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Zaire: AI Statements
Any links to other sites in this file from 1996 are not clickable,
given the difficulty in maintaining up-to-date links in old files.
However, we hope they may still provide leads for your research.
Zaire: AI Statements
Date Distributed (ymd): 961210
Document reposted by APIC
Zaire: Amnesty Says Killings, Torture And Arbitrary Arrests
Persist
Amnesty International, 1 Easton Street, London WC1X 8DJ, UK,
Tel: 44-71 413-5500; Fax: 44-71 956-1157; Web:
http://www.amnesty.org. For recent AI press releases, check
http://www.oneworld.org/amnesty/ai_press.html. For more
information on Amnesty International send an e-mail message
for an automatic reply to [email protected].
Amnesty International - December 3, 1996
KINSHASA -- Torture and arrests are taking place in the
capital and massacres are taking place in areas of intense
fighting in Zaire in the growing climate of insecurity and
lawlessness, Amnesty International's Deputy Secretary General
Herve Berger said today at the end of a two-week
investigation trip to the country.
"Despite the authorities" tight control on travel to the
country's trouble spots, reports of killings, torture and
arbitrary arrest cannot be silenced," Mr Berger said.
"Zairian authorities have created a climate of intimidation,
where questions demanding the truth about the role of the
authorities in the current crisis are repressed. People are
afraid to talk about recent events such as the persecution of
members of Tutsi and Hutu minorities and the role of the
Zairian Armed forces in Eastern Zaire. Meanwhile the armed
groups in Kivu are committing deliberate and arbitrary
killings of Zairians and refugees."
The Amnesty International team has documented violent human
rights abuses committed by both the Zairian armed forces and
the armed group who control much of North and South Kivu in
eastern Zaire in a report released today in Kinshasa,
(Zaire:Violent persecution by State and armed groups).
"We have received reports about the slaughter of hundreds of
Rwandese refugees and displaced Zairians by Tutsi-led armed
groups last week," Mr. Berger said.
The organization has obtained reports of hundreds of
deliberate and arbitrary killings of Zairian civilians and
refugees by members of the Tutsi-led armed groups, now known
as L"Alliance des forces democratiques pour la liberation du
Congo-Zaire (AFDL) in Bukavu, Uvira and Goma as well as the
forcible repatriation of refugees to Rwanda and Burundi.
According to Amnesty International's information, about 500
Rwandese refugees and displaced Zairians were massacred by
AFDL members on or around 18 November. The massacre took
place at Chimanga refugee camp, about 60 km south of Bukavu.
The AFDL have also rounded up and forcibly expelled refugees
from Burundi, handing them over to Burundi government troops
at the border. Hundreds of the returned refugees have been
slaughtered by Burundi government soldiers.
The AFDL has also attacked the refugee camp of Mugunga, near
Goma, causing the mass exodus of refugees to Rwanda. Hundreds
of bodies have been found and buried in Mugunga camp.
"Today amidst international indifference, hundreds of
thousands of Zairian civilians and refugees from Rwanda and
Burundi are fleeing violence in eastern Zaire; they are
without food, water or medicines," Mr Berger said.
The delegation also fears that severe human rights
violations, such as extrajudicial executions are occurring in
Kisangani, north central Zaire, which has recently become an
operational zone as a result of the conflict in eastern
Zaire. The delegation requested authorisation to carry out
research in Kisangani, and though the Vice-Prime Minister and
Minister of Interior assured Amnesty International access,
the authorisation was never delivered, raising questions as
to whether the authorities had reasons to fear the
delegation's presence in Kisangani.
"Reports have been received by the organisation about
killings, raping and pillage being carried out by the Forces
Armees Zairoises ( FAZ), including violent attacks on
families including beating and raping women and girls as
young as 12 in Kisangani," Mr Berger said.
Amnesty International has continued to call on the Zairian
authorities to end continued human rights violations
committed by its own forces.
The organization has called both on the FAZ and on the AFDL
to adhere to the principles of international humanitarian law
through the respect of vulnerable persons (civilians and
other persons hors de combat) and by giving access to the
victims to humanitarian organizations such as the ICRC.
Investigations carried out by the delegation during the last
two weeks reveal that the Zairian authorities are responsible
for detaining dozens of political prisoners in detention
centres throughout the capital. The prisoners are held
without charge or trial and are denied access to visits by
lawyers, doctors or family members. Some of them are believed
to have "disappeared".
Amnesty International is further concerned that the Zairian
authorities continue to arrest persons exercising their right
to freedom of expression. Over the last two weeks the
delegation has interviewed dozens of victims including
parliamentarians, trade unionists, lawyers, journalists and
members of NGOs. They told us of beatings, rapes and
imprisonment for exercising basic rights. The organization
has identified 10 possible prisoners of conscience currently
being held in Kinshasa alone. Three human rights activists,
Floribert Chebeya Bahizire, Harouna Mbongo and Bashi
Nabukili, members of a human rights group La voix des sans
voix (VSV), Voice of the Voiceless, were held incommunicado
for six days before being released.
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News Service 235/96
AI INDEX: AFR/ 62/28/96
10 DECEMBER 1996
ZAIRE: HOPE IS NOT DEAD. DESPITE THREATS, HUMAN RIGHTS
DEFENDERS ARE STRUGGLING FOR HUMAN DIGNITY.
On 10 December, the international human rights day, the
international community should support the daily and
determined struggle of human rights defenders in Zaire,
Amnesty International said today.
South-Kivu region's capital, Bukavu which has become since
1990 the home to a flourishing civil society movement, has
been subjected to a clamp down on human rights activists by
the Zairian authorities. Since September, many of them have
been killed, 'disappeared', attacked or imprisoned either by
members of the Zairian security forces or by members of the
armed group the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the
Liberation of Congo-Zaire, (AFDL).
Many human rights groups are involved in educating the public
about their civil and political rights which have been
systematically violated by the political, security and
judicial authorities for decades. However, despite threats and
continuous harassment, they have not stopped their activities
in documenting and denouncing abuses.
Amnesty International has received many alarming reports on
the difficult conditions that the human rights defenders face
in their effort to investigate and publicize cases of human
rights abuses committed by both the Zairian authorities and
armed groups. Since September 1996, several members of a
church-based human rights and conflict resolution group
Heritiers de la Justice, Heirs of Justice, working in
South-Kivu have been threatened by the Zairian security forces
for criticizing human rights violations in the region.
Furthermore, members of the AFDL have reportedly carried out
executions of actual and potential critics such as the
Archbishop of Bukavu who was killed in October.
The body of Jean-Bosco Bahati, a member of Heirs of Justice,
was found with the bodies of his wife and children towards the
end of October. It is unclear if he was killed by the Zairian
armed forces or by members of AFDL. Jean Marie Kati-Kati, the
president of GRACE, a group of para-jurists based in Goma, was
shot by armed groups. He lost his wife and children in the
attack. Professor Wasso, an outspoken critic of human rights
abuses, has also reportedly been killed. Amnesty International
is investigating all these cases.
Dr. Jean-Paul Simbizi , a member of the human rights group,
Justice et Liberation, Justice and Liberation, was ill-treated
by students and detained by members of the Zairian security
forces. His present whereabouts are still not known. Amnesty
international is concerned that he may have 'disappeared'.
Emmanuel Lubala, a lawyer and president of Heritiers de la
Justice has been forced into hiding in Kinshasa after fleeing
in late October from eastern Zaire; members of the Service
d'action et de renseignements militaires (SARM), Military
action and Intelligence Service, have been searching for him
and is being persecuted because of his human rights and
professional activities on behalf of Tutsi. Amnesty
International is concerned that he may be subjected to
arbitrary arrest or ill-treatment.
Because they hid Tutsi in their houses when AFDL took Goma,
many human rights defenders, like Bushoki Batabiha, were
threatened. Amnesty International is extremely concerned about
his fate. The organization believes that he is in hiding, but
away from Goma.
In July and August, members of a non-governmental organization
in Kamituga, Mwenga district, the Collectif d'action pour le
developpement des droits de l'homme, (CADDHOM), Collective of
Actions for Human Rights Development, including the General
Coordinator of this organization, Didi Mwati Bulambo, were
arrested following a series of articles criticizing corruption
in the Procuracy at Kamituga. Before being released, some of
them were severely beaten. Their office was also closed down
by members of the armed forces.
"Human rights protection should be at the heart of all
attempts to resolve the crisis in eastern Zaire. A strong
international presence in the area is needed to protect people
at risk, including human rights defenders," Amnesty
International said. ENDS\
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This material is being reposted for wider distribution by the
Africa Policy Information Center (APIC), the educational
affiliate of the Washington Office on Africa. APIC's primary
objective is to widen the policy debate in the United States
around African issues and the U.S. role in Africa, by
concentrating on providing accessible policy-relevant
information and analysis usable by a wide range of groups and
individuals.
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