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Lithuania: Don’t Leave Global Ban on Cluster Munitions
(Berlin) – Lithuania’s parliament should reject a government proposal to withdraw from the 2008 treaty banning cluster munitions, Human Rights Watch said today. If approved, Lithuania would be the first country to leave the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which 112 countries have ratified.
“Lithuania’s lawmakers should reject this ill-considered proposal and reaffirm their support for the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” said Mary Wareham, deputy crisis, conflict, and arms director at Human Rights Watch. “Withdrawing from the convention will stain Lithuania’s otherwise excellent reputation on cluster munitions and increase the risk of civilian harm.”
Cluster munitions can be fired from the ground by artillery, rockets, missiles, and mortar projectiles, or dropped by aircraft. They typically open in the air, dispersing multiple submunitions or bomblets over a wide area. Many submunitions fail to explode on initial impact, leaving duds that can indiscriminately injure and kill, like landmines, for years until they are cleared and destroyed.
The Convention on Cluster Munitions is a lifesaving instrument that comprehensively bans cluster munitions and requires the destruction of stockpiles, clearance of cluster munition remnants, and assistance to victims of the weapons. Lithuania actively participated in negotiating the convention and was among the first countries to sign it in Oslo on December 3, 2008, leading by example among countries from the Baltic region. Upon signing, Lithuania pledged its full support for the convention, describing it as “an outstanding example of cooperation” that it hoped would continue.
However, since 2023, Lithuania’s defense minister has advocated for the country to withdraw from the convention, asserting that cluster munitions are a necessary weapon due to changes in its national security situation since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. On July 11, 2024, the Lithuanian government submitted a proposal to parliament recommending that Lithuania withdraw from the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
“Ever-changing national security considerations don’t affect the critical humanitarian reasons that led Lithuania and more than 100 other countries to adopt the cluster munitions ban in the first place,” Wareham said.
In its official transparency reports for the Convention on Cluster Munitions, Lithuania confirmed that it has never produced, stockpiled, transferred, or used cluster munitions. It has actively participated throughout the convention’s meetings and has repeatedly expressed concern at the use of cluster munitions by Russia, Syria, and other countries. The Lithuanian government’s proposal to withdraw from the convention will overshadow this positive track record and reputation, Human Rights Watch said.
Human Rights Watch, the United Nations, and others have reported that repeated Russian cluster munitions attacks have killed and injured hundreds of Ukrainian civilians since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. Ukrainian forces have also used cluster munitions, resulting in civilian casualties. Since July 2023, the administration of US President Joe Biden has approved five transfers to Ukraine of US cluster munitions delivered by artillery projectiles and ballistic missiles. Russia, Ukraine, and the United States have not joined the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
Cluster munitions predominantly harm civilians. The Cluster Munition Monitor 2023 report found that 95 percent of people reported killed or wounded by cluster munitions in 2022, in which the victim’s status was recorded, were civilians. Among victims whose age group was reported, children accounted for 71 percent of casualties from cluster munition remnants.
The massive humanitarian costs of cluster munitions include civilian casualties at the time of attack and long afterward, as well as the long-term social and economic impact of submunition duds.
At the Eleventh Meeting of States Parties of the Convention on Cluster Munitions in September 2023, member countries including Lithuania condemned “any use of cluster munitions by any actor.” They expressed “grave concern at the significant increase in civilian casualties and the humanitarian impact resulting from the repeated and well documented use of cluster munitions” since 2021, particularly with respect to “the use of cluster munitions in Ukraine.”
The convention has saved countless lives through its humanitarian provisions, Human Rights Watch said. Since the convention’s entry into force on May 30, 2008, member countries have destroyed 1.489 million cluster munitions and 179 million submunitions, 100 percent of the cluster munition stocks once held by the states parties.
Members of the Convention on Cluster Munitions include 25 of the 32 NATO member states and 21 European Union member states. This widespread support demonstrates that most governments, including many of Lithuania’s closest allies, support the ban on cluster munitions.
“Countries that have banned cluster munitions should urge Lithuania to not withdraw from this hugely important convention,” Wareham said. “They have a responsibility to discourage others from using, producing, stockpiling, or transferring cluster munitions because of the foreseeable risk of civilian harm.”
Human Rights Watch is a co-founder of the Cluster Munition Coalition, the global coalition of nongovernmental organizations working to eradicate cluster munitions, and contributes to its Cluster Munition Monitor reporting initiative.
‘Dark Day’ in Malawi for Rights of LGBT People
Malawi’s Constitutional Court on June 28 rejected a legal challenge to the penal code that makes same-sex conduct a criminal offense. The decision contradicts fundamental rights, including the rights to equality and nondiscrimination of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, protected under international human rights law.
The three-member judicial panel dismissed an application from Jan Willen Akster, a Dutch citizen, and Jana Gonani, a trans woman and sex worker, challenging the constitutionality of Penal Code sections 153, 154, and 156. These sections criminalize anyone who has “carnal knowledge” of any person “against the order of nature,” attempts to commit an “unnatural offence” or undertakes “indecent practices.” These provisions are vague and overly broad, facilitating anti-LGBT discrimination, and can result in sentences of up to 14 years’ imprisonment.
Both applicants face criminal prosecutions before lower courts: Akster was accused of abusing children, and Gonani was charged with “false pretense” for presenting herself as a woman. Gonani received an eight-year sentence at a men’s prison in December 2021, while proceedings against Akster continue. They each filed appeals with the High Court in 2022 and 2023 to challenge the constitutionality of the prohibitions against same-sex sexual conduct, which the chief justice combined into one case.
Many faith-based groups filed legal briefs and organized demonstrations against LGBT rights during the hearings. The case also sparked a national debate on same-sex marriage. Religious leaders led protests contending that the court proceedings aimed to legalize same-sex marriage in Malawi.
The court dismissed all the arguments that were raised, maintaining that it was parliament’s responsibility to review and amend laws.
“It was a dark day for the whole community,” an LGBT rights activist told Human Rights Watch. “We are afraid more than ever.”
The court’s decision exacerbates risks of arbitrary arrests and prosecutions, physical violence, and discrimination against LGBT people in Malawi, as Human Rights Watch has long documented. There is further risk that LGBT people will be excluded from access to health care, justice, and security.
With the case’s dismissal, the power to guarantee LGBT rights now lies with parliament. Parliament should uphold Malawi’s international human rights obligations by urgently reviewing and amending the Penal Code to end anti-LGBT discrimination and protect everyone’s right to safety, privacy and dignity.
Russia’s July 8 Attack on a Children’s Hospital in Ukraine
(Kyiv) - Russian forces’ strikes on multiple cities in Ukraine on July 8, 2024, killed at least 42 civilians, including five children, and injured at least 190, according to Ukrainian authorities. The attacks also caused significant damage to vital infrastructure, including the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital in Kyiv, the country’s largest children’s hospital.
The hospital’s director told the UN Security Council that the strike severely damaged several departments, including the intensive care units and oncology and surgical wings, and completely destroyed the toxicology and traumatology departments. The director also said that hundreds of children, including those undergoing dialysis treatment, were evacuated immediately after air raid sirens went off at 9:52 am.
When the first strike hit, less than an hour after the sirens went off, patients and staff were still in the hospital, including three patients undergoing heart surgery. Ten children were injured in the attack. On July 10, the Ukrainian health minister reported that a child who had been evacuated from Okhmatdyt’s intensive care unit in a critical condition had died in another hospital.
“Many of Russia’s attacks in Ukraine have resulted in immense civilian loss and harm, and the July 8 attacks only added to that horrendous toll,” said Tirana Hassan, executive director at Human Rights Watch. “Attacks directed at medical facilities are war crimes under international humanitarian law, and the strike that hit Okhmatdyt children’s hospital should be investigated as a potential war crime.”
Since Russia commenced its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, at least 1,736 medical facilities in Ukraine have been damaged or destroyed. On March 9, 2022, a bomb air-dropped by Russian forces landed in one of the courtyards of Mariupol’s Hospital #3, damaging maternity and pediatric units and killing and injuring patients and staff.
As of June, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine put the number of civilians killed since the start of full-scale invasion at least 9,560 civilians with at least 21,450 more injured, mainly by explosive weapons with wide area effects. The casualties include at least 1,796 children (594 killed and 1202 injured).
Bhutan: Urgently Reform Justice System, Prison Conditions
(New York) – A man who served 30 years in a Bhutanese prison for distributing political pamphlets has said that political detainees like him are surviving on meager rations and are reduced to using rice sacks for clothing and bedding, Human Rights Watch said today. The Bhutanese government should immediately free its remaining political prisoners, who are kept in appalling conditions and are serving lengthy sentences following unfair trials and torture.
Ram Bahadur Rai, 66, spoke with Human Rights Watch after he was released after completing his sentence on July 5, 2024, and immediately expelled from the country. At least 34 prisoners convicted of political offenses are still believed to be in Bhutanese prisons. The tiny Himalayan kingdom has been a multi-party democracy since 2008, but it continues to hold people imprisoned earlier who were regarded as opponents of the former autocratic system.
“Bhutan’s government cultivates an enlightened international image by propounding the theory of ‘gross national happiness,’ but the blatantly abusive treatment of these prisoners tells a different story,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “While the Bhutanese government attempts to strengthen its ties with international partners, foreign governments and multilateral organizations should push for the release of political prisoners.”
In 2023, Human Rights Watch documented 37 inmates classified by Bhutan’s government as “political prisoners,” who were first detained between 1990 and 2008. Following the release of three people who completed their sentences in the past year, it is believed that at least 34 remain, many imprisoned for life without parole. Under Bhutanese law, only King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck can commute a life sentence.
Ram Bahadur Rai was among around 90,000 Nepali-speaking Bhutanese people who were forced to flee the country around 1990 due to violence and persecution under the government at that time.
Following his release from prison, he told Human Rights Watch that in 1994 he had returned to Bhutan and was involved in distributing pamphlets on behalf of a banned organization called the Bhutan People’s Party in the border town of Gelephu when he was arrested. He said he was then accused in a “fabricated” case of participating in political violence.
Rai said that before and during his trial, at which he had no defense lawyer, he was tortured so severely that he was hospitalized, only to be returned to jail and further tortured. By the time he was convicted and sentenced to 31 years and 10 months in prison, he said the torture had left him unable to write his own application for an appeal. The appeal was rejected, and he was warned that if he appealed again his sentence could be increased.
Rai said that since 2012, when the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) stopped arranging family contact for national security prisoners in Bhutan, he had had no communication with his family. Upon his release, he sent a photograph to his four children “so they can know what their father looks like.”
In Chemgang prison, near the capital, Thimphu, Rai was held in a block with 24 other prisoners termed “anti-national” by the Bhutanese authorities. Describing conditions there, he said, “It’s a very painful situation. The facilities have almost halved since the Red Cross left [in 2012].”
Prisoners are obliged to buy their own medication if they fall sick and can wait up to eight months if they need to see a doctor, meaning they frequently receive no treatment. Several are in “very poor” health, Rai said.
He said that after the ICRC’s engagement ended, guards had taunted the prisoners: “We are your parents now, we are your everything.”
Food rations have been reduced to half their previous level. Prisoners are supplied with a blanket every three years and a mattress every 18 months, although it is of such poor quality that it is “unusable after a month or two.” Rai said the clothes they are provided are too small. “We collected rice sacks to use for clothing and bedding.”
Rai said that the Bhutan Red Cross Society, which is supposed to have taken over the duties of the ICRC in supporting prisoners’ welfare, “don’t do anything” and that the remaining prisoners had asked him to appeal for the ICRC to resume its engagement.
Bhutan’s treatment of these men, who were convicted following torture and unsafe trials, is a stain on the reputation of the government, Human Rights Watch said.
Bhutan’s legal system is formally based on concepts in the Buddhist tradition such as compassion. The king, who is head of state while most government functions are the responsibility of an elected government, retains the power to grant “kidu,” or relief, including by commuting sentences.
“King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck could end the unjust suffering of these prisoners and their families with a stroke of a pen, as both he and his father have previously done in other cases,” Ganguly said. “Sixteen years since Bhutan’s transition to democracy, all of the remaining political prisoners should finally be released.”
UN Rights Council Takes Big Step for Treaty on Free Education
The United Nation’s preeminent human rights body, the Human Rights Council, today forged a new path for millions of children who have so far been blocked from education by its costs.
The council approved a proposal advanced by Luxembourg, the Dominican Republic, and Sierra Leone, and cosponsored by 29 other states, to establish a working group of countries to consider and draft a new treaty explicitly recognizing every child’s right to early childhood education, free public preprimary education, and free public secondary education.
The principal international children’s rights treaty, the 1990 Convention on the Rights of the Child, already recognizes a right to free and compulsory primary education. The proposed new treaty would build upon that foundation, recognizing that free primary education alone is insufficient to prepare children to thrive in today’s world.
In 2019, the World Organisation for Early Childhood Education and the Latin American Campaign for the Right to Education shared with the UN Child Rights Committee their research concluding that the existing international human rights framework did not specify that the right to education should begin in early childhood, before primary school. In 2022, the UN’s top independent education expert, Dr. Koumbou Boly Barry, recommended that the right to early childhood education be enshrined in a new, legally binding treaty.
More than half a million global citizens signed an open letter from Malala Yousafzai and Vanessa Nakate, sent by the activist group Avaaz, for a new treaty. Various children’s rights luminaries and scholars expressed support for recognizing rights to free preprimary and free secondary education through a fourth optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Child activists from Child Rights Connect have also supported the initiative.
In a further landmark move, the Human Rights Council also requested today that children be given the opportunity to express their views on the treaty’s substance and participate in the process. This will be the first time that children are consulted and given a voice in the drafting of a new international treaty.
The new working group – which all countries may join – will first meet in 2025. They should act expeditiously to adopt a treaty because millions of children should not be made to wait longer before being guaranteed their inherent right to free education, from preprimary through secondary school.
UAE: Unfair Trial, Unjust Sentences
(Beirut) – The convictions of at least 44 defendants in the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) mass trial of at least 84 human rights defenders and political dissidents were based on a fundamentally unfair trial, a coalition of human rights groups said today. On July 10, 2024, the Abu Dhabi Federal Appeals Court meted out sentences ranging from between 15 years to life in prison in the UAE’s second largest unfair mass trial.
In December 2023, while hosting the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28), Emirati authorities brought charges against at least 84 defendants in retaliation for forming an independent advocacy group in 2010, many of whom had already been serving prison sentences for the same or similar offenses. The unfair mass trial was marred by serious due process and fair trial violations, including restricted access to case material and information, limited legal assistance, judges directing witness testimony, violations of the principle of double jeopardy, credible allegations of serious abuse and ill-treatment, and hearings shrouded in secrecy.
“These over-the-top long sentences make a mockery of justice and are another nail in the coffin for the UAE’s nascent civil society,” said Joey Shea, United Arab Emirates researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The UAE has dragged scores of its most dedicated human rights defenders and civil society members through a shamelessly unfair trial riddled with due process violations and torture allegations.”
Given that the charges are based solely on defendants’ peaceful practice of their human rights, UAE authorities should immediately overturn these convictions and release all defendants, the groups said.
Among the 44 defendants whose conviction is known, 4 people were sentenced to 15 years in prison and 40 to life in prison, according to the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center, a human rights organization supporting imprisoned human rights defenders in the UAE.
Three of those sentenced to life in prison are an academic, Nasser bin Ghaith, Abdulsalam Darwish al-Marzouqi, and Sultan Bin Kayed al-Qasimi. At least one defendant was acquitted. The verdicts for many of the defendants are not yet known as the authorities have yet to release official details about the convictions and sentences.
In a statement released on January 6, Emirati authorities accused the 84 defendants of “establishing and managing a clandestine terrorist organization in the UAE known as the ‘Justice and Dignity Committee’.” The charges appear to come from the UAE’s abusive 2014 counterterrorism law, which sets out punishments of up to life in prison and even death for anyone who sets up, organizes, or runs such an organization.
At least 60 of the defendants were already convicted in 2013 for their involvement with the Justice and Dignity Committee, according to the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center, including al-Marzouqi and al-Qasimi. That raises concerns that Emirati authorities are violating the principle of double jeopardy, which prohibits trying people twice for the same offense after they had received a final verdict.
The prosecutor did not provide any new evidence, and the evidence cited in the hearings was based entirely on the UAE94 trial, the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center said. “It is the same case as 2013,” a relative of one defendant told Human Rights Watch. “There is no new evidence, and it is the same allegations.”
In 2013, the grossly unfair “UAE94” trial resulted in convictions of 69 critics of the government, including 8 in absentia, on charges that violated their rights to free expression, association, and assembly. The 69 critics were among 94 people detained beginning in March 2012 in a wave of arbitrary arrests amid an unprecedented crackdown on dissent.
In addition to defendants from the UAE94 case, prominent activists such as Ahmed Mansoor, who is on the Board of the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) and the MENA Division Advisory Committee for Human Rights Watch, and academic Dr. Nasser bin Ghaith were put on trial in the new UAE84 case.
UAE security forces arrested Ahmed Mansoor in a late-night house raid on March 20, 2017. In May 2018, the Abu Dhabi Court of Appeals’ State Security Chamber sentenced Mansoor to 10 years in prison on charges entirely related to his human rights activities. On December 31, 2018, the court of last resort, the Federal Supreme Court, upheld his unjust sentence. In 2017, the Abu Dhabi Court of Appeals sentenced Nasser bin Ghaith, a prominent Emirati academic, to 10 years in prison on charges related to his peaceful criticism of the Egyptian and Emirati authorities.
"Regrettably, these sentences were entirely foreseeable. From the outset, it was clear that this trial was merely a façade designed to perpetuate the detention of prisoners of conscience even after their sentences had been served,” said Mohamed Al-Zaabi, director of the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center. “This trial not only violates the principle of double jeopardy but also contravenes all forms of legal norms.”
Family members have also expressed concern about the partiality of the presiding judge. During a hearing on December 21, one family member said, the judge “put sentences in the mouth of the witness.” The judge interrupted and intervened during the testimony by correcting the witness and dictating statements to him, family members and the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center said. The Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center said that at one point a police officer handed the witness a paper, which the witness then used to answer the remaining questions.
The trial was shrouded in secrecy, and Emirati authorities prevented defendants’ lawyers from freely accessing case files and court documents. Lawyers have apparently not obtained physical or electronic copies of the court documents and were only able to view the documents on a screen in a secure room under the supervision of security officers. Lawyers were not allowed to take photos of the documents and were only permitted to take handwritten notes.
While the January 6 statement from the Emirates News Agency (WAM), the UAE’s official state news agency, claimed the case was “public,” Emirati authorities severely restricted access to the hearings, even for family members, and kept basic details of the case secret, including the names of all the defendants.
Many of the defendants have been held in incommunicado solitary confinement for nearly a year. Phone calls and family visits have been prohibited from between 10 months to a year, except for brief phone calls in December 2023, informing family members of the existence of the new case and instructing them to hire lawyers.
During the trial, defendants have repeatedly described abusive detention conditions, including physical assaults, lack of access to medical care and required medicines, incessant loud music, and forced nudity.
Emirati authorities have not investigated the alleged abusive conditions, nor held those responsible for any unlawful acts to account.
The UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (also known as the Nelson Mandela Rules) state that “solitary confinement shall be used only in exceptional cases as a last resort, for as short a time as possible and subject to independent review, and only pursuant to the authorization by a competent authority.” The UN special rapporteur on torture has said that indefinite and prolonged solitary confinement in excess of 15 days should also be subject to an absolute prohibition, citing scientific studies that have established that even a few days of social isolation cause irreparable harm, including lasting psychological damage.
“It is a real tragedy that so many activists and human rights defenders will remain in prison for decades, deprived of watching their children grow up, for no other reason than calling for a better future for Emiratis,” said Khalid Ibrahim, the Gulf Center for Human Rights’s executive director. “The authorities must release them immediately if they want to retain the respect of the international community.”
SignatoriesEmirates Detainees Advocacy Center (EDAC)Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GC4HR)Human Rights WatchInternational Federation for Human Rights (FIDH)International Service for Human Rights (ISHR)MENA Rights GroupEU Should Add Xinjiang, Aluminum to Forced Labor Database
On Tuesday, the United States government added aluminum to its list of priority sectors for the enforcement of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. The law aims to block any good made in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region tainted by state-imposed forced labor from entering the US market.
The US decision aligns with the findings of Human Rights Watch’s 2024 report “Asleep at the Wheel,” which documented the forced labor risks associated with sourcing aluminum from Xinjiang , and informed the US Senate inquiry this May. Aluminum is key in dozens of automotive parts and the decision will have a huge impact on car companies’ human rights due diligence.
In recent years the European Union has shied away from meaningfully addressing human rights violations in China, notably forced labor in Xinjiang. Instead it has focused on economic security measures, such as imposing tariffs on imported Chinese electric vehicles. But the EU’s upcoming adoption of its Forced Labor Regulation (FLR) presents the EU an opportunity to set up an encompassing and rights-based approach to its relations with Chinese authorities.
The proposed FLR seeks to prevent EU consumers from buying goods produced with forced labor anywhere in the world. Once formally adopted, the European Commission will publish an online database on specific geographic areas and sectors at risk of forced labor, including regions where state authorities impose forced labor. A comprehensive database will be an important resource for companies, regulators, workers’ rights groups, and consumers alike.
Listing Xinjiang and the aluminum sector in the FLR database is crucial for the regulation to have concrete impact on state-imposed forced labor in China. The European Commission should also include other sectors among more than 17 industries associated with state-imposed forced labor that the Coalition to End Forced Labor in the Uyghur Region, including Human Rights Watch, has identified.
Though it seems simple, this action demands political courage, as China’s past retaliatory practices have created a climate of fear. It will doubtlessly also face resistance from those EU countries, Germany among them, that have strong economic dependencies on China. Finding that courage would add considerable strength to the global response, along with the US, Canada, Mexico, and other governments considering forced labor import bans, to address state-imposed forced labor, and more broadly, the Chinese government’s grave international crimes in Xinjiang.
Zimbabwe: Army Commander Threatens Election Integrity
(Johannesburg) – Zimbabwe’s army commander has openly stated that the country’s security forces intend to play a partisan political role, threatening future elections and those participating in them, Human Rights Watch said today.
On June 29, 2024, the Zimbabwe National Army commander, Lt. General Anselem Sanyatwe, was quoted as saying that people would be marched to polling stations “whether you like it or not,” and that the ruling party, ZANU-PF, would “rule forever.” Since the August 2023 general election, in which ZANU-PF failed to win an outright majority in parliament, the country has witnessed several by-elections in constituencies where opposition members of parliament were dismissed in a bizarre ploy. The dismissals were seen as an attempt to tilt the balance of power in ZANU-PF’s favor.
“The Zimbabwe military commander’s open endorsement of the ruling party not only threatens the fairness of elections but opens the door for security force abuses against voters, the opposition, and civil society organizations,” said Allan Ngari, Africa advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Zimbabwe’s security forces need to comply with the country’s laws and regulations that uphold its international human rights obligations to ensure that elections are free and fair.”
For decades, Zimbabwe’s military and other state security forces have interfered in the nation’s political and electoral affairs in violation of citizens’ civil and political rights. Zimbabwe’s constitution states that no member of the security services in exercising their functions may act in a partisan manner, further the interests of any political party, or cause or violate anyone’s fundamental rights or freedoms. However, senior members of the security forces have routinely ignored these provisions with impunity.
The government should take urgent steps to end the military’s participation in partisan politics, including by disciplining or prosecuting military officers who violate laws and regulations that prohibit the security forces from directly supporting any political party.
Zimbabwe has a history of elections that fall far short of international and regional standards, characterized by the involvement of the military in deeply flawed electoral processes. The government has not remedied some of the flaws of the August 2023 election that Southern African Development Community (SADC) observers documented.
Election periods in Zimbabwe, especially in 1985, 1990, 2000, 2002, 2005, and 2008, were characterized by widespread political violence, committed mainly by ZANU-PF, its allies, and government security agencies, including sections of the army.
These problems were particularly evident during the 2008 elections, when the army was credibly implicated in numerous systematic abuses that led to the killing of up to 200 people, the beating and torture of 5,000 more, and the displacement of 36,000.
The 2017 coup against President Robert Mugabe further entrenched the military in its partisanship with the ruling party and interference in civilian affairs. The military leadership and some sections of the army have, since the coup, taken highly visible steps that adversely affect the political environment.
Lt. General Sanyatwe’s recent statements that militate against the holding of free, fair, and credible elections raise the urgency to carry out reforms to ensure that state security forces do not threaten future democratic elections and the electoral affairs of the country, Human Rights Watch said.
Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Zimbabwe is party, states that every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity, without discrimination because of political opinion or other unreasonable restrictions, “to vote and to be elected at genuine periodic elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret ballot, guaranteeing the free expression of the will of the electors.”
SADC heads of state, who will meet on August 17 in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare, for their 44th summit, should press the Zimbabwe government to ensure the political neutrality of its security forces and noninterference in the country’s civilian and electoral affairs.
Zimbabwe is party to the SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections, established to promote regular free and fair, transparent, credible and peaceful democratic elections. Under these principles, countries commit to take all necessary measures and precautions to prevent political violence, intolerance and intimidation, including ensuring the neutrality of security forces in providing election security.
“Security force commanders need to speak and act in a manner that reflects a strictly neutral political position in accordance with Zimbabwe’s constitution and international law,” Ngari said. “Authorities should take appropriate disciplinary action against officers in the security forces, regardless of rank, who violate laws and regulations prohibiting partisan conduct.”
Kazakhstan Should Reject Attempt to Curtail LGBT People’s Rights
In June, Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Culture and Information said it was reviewing a petition, “We Are against Open and Hidden LGBT Propaganda in Kazakhstan!” initiated by the head of Kazakhstan’s Union of Parents, a public association, after the petition met threshold requirements to be considered by the government.
The government of Kazakhstan should reject this discriminatory and stigmatizing petition, whose proposal would violate human rights across the country.
The petition, seen by Human Rights Watch, calls on Kazakh authorities to introduce a law banning so-called “open and hidden LGBT propaganda in Kazakhstan” and impose penalties for such material, under the guise of “protecting children.” It could potentially lead to draft legislation or amendments of existing laws. The law on petitions gives the ministry 40 working days to review the petition and a response is anticipated by August 5.
The petition falls outside the criteria set out in national legislation, which explicitly excludes proposals that flout “human rights and freedoms.” The content of the petition openly discriminates against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people and misuses the rhetoric of protecting children to restrict fundamental freedoms. It refers to Russia’s laws banning “nontraditional sexual relationships propaganda,” which have been universally condemned by human rights bodies. If taken up, this “propaganda” proposal would breach Kazakhstan’s international human rights obligations on nondiscrimination and freedom of expression, opinion, information, association, and assembly.
Despite its international obligations, Kazakhstan does not include sexual orientation or gender identity as a ground for protection against discrimination in its laws, and authorities have in the past denied registration to nongovernmental organization engaged in LGBT rights activism. In 2023, the United Nations Committee against Torture expressed concern about “violence against individuals on the basis of their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity” and called on the authorities to end such violence.
Harassment, discrimination, and the threat of violence already color the everyday lives of LGBT people in Kazakhstan. If authorities choose to support this petition, they would be making a difficult reality even worse by endorsing discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Kazakhstan’s international partners should publicly condemn attempts to glorify homophobic and transphobic rhetoric. The government should immediately halt this harmful proposal and work with human rights organizations and LGBT activists to improve protections rather than eroding them.
Refugees in Eastern Sudan at Risk
Amid the widespread civilian suffering in Sudan, the fate of over one million refugees living in Sudan when the conflict erupted is often overlooked.
In recent weeks, Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacked towns across Sennar state, which neighbors Gedaref state and where more than 40,000 refugees from Ethiopia are currently hosted. In Kassala state, further east, Eritreans fleeing repression and indefinite forced conscription at home continue to arrive in the camps.
“If the fighting approaches Gedaref and Kassala, we will not be safe,” an Ethiopian refugee told me last month; these fears are now even more justified.
Since conflict erupted in Sudan, Ethiopian refugees, mainly hosted in Gedaref, have been raising very real concerns about their safety and the lack of humanitarian support. Some have independently sought ways to leave the camps, but many thousands remain.
Without a clear protection or evacuation strategy, those in the camps could face violence or targeted attacks by warring parties, especially following accusations by the RSF that Tigrayan forces were fighting alongside Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). Refugees also face the risk of mass arrests by SAF-aligned authorities in towns in Gedaref state, with reports that some Ethiopians have already been detained.
Some Ethiopian refugees understandably fear returning home as the real risk of violence or persecution that made them refugees may still persist. The majority in Gedaref’s two camps, and some in Kassala, are from Ethiopia’s Western Tigray Zone and fled a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign against Tigrayans during Ethiopia’s two-year conflict. Those responsible for these crimes still control the area, and Human Rights Watch continues to receive reports of forces forcefully expelling Tigrayans, with Ethiopian military complicity, to other parts of Tigray. Here they join hundreds of thousands of other internally displaced people facing dismal conditions.
Ethiopian authorities have reportedly formed a committee to return refugees in Sudan to Ethiopia, but refugees inside the camps need travel permits from the Sudanese authorities. It is critical that United Nations agencies work with Sudanese and Ethiopian authorities to assist refugees seeking to leave with safe, dignified, voluntary, and organized pathways, while ensuring that no one is coerced or forced to return to locations where they would face serious risks. Organizations and the international community should consider all possible means of support, including cash and transport, to ensure that refugees are moved out of harm’s way.
Ethiopian and Eritrean refugees in Sudan have been forgotten for too long; now is the time to act.
Burkina Faso: Journalist, Junta Critics Feared Disappeared
(Nairobi) – Burkina Faso authorities should urgently investigate and publicly report on the whereabouts of a journalist and two prominent critics of the country’s military junta, Human Rights Watch said today.
The abductions since June 18 of Serge Oulon, director of an investigative newspaper, Adama Bayala, and Kalifara Séré, both working as television commentators, raise concerns about enforced disappearances and possible unlawful conscriptions into the armed forces. Their cases appear linked to a wave of repression by Burkinabè authorities, who have severely restricted the rights of activists, journalists, opposition party members, and dissidents.
“Arbitrary arrests, abductions, and enforced disappearances of journalists, activists, and dissidents have become the new normal in Burkina Faso,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The military junta should take immediate action to locate and report on the three missing individuals and release them if they are wrongfully held.”
Adama Bayala, 45, a regular commentator on the private television channel BF1’s show Presse Échos has been missing since he left his office located in the 1,200 Logements neighborhood in the country’s capital, Ouagadougou, at about 1 p.m. on June 28.
Days before Bayala was reported missing, a message posted on the pro-junta Facebook page Anonymous Élite Alpha threatened him, warning him that he “will be next.” The message referred to previous abductions of journalists and dissidents.
“Bayala is one of the few dissenting voices left in Burkina Faso, one who has not spared critical analysis of the decisions and actions of the military authorities,” said a close friend. “We spoke the day of his abduction about the risks he faced. We knew he was in danger.”
On June 24, at 5 a.m., at least nine gunmen in civilian clothes abducted Serge Oulon, 39, director of the bimonthly publication L’Événement (the Event), from his home in Ouagadougou. “They first came with two civilian unmarked vehicles, forced their way in, took Serge, and drove off with him,” Oulon’s brother said. “Later, they came back to Serge’s home, ordered his wife to give them Serge’s phone and laptop. They claimed to be working for the intelligence services.”
In December 2022, Oulon wrote an article denouncing the alleged embezzlement by an army captain of some 400 million CFA (US$660,000) that were part of a budget allocated to support the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (Volontaires pour la défense de la patrie), civilian auxiliaries of the Burkinabè armed forces. On June 20, 2024, the Superior Council for Communication (Conseil supérieur de la communication), Burkina Faso’s media regulator, suspended L’Évènement for one month after it published another article covering the alleged corruption scandal.
On June 18, Kalifara Séré, commentator on BFI’s TV show 7Infos, was reported missing after leaving a meeting with the Superior Council for Communication to return to his office in Ouagadougou. People close to Séré told Human Rights Watch that the council questioned him about his June 16 TV commentary, where he had expressed doubts about the authenticity of some photographs showing the head of state. On June 19, the council announced the suspension of 7Infos for two weeks.
On June 24, 11 Burkinabè media organizations denounced the abductions of Oulon and Séré as “proof that the press in Burkina Faso is the subject to harassment and intimidation … in flagrant violation of the law,” and called on the authorities “to put an end to these practices likely to harm the public's right to information.”
Relatives and lawyers representing Bayala, Oulon, and Séré said they have searched for them in various police stations and gendarmerie brigades in vain. The authorities have not disclosed any information on their whereabouts.
“Burkinabè journalists should not live in fear of abduction for doing their job,” said a Burkinabè journalist, whose name has been withheld for security reasons. “The authorities have succeeded in reducing access to public interest information to virtually zero by targeting journalists, limiting their ability to hold powerful actors to account.”
The abductions of Bayala, Oulon, and Séré come amid growing reports that Burkinabè security forces have intimidated, arbitrarily detained, forcibly disappeared, and unlawfully conscripted journalists, human rights defenders, political opponents, and dissidents.
In February, Human Rights Watch reported on six other cases of abductions of activists and opposition party members. They are Rasmané Zinaba, Bassirou Badjo, both members of the civil society group Balai Citoyen; Guy Hervé Kam, a prominent lawyer and coordinator of the political group Serve and Not be Served (Servir Et Non Se Servir); Ablassé Ouédraogo, chair of the opposition party Le Faso Autrement (the Alternative Faso); Daouda Diallo, a prominent human rights activist and secretary-general of the Collective against Impunity and Stigmatization of Communities (Collectif contre l'Impunité et la Stigmatisation des Communautés, CISC); and Lamine Ouattara, a member of the Burkinabè Movement for Human and Peoples’ Rights (Mouvement Burkinabè des Droits de l’Homme et des Peuples). At least four of them appeared to have been unlawfully conscripted.
While governments have the authority to conscript members of the civilian population age 18 and over for national defense, conscription should be authorized and in accordance with domestic law. The conscription law needs to be carried out in a manner that gives the potential conscript notice of the duration of the military service and an adequate opportunity to contest being required to serve at that time. Conscription also needs to be carried out according to standards consistent with nondiscrimination and equal protection under law. The use of conscription for politically motivated purposes violates international human rights protection standards.
Burkina Faso is party to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. Enforced disappearances are defined as the arrest or detention of a person by state officials or their agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or to reveal the person’s situation or whereabouts. Families of people who have been forcibly disappeared live with the uncertainty of not knowing whether their loved ones are safe and their conditions in captivity.
Since the military coup in September 2022, the junta has increasingly suppressed media freedom and access to information. In April 2024, Burkina Faso’s media regulator suspended the French news network TV5 and several other media outlets for two weeks after they reported on a Human Rights Watch report finding the military committed crimes against humanity against civilians in the Yatenga province. The regulator also blocked the Human Rights Watch website in the country.
The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, based in Banjul, Gambia, has held four ordinary sessions between August 2023 and June 2024 without adopting one resolution on the deteriorating human rights situation in Burkina Faso.
“The African Commission should break its inexplicable silence on the Burkina Faso junta’s deepening assault on media freedom,” Allegrozzi said. “The commission should urgently issue a resolution calling on the military authorities to uphold the rights of journalists and critics in line with their obligations under the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.”
Saudi Arabia: 20-Year Sentence for Tweets
(Beirut) – A Saudi court has sentenced a man to 20 years in prison on charges related to his peaceful social media activity, Human Rights Watch said today. The conviction is the latest example of Saudi Arabia’s likely transnational repression due to his family member’s activities abroad and yet another escalation in the country’s ever-worsening crackdown on freedom of expression and other basic rights.
On May 29, 2024, Saudi Arabia’s counterterrorism tribunal, the Specialized Criminal Court, convicted Asaad al-Ghamdi, 47, a Saudi teacher, of several criminal offenses related solely to his peaceful expression online. He is the brother of Mohammed al-Ghamdi, a retired Saudi teacher, who was sentenced to death in July 2023 based solely on his posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, and YouTube activity. Saeed bin Nasser al-Ghamdi, a third brother, is a well-known Saudi Islamic scholar and government critic living in exile in the United Kingdom. Saudi authorities often retaliate against the family members of critics and dissidents abroad in an effort to coerce them to return to the country.
“Saudi courts mete out decades long sentences to ordinary citizens for nothing more than peacefully expressing themselves online,” said Joey Shea, Saudi Arabia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The government should also stop punishing family members of critics living abroad.”
Saudi security forces arrested Asaad al-Ghamdi on November 20, 2022, in a nighttime raid on his home in the al-Hamdaneyah neighborhood of Jeddah, while his wife and children looked on, informed sources told Human Rights Watch. Security forces confiscated electronic devices and ransacked every room of the house. He was not informed of the reasons for the arrest or of the charges against him.
The authorities held him in the Dhahban prison in Jeddah, initially in solitary confinement for three months. Al-Ghamdi was also held incommunicado for nearly two months, and only received his first visit from family members on January 11, 2023.
In a tweet in July 2023 in response to Mohammed al-Ghamdi’s death sentence, Saeed, the third brother, wrote that the “false ruling aims to spite me personally after failed attempts by the investigations to return me to the country.”
Court documents reviewed by Human Rights Watch show that authorities charged Asaad al-Ghamdi with Articles 30, 34, 43, and 44 of Saudi Arabia’s counterterrorism law: the same articles used in July 2023 to sentence his brother Mohammed al-Ghamdi to death. The documents show that Asaad al-Ghamdi was charged with “challenging the religion and justice of the King and the Crown Prince” and “publishing false and malicious news and rumors.” The documents state that al-Ghamdi was arrested “for publishing posts that harmed the security of the homeland on social media websites (Twitter).”
Informed sources told Human Rights Watch that tweets used as evidence against him criticized projects related to Vision 2030, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s program for diversifying the country’s economy, as well as the recent changes in the Saudi government, referring to “its abandonment of the old religious alliance.” One tweet mourned Dr. Abdallah al-Hamed, the founder of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association and a leading Saudi human rights figure who died in prison following his conviction on charges relating to peace peaceful human rights activism, and offered condolences to his family.
The documents cite al-Ghamdi’s X social media posts as evidence against him and sought the maximum penalty for each article he was charged under. The prosecution also asked the authorities to confiscate al-Ghamdi’s mobile device and close his X account, the court documents say.
Saudi authorities held al-Ghamid’s first trial session on September 7, 2023, in Riyadh and only then informed him of the charges against him. The court in late August appointed a lawyer, who later refused to provide him or his family with any court documents related to the case. The lawyer only met al-Ghamdi in court during the trial sessions and never travelled to Jeddah to meet with him outside of the court sessions. The lawyer often refused to meet with his family and failed to share pertinent information about the case with them.
Informed sources said that the lawyer also refused to present evidence of al-Ghamdi’s health condition in court, despite urgings by al-Ghamdi’s family, who apparently believed this could be a useful defense.
Al-Ghamdi suffers from epilepsy, which requires consistent medical attention to manage adequately. He has not received such care during his detention, the informed sources said. In one episode, al-Ghamdi remained unconscious in the bathroom for hours. “He had a spasm and he fell and broke his finger and his tooth,” the source said. “When other inmates saw that he was late in the toilet they went to check on him and found his blood everywhere.” Prison authorities later took him to a general physician in the prison but not a specialist, which he requires.
Informed sources had expressed concern to Human Rights Watch about Asaad’s brother Mohammed, who was sentenced to death based solely on his peaceful social media activity. Mohammad al-Ghamdi also suffers from epilepsy and his health has significantly deteriorated in detention. Sources said that prison authorities ignored Mohammed al-Ghamdi’s repeated requests to see a doctor or visit a hospital until his pain became unbearable. When prison authorities finally allowed him to see a doctor, the general practitioner did not provide him with any medication.
Saudi authorities should immediately provide both Asaad and Mohammad al-Ghamdi with medical attention, including specialists able to treat their health conditions and adequate medications.
Human Rights Watch has repeatedly criticized rampant abuses in Saudi Arabia’s criminal justice system, including long periods of detention without charge or trial, denial of legal assistance, and the courts’ reliance on torture-tainted confessions as the sole basis of conviction. The violations of defendants’ rights are so fundamental and systemic that it is hard to reconcile Saudi Arabia’s criminal justice system with a system based on the basic principles of the rule of law and international human rights standards.
“Yet another outrageous, decades-long sentence demonstrates that the Saudi authorities are willing to crush any and all dissent,” Shea said. “Saudi Arabia’s allies should condemn these sentences and demand that the Saudi government release the prisoners and end their repressive practices.”
New EU Leadership Should Uphold the Right to Asylum in Europe
(Brussels) – The EU and its member states should safeguard the right to territorial asylum in Europe, Human Rights Watch and more than 95 other organizations said in a statement released today. The recent and increasing attempts by several European Union member states to outsource asylum processing and refugee protection to countries outside the EU – such as in the Italy-Albania agreement on migration – contravene their legal responsibilities toward people in need of protection.
“All EU member states are obliged to ensure the right to asylum under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights,” said Iskra Kirova, Europe and Central Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Neither the Charter nor the recently adopted EU Pact on Migration and Asylum provides any option for countries to transfer asylum seekers for processing to countries outside of the EU.”
The European Commission should firmly reject calls to facilitate shifting asylum processing outside EU territory, the groups said. Wherever such externalization schemes have been attempted, they have been rife with rights violations. They may place asylum seekers in prolonged detention in countries that lack capacity to fairly and fully examine claims and provide protection, leaving them in limbo and denying them crucial legal safeguards, while costing taxpayers inordinate sums.
Proposals to externalize asylum processing come against the backdrop of increased efforts by the European Commission to reach controversial deals and provide hefty migration cooperation funds to neighbouring countries to keep migrants outside of Europe, with little or no attention to much needed human rights safeguards, the groups said.
“Instead of wasting further time and resources on proposals incompatible with EU law and human rights commitments, the EU should support humane, sustainable, and realistic reception and asylum processing policies in EU territory,” said Kirova. “Such policies would benefit both the people seeking protection and the communities that welcome them.”
New EU Leadership Should Uphold the Right to Asylum in Europe
(Brussels) – The EU and its member states should safeguard the right to territorial asylum in Europe, Human Rights Watch and more than 95 other organizations said in a statement released today. The recent and increasing attempts by several European Union member states to outsource asylum processing and refugee protection to countries outside the EU – such as in the Italy-Albania agreement on migration – contravene their legal responsibilities toward people in need of protection.
“All EU member states are obliged to ensure the right to asylum under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights,” said Iskra Kirova, Europe and Central Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Neither the Charter nor the recently adopted EU Pact on Migration and Asylum provides any option for countries to transfer asylum seekers for processing to countries outside of the EU.”
The European Commission should firmly reject calls to facilitate shifting asylum processing outside EU territory, the groups said. Wherever such externalization schemes have been attempted, they have been rife with rights violations. They may place asylum seekers in prolonged detention in countries that lack capacity to fairly and fully examine claims and provide protection, leaving them in limbo and denying them crucial legal safeguards, while costing taxpayers inordinate sums.
Proposals to externalize asylum processing come against the backdrop of increased efforts by the European Commission to reach controversial deals and provide hefty migration cooperation funds to neighbouring countries to keep migrants outside of Europe, with little or no attention to much needed human rights safeguards, the groups said.
“Instead of wasting further time and resources on proposals incompatible with EU law and human rights commitments, the EU should support humane, sustainable, and realistic reception and asylum processing policies in EU territory,” said Kirova. “Such policies would benefit both the people seeking protection and the communities that welcome them.”
Zimbabwe: SADC Should Respond to Intensified Crackdown on Opponents
(Johannesburg) – The Southern African Development Community (SADC) should speak out against the Zimbabwean authorities’ intensified crackdown on the opposition and civil society organizations ahead of its summit in Harare, Human Rights Watch said today. The heads of state of SADC’s 16 members will meet on August 17, 2024, in Harare, Zimbabwe, for their 44th summit, where Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa will be taking over as chair of the subregional organization.
Since assuming power in a military coup in 2017, the administration of President Mnangagwa has committed serious human rights violations and shown a failure or unwillingness to institute lasting human rights reforms. Violence, intimidation, harassment, and repression aimed principally at opposition members and civil society activists have restricted civic and political space. Several activists have been abducted and tortured in the past year. The authorities have weaponized the criminal justice system against the ruling party’s political opponents. Opposition politicians have been held in prolonged pretrial detention or convicted on baseless, seemingly politically motivated charges.
“The government of President Mnangagwa is accelerating its crackdown against legitimate and peaceful activism ahead of the August summit,” said Allan Ngari, Africa advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “The Southern African Development Community needs to engage with the authorities to take clear measures to ensure the enjoyment of basic freedoms by all Zimbabweans.”
On June 16, the Zimbabwe Republic Police raided a private home in a suburb of Harare, the capital, and arrested over 70 people, most of them young, in what can be considered an attack on the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of association.
Those detained were charged with participating in a gathering with the intent to promote violence, breaches of peace or bigotry as well as disorderly conduct. Their lawyers told the media that the gathering was a barbecue at the home of Jameson Timba, an opposition leader, to commemorate June 16, Day of the African Child.
On June 27, while denying them bail, a Harare magistrate ruled that the detainees were likely to commit similar offenses if released. The media has quoted their lawyers stating that the detainees had been assaulted and tortured during their arrest and while in custody.
The media has also reported that police assaulted and injured people who were at court in solidarity with the detained activists.
Also on June 27, at a meeting of his ZANU PF party, President Mnangagwa said he was “aware of certain rogue elements within the nation who are bent on peddling falsehoods and instigating acts of civil disorder, especially before, during, and after regional and world stage events.” He said security agencies were on high alert to decisively deal with the so-called rogue elements.
On June 28, a statement by Zimbabwe’s information, publicity and broadcasting minister claimed that “criminal and opportunistic elements within the opposition, certain politicians, and some civil society organizations” were “attempting to incite disorder and discontent.”
However, the minister said nothing about the constitutional rights of Zimbabweans to peacefully protest or the government’s domestic and international human rights obligations to respect peaceful activism. Several human rights organizations condemned the minister’s statement as “deeply concerning and undemocratic”.
On June 29, police raided a private home in Harare and arrested five people for holding an “unsanctioned gathering” and “agitating for criminal acts in the country.” A spokesperson of the five, who are members of a movement called National Democratic Working Group, said they were meeting to organize food disbursements to needy people in their area. On June 30, authorities disrupted a memorial event for an opposition supporter killed in 2022 and arrested several participants.
The Zimbabwe constitution and international law such as the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights provide for the pretrial rights of detainees and guarantee freedom of assembly and association, as well as freedom from torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, or punishment.
SADC should use the August summit and President Mnangagwa’s chairmanship as an opportunity to encourage Zimbabwe to put in place key reforms to improve respect for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law, in line with the SADC Treaty, which requires members to act according to these principles.
Human Rights Watch and other organizations have reported numerous instances of the inability of the Zimbabwean judicial system to effectively provide remedies for alleged human rights violations. SADC member states should consider engaging the African human rights systems, such as the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, to provide clarity on Zimbabwe’s obligations to protect all human rights under conditions laid down by the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.
“SADC should promote respect for human rights by calling upon Zimbabwe’s government to end repression and the arbitrary arrests and prosecutions of activists and opposition supporters,” Ngari said. “The pervasive climate of intimidation and repression needs to end.”
Iran: Security Forces Killing Kurdish Border Couriers
(Beirut) – Iranian authorities have used excessive and lethal force against predominantly Kurdish border couriers, known in Kurdish and Farsi as Kulbars, transporting goods between Iran and Iraq over rugged terrain, Human Rights Watch said today. The couriers have limited access to justice or remedy for these violations, and Iranian authorities have mistreated those they have detained.
Iranian authorities have long repressed and marginalized Kurdish communities. High rates of unemployment and poverty are among the main drivers for people to work as border couriers, legally or illegally, which is a physically demanding and dangerous work even beyond the additional dangers posed by Iranian security forces. United for Iran, a human rights group, said that the border couriers are mostly men and boys ages 13 to 65. But that they include some women. Iranian authorities have claimed that they have used force to stop smuggling but have also said they want to regulate the border couriers’ economic activities more broadly rather than violently repress it.
“Iranian security forces’ excessive use of lethal force against Kurdish border couriers is one more way that authorities repress socially and economically marginalized Kurdish communities,” said Nahid Naghshbandi, acting Iran researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Iranian authorities should develop sustainable economic opportunities in border regions to reduce dependency on border courier work for these communities to economically survive.”
Between October 2021 and April 2024, Human Rights Watch interviewed 13 Kurdish border couriers who were survivors of and/or witnesses to Iranian security forces’ use of excessive and lethal force or relatives of victims. Witnesses said that Iran’s FARAJA Border Guard force and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) were among the units that targeted the border couriers with lethal force.
Incidents documented occurred along Iran-Iraq border areas in the Iranian provinces of Kermanshah and West Azerbaijan. All 13 people were Kurdish, interviews were conducted remotely in Kurdish and Farsi, and interviewees described incidents that occurred between 2014 and 2023.
Six people interviewed said that Iranian security forces aimed at them and shot them, and that they had seen others shot. Two said that Iranian security forces shot and killed their relatives who worked as border couriers. One lost a leg after stepping on a landmine. Human Rights Watch reviewed medical records and court documents of six survivors of landmine and gunshot injuries, including two people who lost limbs after landmine explosions. Three said that Iranian security forces detained and beat them while shouting insults.
Ebrahim Raeesi, the recently deceased president, suggested in meetings with Kurdish communities that authorities should regulate Kurdish border couriers work rather than deeming it illegal. Since 2020, there have been plans in the government and parliament on regulatory measures for border couriers’ work, support for border communities’ socioeconomic needs, and calls to limit the use of lethal force against Kulbars.
Yet, officials in Iran’s security forces have framed this activity as a security issue. On December 16, 2018, Espadana Khabar News Agency, quoting General Qasem Rezaei, the commander of Iran’s border guards, saying that “borders are defined by law; any unauthorized crossing of the border is considered a crime....”
According to a July 8 report by the Centre for Supporters of Human Rights (CSHR), a nongovernmental organization established in the United Kingdom dedicated to advocating for sustainable peace and democracy in Iran and the broader Middle East by promoting human rights, many border couriers are involved in legitimate cross-border trade and not engaged in unlawful activities.
In June 2023, a member of the Iranian parliament’s National Security Commission announced the completion of a review of pending legislation, with proposed amendments that not only broaden the range of authorities authorized to use firearms but also the conditions under which they can do so. If passed into law, the amendments would put the couriers at even greater risk.
Instead of enabling even more lethal force against Kurdish border couriers, Iranian authorities should restrict the blatant use of lethal force against them, ensure their due process rights, and hold the forces who unlawfully attack them accountable for these violations Nahid NaghshbandiActing Iran Researcher, Human Rights Watch
Iranian authorities’ use of lethal force against those crossing the border has led to deadly consequences for hundreds of these workers. The Kurdistan Press Agency, known as Kurdpa, reported that at least 44 were killed and 463 injured between March 21, 2023, and March 21, 2024. According to the report, military forces were responsible for over 80 percent of these casualties, and that at least 28 of the casualties were children. In a separate report, Kurdpa provided statistics indicating that from 2011 to 2024, at least 2,463 couriers have been killed and injured from the Iranian Kurdish regions of Kurdistan, Kermanshah, and Western Azerbaijan.
Access to remedy and justice for the border couriers remains severely limited, exacerbating their social and economic marginalization. Despite the frequent and often fatal assaults they face, legal recourse is minimal and accountability for state agents is rare. Iran’s legal system prioritizes national security over individual rights, leaving the victims with little protection under the law. Efforts to seek justice are often thwarted by systemic biases, lack of transparency, and the broad discretionary powers granted to security forces.
The UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials states that law enforcement officials shall not use firearms except in self-defense or defense of others against the imminent threat of death or serious injury, to prevent a particularly serious crime involving grave threat to life, to arrest a person presenting such a danger and resisting their authority, or to prevent their escape, and only when less extreme means are insufficient. In any event, intentional lethal use of firearms may only be made when strictly unavoidable to protect life.
The United Nations Fact-Finding Mission, as well as the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, should monitor and report on the treatment of Kurdish border couriers in Iran.
“Instead of enabling even more lethal force against Kurdish border couriers, Iranian authorities should restrict the blatant use of lethal force against them, ensure their due process rights, and hold the forces who unlawfully attack them accountable for these violations,” Naghshbandi said.
Border Couriers in Kurdish RegionsBorder couriers, who are often Kurdish, transport goods between Iran and Iraq by bypassing customs, typically earning payment based on the weight and type of goods they carry. The Kurdish word Kulbar, is derived from “Kul” meaning back and “bar” meaning carrier. They often carry loads weighing between 25 to 50 kilograms (55 to 110 pounds), sometimes heavier, along mountainous routes averaging around 10 kilometers, with some routes stretching longer distances. A small number also carry their loads on horses and mules. Payment varies depending on factors such as load weight, route, and economic conditions.
The border couriers typically transport consumer goods legally available for sale. This includes a range of items such as tea, packaged foods, electronics, textiles, footwear, clothing, kitchenware, health and beauty products, tires, mobile phones, and occasionally cigarettes. Border couriers told Human Rights Watch that alcoholic beverages are generally avoided because there are prohibitions on transporting alcohol and alcoholic consumption, which can result in significant fines or imprisonment.
Kurdish border couriers told Human Rights Watch that Iranian security forces frequently shot at or assaulted them without warning, even when they were not carrying any goods. A 31-year-old man from Sardasht in Western Azerbaijan province said that in July 2018, security forces began shooting at him and fellow couriers from a distance of 10 meters (32.8 feet) without warning. The security forces shot him in the spine, leaving him paralyzed.
A 33-year-old man from the region Hawraman, which is located in both Kurdistan and Kermanshah provinces, said he witnessed a border courier in front of him being shot and tried to help move him to a hospital.
“In fall 2023, about 2,000 couriers were gathered when security forces suddenly attacked,” he said. “They fired shots into the air, hoping we’d flee, but many held onto our goods. When they saw this, they began shooting into the crowd. With no way to run, they accused us of smuggling weapons, which was untrue. Someone lower down in the mountains was shot in the leg. We tried to help him, but security forces initially blocked us.”
Many border couriers are also killed and injured by landmines, many of them remnants from the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. However, some said they believed some of the mines were placed recently as explosions occurred along routes they had previously used and believed to be safe.
A 33-year-old man from Piranshahr in Western Azerbaijan province said that he lost his leg from a landmine explosion when he was 30. He said that many of his family members also were border couriers. Security forces had also shot his brother and killed his cousin.
Provinces with large Kurdish communities like Kermanshah and Kurdistan were among the top 10 provinces with the highest unemployment rates last year, as reported by AsrIran news website, and many border couriers come from these areas. Eleven border couriers said that they turned to this work as a last resort because they could not find any other employment opportunities and needed to support their families. Four men said that they started working as border couriers as young as age 11.
A 36-year-old man from Sardasht, in Western Azerbaijan province, said that when he was 8, his father stepped on a landmine and died while working as a border courier. The son started doing the same work at age 11 to help cover family expenses.
Some people said they took up this work because other available jobs offer unsustainably low wages. A 33-year-old man from Hawraman said that despite having a bachelor’s degree, he could not get a stable government job. The private-sector jobs he found paid so poorly that he could barely afford his rent. He started working as a border courier to cover his rent and provide for himself and his wife.
Security Forces’ Use of Lethal ForceTwelve people interviewed described incidents in which Iranian security forces had opened fire on couriers, usually without warning. Two described killings of their relatives. One said that his brother-in-law, 30, was fatally shot in October 2022. The man, who had a 10-year-old child, was the second husband of the interviewee’s sister, whose first husband had also died while working as a border courier a decade earlier. He said:
My brother-in-law and his friends, who all faced unemployment, went to Iraqi Kurdistan to bring goods for sale in Iran. However, Iranian border closures left them stranded in Kurdistan Region of Iraq for almost 10 days. Upon their attempt to return, Iranian forces shot my brother-in-law in the mountains around 1 a.m. … When we received the body … the doctor said that he had been hit by a Kalashnikov bullet, piercing his left leg and causing severe bleeding.
A 33-year-old man said that in fall 2023, he was shot by security forces in his back, injuring his spine, while he was carrying cosmetics and hygiene products. He said he faced serious mental health issues after the shooting, including attempting suicide three times. A month earlier, security forces had shot him with birdshot pellets in his back, which he said resulted in infection.
Iranian security forces shot a 40-year-old man from Oshnavieh, West Azerbaijan province in February 2017, blinding him. He said:
It was the first and last time I worked as a Kulbar. I decided to go out of necessity that time. It was evening when we saw people coming down from the border… Little did I know they were border guards who had come on foot… As I realized they were soldiers, my head was facing towards them, and they were shooting bullets toward me. One bullet hit me directly on my head, hitting my left eye, and then it hit my right eye, causing me to lose both of my eyes.
A 36-year-old man from Sardasht was shot in the back in January 2014, resulting in a spinal cord injury and permanent disability. He said he was carrying goods with his mules when the security forces began shooting. His mules were killed, and he witnessed the mules of another man accompanying him killed by security forces and then set on fire.
A 25-year-old man said that when he was 16 or 17, security forces shot him on the borders of Nowsud, in Kermanshah province.
The Iranian border police always shoot at us. I’ve been shot in the knee multiple times, and now I have three bullets lodged in the tendon of my right knee that affect my balance. The first time I faced a shooting, I was just 16 or 17 years old. Initially, fear paralyzed me: it’s a strange feeling when you see someone aiming directly at you…. During my escape, I tumbled from a five-meter-high rock and ended up breaking my knee.
A 41-year-old man from Oshnavieh in Western Azerbaijan province said that in February 2017, security forces shot him in the head, leaving him blind in both eyes. A 32-year-old man from Sardasht said that in December 2013, security forces ambushed him and his fellow border couriers, resulting in severe injuries to him and the loss of eight horses:
The [Iranian security forces] fired as if they were on a battlefield, a bullet struck me in the stomach. I fell from my horse, and they approached me, beat and insulted me as I bled, despite my pleas. One of them aimed a gun at my head, just like a close-up execution. Miraculously, I survived. After [I was] taken to multiple hospitals, doctors said I wouldn’t make it. I spent nearly a year in a coma, losing my eyesight and undergoing stomach surgery due to the bullet tearing my large intestine in five places.
Lethal Threat of LandminesMany border couriers suffer severe injuries from landmines, including loss of limbs. While many landmines were laid during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, some border couriers believe that Iranian security forces have laid mines more recently along their routes. Iran is not among the 164 countries that have ratified the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, which comprehensively prohibits antipersonnel landmines and requires mine clearance, stockpile destruction, and victim assistance.
A 33-year-old man from Piranshahr lost his leg due to a landmine in November 2020. He said:
I had been through the route that I took many times before as a Kulbar, and I knew it well. Even just three nights before, I was there, and there were no mines. There had never been any mines there previously. But on the day, we went, there were mines there. This indicates that just one or two nights before, they had planted mines there, knowing that it was the route used by Kulbars. We’ve traveled these routes so many times, we know where the old mines are and we go through places we’re sure of, but they plant new mines.
In 2022, a local Iranian lawyers’ office requested in a letter to the West Azerbaijan province governor to remedy the landmine issue, stating:
The frequent and indiscriminate victimization of citizens due to landmines underscores the extensive and insecure nature of the mine-affected areas. There is a pressing need for extensive and continuous communication with the Ministry of Defense and the Mine Clearance Command… Additionally, the use of landmines in some border areas, where the transit of Kulbars is expected, requires the governorate to seriously address the issue with relevant authorities.
Injuries often lead to lost livelihoods. Without social or unemployment benefits in Iran, the injured border couriers’ only hope is to be recognized as disabled veterans and receive disability benefits.
According to BBC Persian, the only Iranian authority addressing the situation of landmine victims is the “Article 2 Commissions” stationed within Iranian governorates, consisting of eight members including representatives from military and security agencies, as well as the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs, an Iranian foundation that receives its funding directly from the national budget which gives home loans to disabled veterans and to the families of soldiers killed in action.
However, there is no representative from the victims’ side in these commissions. The Commissions are formed at the provincial level where the incident occurred, reviewing the evidence provided by the victim and determining whether they qualify as a martyr (soldiers killed in action) or disabled veteran. If the Article 2 Commission recognizes the individual as a disabled veteran, the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs provides them with a pension; otherwise, they receive support from other welfare organizations such as relief committees that are Iranian charitable organizations providing support for poor families or the State Welfare Organization of Iran, also known as the Behzisti Organization.
Lawyers and civil activists argue that Article 2 Commissions often fail to recognize border couriers as disabled for various reasons. These include stepping on mines while crossing into Iraqi territory, engaging in illegal border crossing, having relatives involved in Kurdish anti-government groups, or smuggling alcohol from Iraq.
Lack of Access to Remedy and JusticeHuman Rights Watch reviewed court documents of five people who were injured by Iranian security forces. Review of legal documents reveals that complaints filed by those who have been shot are often dismissed under Article 3, Clause 9 of the law on security forces’ use of arms. However, interviewees who were granted compensation by the authorities said that it had never been paid, or never paid in full.
In 2022, an investigative court of the Military Prosecutor’s Office in West Azerbaijan addressed a case involving a shooting in violation of regulations. In 2021, members of the border patrol had fired at border couriers in the “no man’s land” area of the border, resulting in a person’s death. Based on Article 265 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 2013, the authorities issued a non-prosecution order for the shooter.
A 41-year-old man, who was shot and lost his eyes while working as a border courier in 2017, shared his court documents with Human Rights Watch. According to the proceedings in 2020, a Military Court in West Azerbaijan, issued a non-prosecution order for the defendants. The court eventually ordered the border guards to pay him blood money, but he said that he has not yet received any compensation.
In May 2022, a military court in the West Azerbaijan province sentenced a border patrol officer to pay full blood money and a fine of 30 million Iranian rials (approximately US$100 at the time) as an alternative to imprisonment for what it ruled was the involuntary manslaughter of Naser Ebrahimzadeh, who was in a vehicle near the border.
In 2018, a Military Court in West Azerbaijan reviewed the case of the firing of more than 100 Kalashnikov bullets by the border guards in West Azerbaijan towards border couriers, which resulted in a man being injured in the right shoulder in 2017. A verdict also ordered blood money.
Human Rights Watch also reviewed court documents of a man injured in a landmine incident. In this case not only was he not compensated but the court found him guilty of illegal border crossing.
A 33-year-old man, who lost his leg in 2020 due to a mine explosion while working as a border courier, received medical treatment in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) and returned to Iran. He was summoned by a Revolutionary Prosecutor’s Office in West Azerbaijan on charges of illegal border crossing. Ultimately, an appellate court freed him, but confiscated his passport, and placed him under a travel ban.
In 2022, a local Iranian lawyers’ office addressed the review of unresolved cases of landmine victims in the letter to a governor in West Azerbaijan province. The lawyers cited over 400 unresolved cases, some dating back more than 25 years, that have been brought to the attention of the governor's office without receiving any response.
The lawyers said that because of the government’s failure to clear landmines, it has the responsibility to support and compensate the victims. Current statistics indicate that the governor's office has not convened commission meetings proportionate to the number of cases.
Meaningful Follow-Up Needed as China’s UN Rights Review Concludes
Throughout its Universal Periodic Review – a state-to-state rights review process at the United Nations Human Rights Council that concluded today – the Chinese government issued blanket denials in the face of well-documented and egregious rights violations in Xinjiang, Tibet, Hong Kong, and across mainland China and dismissed recommendations on ending such abuses.
China rejected all calls to implement the recommendations of the landmark 2022 UN report on Xinjiang, concluding that abuses against Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim groups in the region may amount to crimes against humanity, dismissing the well-founded report as “illegal and void.”
Such outright refusal to meaningfully address allegations of crimes against humanity is no surprise but should be of grave concern to all UN member states.
China was also disdainful in the face of other grave concerns, rejecting recommendations from a range of countries to end reprisals against human rights defenders, to repeal and cease use of the Hong Kong national security law, and to end arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, and residential surveillance.
However, a few less direct recommendations that offered no rebuke but requested the protection of rights were accepted. These include Gambia’s recommendation to “reinforce the safeguarding of ethnic and religious minorities’ rights by promoting the preservation of cultural identities,” Indonesia’s to “strengthen protection of freedom of religion or belief,” and Estonia’s to “enable all members of civil society to freely engage with international human rights mechanisms without fear of intimidation or reprisals.” These countries should follow up on these recommendations and push for their implementation, which would represent a reversal of current Chinese government policy.
Now that the review has concluded, it is time for robust collective follow-up.
Nearly two years since the UN report on Xinjiang, UN rights chief Volker Türk should provide a public update on the situation. He should also do more to shed light on the worsening situation in Tibet.
Countries from all regions should work together to advance recommendations made by over 50 UN experts and hundreds of rights groups from around the world to hold the Chinese government accountable for its abuses, including convening a dedicated discussion at the Human Rights Council and launching a probe to further investigate and report on serious abuses.
The message should be clear from all governments that claim to support the universality of human rights: no state, no matter how powerful, is above international law.
Qatar Risks Backsliding on Critical Labor Reforms
In a recent meeting, Qatar’s advisory Shura Council proposed the government adopt measures that would require domestic workers to obtain their employer’s permission before being allowed to leave the country. Workers would have to submit their leave or departure requests through the Ministry of Interior’s “Metrash” online portal at least five days ahead of their proposed date of departure. They would be allowed to appeal if their employer did not approve their request.
If the motion is accepted, Qatari authorities risk severely backtracking on their labor reforms introduced in 2020. Under these reforms, Qatar extended a 2018 reform that removed an exit permit requirement for migrant workers to leave the country to include domestic workers.
Click to expand Image Excessive working hours © 2016 Rositsa Raleva for Human Rights WatchAlthough a marked improvement, the 2020 reforms were far from perfect and still required domestic workers to inform employers about their wish to leave Qatar at least 72 hours in advance. This is a glaring flaw of the reform, especially for those in abusive or exploitative situations or who fear retaliation. Human Rights Watch stressed that abusive employers, after receiving notice of their employee’s intent to leave, could retaliate by confining the worker to the house or filing trumped-up criminal charges against them.
Instead of removing this notification requirement, the new Shura Council motion would make it even more difficult for domestic workers to leave the country and put them at greater risk of exploitation and abuse.
Additional measures proposed by the Shura Council would further penalize and endanger domestic workers, among them: making domestic workers who their employers have reported as “absconded,” or those housing or employing them, responsible for deportation expenses; increasing penalties against runaway domestic workers and those who provide them shelter and employment; and preventing workers reported as absconding from transferring their sponsorship.
The Qatari authorities should reject these recommendations and look to expand and improve on their 2020 reforms. International human rights law provides that “everyone has the right to leave any country.” Any restrictions can only be on a case-by-case basis, for a legitimate reason.
Chinese Government Expands Criminalization of Taiwanese Identity
New judiciary guidelines in China specify that crimes of secession by Taiwanese “separatists” are punishable under Chinese law. The guidelines authorize the use of trials in absentia and even the death penalty for anyone asserting Taiwan’s independence.
The People’s Republic of China since its founding in 1949 has never ruled Taiwan and has no jurisdiction over Taiwan, which is democratically governed.
The guidelines regarding Taiwanese “separatists” are stark reminders that the Chinese government routinely threatens Taiwan and its 23 million inhabitants and has expanded its aggressive efforts to stifle their basic freedoms.
China’s 2005 Anti-Secession Law made vague threats of using “other measures” against “Taiwanese secessionist forces” without specifying what constituted “secessionist.” The new guidelines make a criminal offense anything related to Taiwanese independence, including “establishing a ‘Taiwan Independence’ separatist organization,” “promoting Taiwan’s entrance into international organizations,” and deviating from the Chinese narrative of Taiwan “in fields such as education, culture, history, or news media.” Other overly broad offenses include “conduct seeking to separate Taiwan from China” and “otherwise actively participat[ing]” in Taiwanese “separatist organizations.”
The guidelines threaten in absentia trials with no statute of limitations for those who evade being tried. They also do not differentiate between Taiwanese and foreign nationals.
The new guidelines also threaten the death penalty for “crimes” considered “especially serious or … vile.” The Chinese government carries out the most executions in the world, although the exact number remains a state secret. Human Rights Watch opposes the death penalty in all circumstances because of its inherent cruelty.
Taiwan has raised its alert levels for Taiwanese nationals traveling to China, citing recent cases of arbitrary arrests, detention, and interrogations. These new guidelines are likely to have a further chilling effect on the approximately 150,000 Taiwanese nationals living in China, for whom self-censorship is routine.
The new court guidelines are the Chinese government’s latest effort to control people’s right to freedom of expression beyond its borders. Everyone has fundamental rights and freedoms, including those who believe in or advocate for Taiwanese independence.
South Sudan: Damaging Security Law Revisions Adopted
(Nairobi) – South Sudan’s National Legislative Assembly on July 3, 2024, amended the law governing the National Security Service (NSS), in ways that will further undermine human rights and entrench the agency’s longstanding abuses, Human Rights Watch said today.
Parliament passed amendments to the 2015 National Security Service Act after a four-hour debate by a vote of 274-114 that will allow the agency to continue arresting or detaining people without a warrant. Human Rights Watch and other rights organizations have documented how the agency has used the 2015 law’s broad and vague powers to establish a regime of censorship, surveillance and other abusive interference with fundamental rights and freedoms.
“Instead of reining in the security service, which has been the government’s preferred tool of repression, South Sudan’s parliament has further emboldened the agency,” said Laetitia Bader, deputy Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “This was an opportunity to promote and enhance justice and human rights but instead parliament chose to strengthen a security service that routinely abuses rights with impunity.”
The security service has exercised these powers without meaningful judicial or legislative oversight, and its agents are rarely punished for abuses.
The National Constitutional Amendment Committee drafted the amendments as part of reforms initiated by the Revitalized Peace Agreement of 2018. When the committee failed to reach consensus on the agency’s arrest authority, the bill was referred to the Justice Ministry in 2019 and in April 2021, to the presidency for resolution. In August 2022 the presidency sent the bill back to the Justice Ministry, which suggested limiting the agency’s powers of arrest and detention.
On February 21, 2023, several media outlets reported that the presidency had agreed to remove the relevant provisions (articles 54 and 55) and abolish the agency’s authority to arrest and detain anyone with or without a warrant.
But the bill presented to parliament in May 2023 by the justice minister, retained arrest powers but limited them to use “under emergency circumstances,” and also explicitly allowed the agency to arrest an individual without a warrant if they are suspected of broad “crimes against the state.” The bill has a broad definition of “crimes against the state” as “any activity directed at undermining … the government” and references the provision on “crimes against the state” in the 2008 Penal Code, which is equally vague and problematic.
The government has in the past used trumped-up charges of “crimes against the state” to restrict freedoms of expression, assembly and association, in particular, peaceful exercise of these rights by political opposition, or other public criticism of government policy and actions. In July 2023, Human Rights Watch urged parliament to remove the agency’s powers of arrest or at a minimum to limit its powers of arrest to those that require a judicial warrant.
Several parliament members who had voted against the agency having powers of arrest and detention expressed their dismay to Human Rights Watch.
“We have argued that the agency has no prosecutorial or arrest powers and should only have an intelligence gathering role as envisioned by the constitution,” a member affiliated with the South Sudan Opposition Alliance told Human Rights Watch. “But certain powers believe it is better to embolden the agency more and more. It is a very dark omen for the days to come that the agency can now without fear, or doubt, pick any member of the public up without any warrant.”
Human Rights Watch has repeatedly called on the South Sudanese authorities to limit NSS powers to intelligence gathering, as envisioned by the Transitional Constitution of 2011, which mandates the agency to “focus on information gathering, analysis and to advise the relevant authorities.
Over the past few months, the agency has unlawfully detained activists, critics, and even foreign citizens. People interviewed said that in at least seven cases, the agency arrested people without warrants, detained them for long periods without access to legal counsel and in some cases, also held them incommunicado.
Human Rights Watch has also received reports of torture and ill-treatment. For example, one person told Human Rights Watch that he was caned daily for the first three days when he arrived at the agency headquarters, Blue House, in Juba. He said that every time his wounds began to heal, he would be beaten again. Detainees are held in overcrowded and unsanitary cells and eat once a day.
The agency also continues to hold Morris Mabior Awikjiok, a South Sudanese critic and former refugee in Kenya, since February 2023, even though the justice minister directed the agency in June this year to free him.
Victims of agency abuses have no credible, far less effective, avenues in South Sudan to seek redress.
South Sudan’s partners should raise concerns about the agency’s record of abusive behavior and that the law is likely to facilitate further abuses, Human Rights Watch said.
The next step is for the speaker of parliament to refer the bill to the president for assent, and the president has 14 days to assent or refer the bill back to parliament for reconsideration, noting his reservations.
“President Kiir should reject the broad powers of arrest and detention and send the law back to parliament so they can bring the law in line with the constitution and international human rights standards,” Bader said. “This could go a long way to curtail abuses by the security service and contribute to a rights respecting South Sudan.”