Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards

On 22 May 2013 human rights defender George Reginald Freeman was driving to a guest house when he was intercepted by two unknown assailants on motorbikes. One of the men threw a stone through his car window and Freeman was  badly beaten as he attempted to escape. The assailants also robbed valuables from his car after he escaped. George Reginald Freeman is the director of Pride Equality, an organisation which works on LGBTI rights in Sierra Leone. On the morning of the attack, the human rights defender was informed that the newspaper Exclusive Newspaper had published, without his permission, a story authored by him entitled “I was born gay”, which had previously been published online by the MTV Staying Alive Foundation on 30 July 2012. The story was originally intended for an international audience via the internet, but Exclusive Newspaper published it on its front page, along with a picture of George Reginald Freeman, a fact which gave the story much greater prominence and put the human rights defender in danger. … At this stage of the day, the human rights defender was already receiving homophobic messages to his mobile phone, and had been stopped in the street by people making homophobic comments such as “Homosexuals should be killed as Sierra Leone is not their place”.

Pride Equality decided that, as a security measure, members of the organisation should spend the night away from home, which is why George Reginald Freeman was driving to a guest house. They also reported the matter to the Criminal Investigations Department of the Sierra Leone Police. … The human rights defender was accompanied by two other police officers to the scene where they discovered two notes which read: “This is just the beginning”; “We know you people. We are coming after you. You bloody homosexuals”.

 https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/

This entry was posted on May 24, 2013 at 17:15 and is filed under human rights, Human Rights Defenders.

Tags: Africa, assailants, Criminal Investigation Department, Front Line Defenders, gay rights, George Reginald Freeman, homophobia, homophobic comments, Human rights defender, LGBT rights, LGBTI, media, Pride Equality, Sierra Leone, Sierra Leone Police