houla, pounding by pro-Assad troops resumes after departure of UN monitors leaving many dead and wounded: treating the injured http://youtu.be/jBPjhJnjuMs ,http://youtu.be/7evsmN41-YQ Martyrs http://youtu.be/eb5D7Z3XzQo Crops catch firehttp://youtu.be/C3pWlKx9d9I The pounding http://youtu.be/2AUE2io4tbw ,http://youtu.be/2AUE2io4tbw The gunfire http://youtu.be/PnsxuLJ1vp8 ,http://youtu.be/vsjp5WIJ9ko Locals running away from town across the fieldshttp://youtu.be/Z3Z7mCYuphM Earlier in the day, UN monitors visited some of the local houses where entire families were slaughtered http://youtu.be/c1txS0LPPq8
Assad officials keep insisting that no condemnation should be made until their investigation of the events is concluded, but their methods of investigations, which involve random pounding of the town, are a bit… unorthodox.
Some of those Russians anti-aircraft missiles, not intended for use in the current crackdown, if we go by the assertions of Russian officials, get used in the pounding of the Old Homs neighborhoods, setting entire buildings on fire: Hamidiyeh http://youtu.be/OmeexzSs1aELocal activist is almost killed while filming http://youtu.be/JZI-C-1zY9g Bab Al-Sibaa: pulling the bodies of the dead from the streets while under fire from snipershttp://youtu.be/AK1i4jnG1sg Khaldiyeh http://youtu.be/3275Rb8nrbg The poundinghttp://youtu.be/P5YE7A8Lygk , http://youtu.be/QurkSJrrnj0 ,http://youtu.be/wMmOHpVkubA , http://youtu.be/wBc0IAGqrvY ,http://youtu.be/qJB6FoVLrZo
In Rastan, the pounding resumes at night http://youtu.be/RKW7NuJb8TQ
In Idlib Province, chopper fires rockets on the village of Mar Shammareenhttp://youtu.be/5Y8ZBI32QMs
In Anadan, Aleppo Province, chopper fires rockets on the townhttp://youtu.be/pVhC15D8Fm0
In Damascus, the pounding of the town of Douma continues http://youtu.be/pnZqu73h5ps
Press Release: Italian Parliament Debates Response to the Magnitsky Case
Press Release
Hermitage Capital
Italian Parliament Debates Response to the Magnitsky Case
30 May 2012 – The Italian Parliament held a debate on the Magnitsky motion on Monday, giving one of the strongest condemnations yet of any European national parliament of Russia’s handling of the torture and murder in police custody of 37-year old Russian whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. The Magnitsky motion was introduced by Matteo Mecacci, MP from Italy’s Democratic/Radical Party, and Chair of the Committee on Democracy, Human Rights and Humanitarian Questions at the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly.“The Magnitsky case is a test for European politics. We are calling on European countries, and in this case on Italy, to act to stop officials responsible for the torture and murder of an innocent and corageous man, from freely traveling and investing in our nation. This is not a question of politics, is a question of human justice that needs to have an answer,” said Matteo Mecacci, MP.
Supported by representatives from five different parties in the Italian parliament, the motion calls for visa bans and asset freezes on the 60 Russian officials identified by the US Helsinki Commission for their role in the false arrest, torture and death of Sergei Magnitsky and the $230 million corruption he uncovered.
The Magnitsky motion calls the two-and-a-half year investigation into Magnitsky’s death “unsatisfactory” and condemns the posthumous prosecution launched against Mr Magnitsky.
“The proceedings initiated by Russian authorities in order to ascertain the cause of Magnitsky’s death have to date been completely unsatisfactory, culminating… in the reopening of a proceeding against Magnitsky, thus giving rise to the first proceeding against a deceased person in the history of the Russian Federation,” says the Italian motion.
“The detailed complaints which were recorded and expressed by Magnitsky himself over the course of his imprisonment have allowed accurate identification of those responsible 60 people within the Russan government…who have not to date been subject to due criminal process,” says the motion.
The motion urges the Italian government to act by imposing sanctions on the 60 Russian officials:
“To not issue entrance visas to the sixty people on the Cardin’s list in Italian territory or under Italian jurisdiction, and to identify, if any, the assets belonging to the sixty people on the Cardin’s list…and to take the appropriate measures in order to attain a substantial block on the availability of said assets.”
In addition to Mecacci, the motion is supported by Italian parliamentarians Luca Volontè, Fabio Evangelisti, Gianni Vernetti, Lapo Pistelli, Ricardo Migliori, Ettore Rosato, Marina Sereni, Antonio Misiani, Rita Bernardini, Elisebetta Zamparutti, Maurizio Turco, Maria Antonietta Farina Coscioni, and Marco Beltrandi.
During the debate, “The People of Freedom” party introduced a different motion on the Magnitsky case. It recognised that the Russian government failed to provide clear answers to the EU on the Magnitsky matter, but stopped short of calling for Italy to impose visa sanctions and asset freezes on the complicit Russian officials.
“The People of Freedom” party was launched five years ago by Silvio Berlusconi, former Prime Minister and a friend of Russian president Vladimir Putin. Mr Berlusconi was one of the few Western leaders who attended President Putin’s inauguration on 7 May 2012 in Moscow.
“We are calling on the Italian government not to allow Russian torturers and murders to come into Italy,” said a representative of Hermitage Capital. “We hope that personal friendships don’t get in the way of justice.”
The Magnitsky motion is now going into the consultation phase between various factions in the Italian parliament and the Italian government. It should be voted on at a plenary session next week.
For further information please contact:
Hermitage Capital
Phone: +44 207 440 17 77
E-mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org
Website: http://lawandorderinrussia.org
Facebook: http://on.fb.me/hvIuVI
Twitter: @KatieFisher__
Livejournal: http://hermitagecap.livejournal.com/