The Countries And The Issues (edited Extract)
AFRICA
1 KENYA– On March 31st the International Criminal Court (ICC) accepted its prosecutor's November 2009 application to open investigations into alleged crimes against humanity committed during the post-election violence and police and military operations in 2008.
The work of Kenya’s truth, justice and reconciliation commission, established after the post-election violence, stalled in April.
2 SUDAN– Presidential and legislative elections took place in April with restrictions on essential freedoms in the run-up to the elections. President Omar al-Bashir was elected as president with 68 per cent of the vote after many of the main opposition parties withdrew their candidates over fraud allegations.
Fighting continued in Darfur between government forces and armed opposition groups. UN and humanitarian organisations were denied access by the government.
In February 57 people charged for their alleged participation in the attack on Khartoum in 2008, including 50 that had been sentenced to death, were released as a result of a framework agreement to resolve the conflict.
3 EASTERN CHAD– The Chadian government requested that the military component of the UN mission (Minurcat) leave the country when its mandate expires on May 26th. Negotiations between the Chadian government and the United Nations led to a proposal whereby Minurcat would be extended beyond May but the mission would no longer have the resources or mandate to protect civilians. There is a real risk that civilians will be exposed to increased attacks. The Chadian security forces have been unable and unwilling to protect the population in eastern Chad in recent years, which includes 250,000 Sudanese refugees from Darfur and 170,000 displaced Chadians.
4 DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO (DRC)– The government requested a withdrawal of the UN mission June 2011 and a withdrawal of UN troops not involved in eastern DRC by 2010. A premature withdrawal of the military component of the mission would compromise the security of civilians in the DRC and would lead to an upsurge of violence.
AMERICAS
5 ARGENTINA– Reynaldo Benito Bignone, Argentina's last military president, was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment for human rights violations. The tribunal convicted Gen Bignone and six other former officials of responsibility for enforced disappearance and torture involving 56 people from 1976 to 1978 at the notorious Campo de Mayo military detention centre on the outskirts of Buenos Aires.
6 BRAZIL– The Supreme Federal Court in April ruled to uphold the interpretation that crimes committed by members of the military government between 1964 and 1985 were political acts and therefore covered by the 1979 Amnesty Law. The 1979 Amnesty Law protects members of the former military government from being put on trial for extrajudicial killings, torture and rape.
7 COLOMBIA– In January several senior officials from the civilian intelligence service, which reports directly to the president, were charged with various offences in connection with a massive and long-standing illegal operation against perceived opponents of the government, including human rights defenders, some of whom were subsequently threatened, killed or subjected to unfounded criminal proceedings.
8 HAITI– The devastating earthquake in January killed more than 225,000 people and forced the displacement of more than a million people into makeshift camps in Port-au-Prince and other localities. Living conditions in the camps remain dire in spite of a strong presence of international humanitarian organisations. Failure to protect women and girls from sexual and gender-based violence remains a source of great concern.
9 HONDURAS– Six journalists were killed between March and April following a year of violent attacks and threats against journalists, particularly targeting those investigating organised crime or human rights violations and those who speak out about the June 2009 coup, when then president José Manuel Zelaya Rosales was forced into exile.
10 UNITED STATES– In the counter-terrorism context, accountability for past human rights violations by the US remains largely absent, particularly in relation to the CIA programme of secret detention. One-hundred and eighty-one detainees remain in Guantánamo despite President Barack Obama's commitment to close the detention facility by January 2010. A new Manual for Military Commissions, released by the Pentagon in April, confirmed that even if a detainee is acquitted by a military commission, the US administration reserves the right to continue to hold them in indefinite detention.
ASIA-PACIFIC
11 AFGHANISTAN– The upcoming forum of tribal elders and political leaders is due to be held on May 29th in Kabul. It will discuss peace talks with the Taliban, and comprise more than 1,000 representatives of the government, judiciary, religious leaders, representatives of different groups of the society, and the international diplomatic missions.
12 SRI LANKA– The ruling UPFA party won the majority of seats in the April 8th parliamentary elections, reinforcing President Mahinda Rajapaksa's hold on power. The president dissolved the ministry of human rights. One of his ministers, Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, is better known as Col Karuna, a former leader of a breakaway faction of the LTTE which Amnesty International has said should be investigated for recruiting and deploying child soldiers and other violations of human rights.
13 INDIA– A government-appointed expert panel published a report on the activities of international mining company Vedanta Resources, confirming the human rights abuses committed by the company that Amnesty International had highlighted in February 2010.
14 MYANMAR– On March 8th, the Myanmar government enacted five laws in relation to the national and regional elections – the first in 20 years – expected to take place towards the end of this year. One of these laws, Political Parties Registration Law, bars all political prisoners, including detained Nobel Peace-prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, from belonging to a political party. Suu Kyi's party, the National League for Democracy, and some other smaller parties have since announced they will boycott the polls.
15 THAILAND– The United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) returned to the streets in growing numbers in March. They have been demonstrating in Bangkok since March 12th, demanding the dissolution of parliament, followed by new elections. Many UDD members, commonly known as Red Shirts for the colour of their clothing, are allied with former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, deposed in a 2006 coup d'etat and currently in self-imposed exile.
16 CHINA– The harassment of rights defence lawyers continues. Recent actions include revoking licences of well-known lawyers.
DEATH PENALTY– In Taiwan, although the government maintains that its long-term goal is abolition, on April 30th it executed four men, ending a moratorium in place since 2005. Recent statements and actions by the government of South Korea have raised concerns that it will resume executions in the near future.
EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA
17 KYRGYZSTAN– In early April tension between the government and opposition supporters over rising energy prices and official corruption escalated into violent confrontations. Violent protests in the capital Bishkek on April 7th reportedly left 85 people dead and hundreds injured. Opposition supporters took control of the presidential administration the following day and a group of 14 opposition party leaders formed an interim government.
18 RUSSIAN FEDERATION
On March 29th a double suicide bombing on two central Moscow subway stations during the height of the city’s rush hour led to 40 deaths and more than 60 injuries.
19 GEORGIA– De facto authorities in the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as well as Russian armed forced continued to restrict rights and freedoms of civilians in areas under their control.
20 BALKANS WAR CRIMES LEGACY– On January 18th the Bosnia and Herzegovina state prosecutor's office issued an indictment against Dusko Jevic, Mendeljev Djuric and Goran Markovic in relation to their individual and command responsibility for the crimes committed in Srebrenica in July 1995 where more than 7,000 Bosnian Muslim men were killed by the Bosnian Serb army. The accused are charged with genocide, including the charge of rape. On March 31st the Serbian parliament officially condemned the 1995 "massacre of thousands of Muslim men and boys" in Srebrenica.
21 BELARUS– Two prisoners, Vasily Yuzepchuk and Andrei Zhuk, convicted of murder in 2009, were executed in March without being granted a last meeting with their relatives. Their families were not informed in advance of the executions.
HUMAN RIGHTS AND SECURITY– On January 26th an international report highlighted the global nature of secret detention and included information on secret detention in European countries. In Spain an official investigation was launched in January into the alleged torture of Ahmed Abderraman Hamed, a Spanish national held at Guantánamo Bay. In Britain in February the Court of Appeal ordered that previously secret evidence regarding the treatment of British resident Binyam Mohamed in Guantánamo Bay be disclosed.
22 ITALY– The "Nomad Plan" has resulted in the forced eviction of hundreds of Roma and paves the way for thousands more over the coming months. The measures envisage the destruction of over 100 Roma settlements across Rome and an estimated 6,000 Roma are to be resettled into just 13 new or expanded camps on the outskirts of the city. In the last few months, hundreds of Roma families have already been evicted from at least five different camps.
MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA
23 EGYPT– On May
11th the renewal of the long- standing state of emergency was pushed through parliament for a further two years. Emergency powers continued to be used throughout the early months of the year to clamp down on dissent, including the arrests of political activists. Border guards continued to use lethal fire with impunity against migrants, possibly including refugees and asylum seekers, trying to cross into Israel. In all 16 are known to have been killed in the first five months of 2010, following the killing of 19 others in 2009.
24 IRAN– The government continued to clamp down on all forms of dissent in the wake of the mass demonstrations following the disputed June 2009 presidential elections. The authorities deployed the paramilitary Basij and other security forces to prevent protesters gathering, arrested hundreds more political activists, journalists, students and women's and human rights defenders, and continued to mount grossly unfair "show trials" resulting in long prison terms and, in a few cases, death sentences. Two men were executed in January in connection with the protests.
The Iranian authorities rejected out of hand many key recommendations made by other states to improve respect for human rights in the country as part of the Universal Periodic Review of Iran by the UN Human Rights Council in February.
25 IRAQ– Deadly attacks, including suicide and other bombings targeting civilian areas, were carried out in the run-up to and following national elections – held on March 7th – by armed groups opposed to the government and the presence of US forces in Iraq. The elections resulted in a narrow victory for Ayad Allawi's Sunni-backed Iraqi List over the State of Law Alliance led by the prime minister, amid vote-rigging claims by both sides, and by mid-May no new government had been formed.
26 ISRAEL/OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES
A year after the 22-day conflict in Gaza and southern Israel ended accountability remained wanting. Both the Israeli and Palestinian sides, however, did submit information to the UN shortly in advance of an early February 2010 deadline for reporting on their own investigations into alleged war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.
The Israeli submission reported that investigations had been or were being conducted, but they failed to satisfy the UN’s requirements that they be “independent, credible and in conformity with international standards”. The submission by Hamas indicated that the organisation had conducted no serious investigations.
Meanwhile, Israel’s continuing blockade of Gaza continued to cruelly exacerbate the devastation of the conflict and its aftermath.
27 YEMEN– Fighting between government forces and Huthi rebels in the northern Sa'dah region ended in February in accordance with a ceasefire agreement between the two parties, but the situation remained unstable. Some 250,000 people are reported to have been internally displaced as a result.
The question of the extent of the threat posed by suspected al-Qaeda militants and the Yemen government’s repressive and sweeping measures to combat it came under the spotlight in early 2010. This followed the alleged attempt by a Nigerian national, who is reported to have visited and received training in Yemen, to blow up a passenger plane on which he was travelling over the US on December 25th, 2009.