Human Rights Watch - The African Mirror

Sep

2021

How Chadians torture victims faced ex-president

RICCI SHRYOCK CLEMENT Abaifouta, 55, has been waiting nearly 25 years to put one question to Hissène Habré, the former president of Chad: “Why did you arrest me?” Video: The Gravedigger and the President https://youtu.be/G1Lh4w6Bj3g Film by Aida Grovestins and Ricci Shryock Abaifouta was arrested on 12 July, 1985, when he was 23 years old. He had won a scholarship to study in Germany and reckons his travel plans raised suspicions in Habré's government that he was an opposition supporter. Instead of going to university, he first spent two weeks at the headquarters of the political police, known as the Documentation…

Jul

2021

By The African Mirror

‘Kenya plan to help poor plagued by irregularities’

COVID-19

GEORGE OBULUTSA A Kenyan government programme intended to help the capital's poorest citizens weather the pandemic was crippled by irregularities including cronyism and benefited just a fraction of those in need, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Tuesday. President Uhuru Kenyatta announced the 10 billion-shilling ($92.51 million) cash transfer programme in May 2020, two months after the East African nation entered a strict lockdown. A report by the U.S.-based rights group found that officials in charge of enrolment frequently ignored eligibility criteria "and directed benefits to their relatives or friends, even in cases where they did not meet the criteria".…

May

2021

By The African Mirror

Governments urged to boost cash grants to end pandemic-fuelled child labour

HUMAN RIGHTS

KIM HARRISBERG FROM brick kilns to carpet factories, COVID-19 has pushed children as young as eight years old into dangerous and abusive jobs, rights groups have said, urging governments to roll out cash allowances to reduce child labour. Human Rights Watch and advocacy organisations in Ghana, Nepal and Uganda interviewed 81 children working in often risky settings, including gold mines, fisheries and construction sites, during the coronavirus pandemic. "The most shocking finding for me was the exploitation ... some children were paid in alcohol at stone quarries," said Angella Nabwowe Kasule, programmes director for the Ugandan charity Initiative for Social…

Apr

2021

By The African Mirror

LGBT persecution on the rise in Cameroon, Human Rights Watch says

LGBT+

CAMEROON security forces have arrested, threatened or assaulted at least 24 people since February in a ramped-up crackdown on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT+) people, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said yesterday. The rights group said recent documented accounts of abuse, including that of a 17-year old boy, point to an overall rise of police action against LGBT+ people in Cameroon, where same-sex relations are criminalised. Cameroon authorities did not respond to Reuters requests for comments. HRW said it shared its report with Cameroon's justice, and defence ministries, and the head of police. It received no response to a March…

Mar

2021

By The African Mirror

Uganda urged to end abductions

NEWS

ELIAS BIRYABAREMA UGANDA should stop the abductions of opposition supporters and release those illegally detained, New York-based Human Rights Watch said on Thursday, adding to pressure on President Yoweri Museveni to end a crackdown on dissidents. In recent months, hundreds of supporters of opposition leader and pop star Bobi Wine have been seized and some tortured by state agents, according to his National Unity Platform (NUP). Wine, 39, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, lost to Museveni in a Jan. 14 presidential election marred by widespread violence. He rejected the results, claiming he won. This week, he urged supporters to…

Feb

2021

By The African Mirror

Cameroonian soldiers accused of mass rape

NEWS

JOSIANE KOUAGHEU CAMEROONIAN soldiers raped at least 20 women and killed a man in a raid on a village last year, Human Rights Watch (HRW) alleged on Friday, calling it one of the worst attacks by the army since an insurgency by Anglophone separatists began in 2016. Witnesses told the New York-based rights group that the attack on March 1, 2020, was a reprisal against civilians in the western village of Ebam suspected of collaborating with rebels seeking independence from the mostly Francophone state. Reached for comment, Cameroon's army spokesman dismissed the findings. "We have better things to do than…

Feb

2021

By The African Mirror

International Criminal Court rules it has jurisdiction over Palestinian Territories

WORLD

THE International Criminal Court has ruled that it has jurisdiction over war crimes or atrocities committed in the Palestinian Territories, paving the way for a criminal investigation, despite Israeli objections. Judges said their decision was based on jurisdictional rules in the Hague-based court's founding documents and does not imply any attempt to determine statehood or legal borders. Israel, which is not a member of the court, has rejected its jurisdiction. The court's prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, said in December 2019 there was "a reasonable basis to believe that war crimes have been or are being committed in the West Bank, including…

Feb

2021

By The African Mirror

Angolan security forces kill protesters

NEWS

ANGOLAN authorities should immediately ensure a prompt, independent, and thorough investigation into the killing by security forces of at least 10 unarmed protesters on January 30, 2021 during a protest organized by the Lunda Tchokwe Protectorate Movement in Lunda Norte province, Human Rights Watch said today. Four witnesses told Human Rights Watch that Angolan security forces indiscriminately fired at protesters who had peacefully gathered to demand better public services, including water and electricity supply, in the diamond-rich town of Cafunfu. The Angolan police reported that 6 people were killed, more than 20 were injured, and 16 were detained after officers…

Jan

2021

By The African Mirror

Indonesia’s Aceh province publicly canes two gay men

WORLD

AUTHORITIES in Indonesia’s Aceh province publicly caned six people accused of breaching Islamic law, including two men who received 77 lashes for having a same-sex relationship, in a punishment Human Rights Watch called “public torture”. Aceh is the only province in majority-Muslim Indonesia to follow Islamic law, and this was the third such caning since Aceh outlawed homosexuality in 2014. The province, on the northern tip of Sumatra island, also imposes caning for crimes such as theft, gambling and adultery. A hooded religious police officer carried out Thursday’s floggings, watched by a crowd wearing face masks. One of the men…

Jan

2021

By The African Mirror

‘French bombs hit wedding’

NEWS

AARON ROSS THREE villagers in northern Mali told Human Rights Watch (HRW) that a French airstrike this month hit a wedding party attended by civilians, disputing French claims that only Islamist militants were hit. Different sides have offered contradictory accounts of the Jan. 3 strike outside the village of Bounti. The French military said it killed about 30 Islamist fighters - a version backed by Malian authorities. The military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the HRW report. It has previously said its intelligence before and after the strike allowed it to exclude the possibility of…