Front Line Defenders launched today its 2013 Annual Report on human rights defenders, which rather confusingly in fact covers 2012. It highlights developments in the
situation of human rights defenders in 2012 and analyses the situation in each region of the world. It concludes: “The sad reality is that while governments proclaim their support for human rights and their respect for the workof human rights defenders in international fora, in practice, humanrights defenders face a daily struggle for survival.”
In 2012, Front Line Defenders issued 287 urgent appeals on 460 human rights defenders at risk in 69 countries; it provided 267 security grants and trained 358 human rights defenders.
The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the FIDH and OMCT, received information from the local group “Voix des sans-voix pour les droits de l’Homme ” about serious threats against the HRD Philomène Muamba, President of ADDEF ( l’Association pour la défense des droits des enfants et femmes opprimés), based in Kasaï-Occidental. It seems that on 17 January at 03h00 in the morning 3 policemen and 2 military came to the house of Ms Philomène Muamba, in Tshikapa, without any written order. As she was not home, they expressed threats against her little sister. Philomène Muamba then lodged a complaint against X with both the military and civilian prosecutors in Tshikapa.
Since 2011 Philomène Muamba has received several death threats on the telephone along the lines that “you had us arrested and thought we were going to die in jail but …we will bury you”. In 2011 et 2012, she was indeed at the basis of a trial that had led to the conviction of persons who had been accused of several cases of rape. And one should note that on 17 January 2013 around 20h00 several detainees – including men mentioned above – had escaped from the central prison in Tshikapa.
Liu Xia, the wife of Liu Xiaobo has been illegally held under house arrest for over 26 months. She has not been able to communicate with others or leave her apartment freely.
On the 28 December 2012 a group of activists attracted Liu Xia’s attention outside her apartment beneath her window. They discussed how to get around the security guards through the side door. Liu Xia welcomed them with hugs and tears.
The meeting was brief, just three minutes as they wanted to avoid conflict with the security guards whose backup team would rush in soon. Some friends kept talking with Liu Xia through the windows and Liu Xia threw out some chocolates to them to express her thanks. Some were arguing with the security guards, explaining that they were just Liu Xia’s friends to celebrate Liu Xiaobo’s birthday with Liu Xia.
Eventually, all the friends managed to return home safely. Amnesty International has translated the video about their visit into English. The original can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJumioueaAo
On 12 January 2013 the family of imprisoned human rights defender Gao Zhisheng were permitted a visit to see him ten months after an initial visit on 24 March 2012. A report of this second visit reached Front Line only on 18 January 2013. Gao Zhisheng’s wife, Ms Geng He who is US-based, told Radio Free Asia that her father and brother-in-law saw Gao Zhisheng for 30 minutes on 12 January but were forbidden from asking any “sensitive” questions, including what conditions in prison were like. Gao Zhisheng is being held in China’s remote northwestern Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. Previous attempts by his family for a second visit had been denied by the authorities. According to Geng He, Gao Zhisheng appeared to be ‘relatively well’ and did not need assistance walking. Gao Zhisheng is a human rights defender and self-taught lawyer, and was named one of China’s top ten lawyers by the Ministry of Justice in 2001. He regularly took on cases involving persecution of religious minorities, including Falun Gong practitioners and those associated with the unofficial ‘house church’ movement.
While Front Line Defenders welcomes this recent visit by the family of Gao Zhisheng, it reiterates its continued call on the Chinese authorities to immediately and unconditionally release Gao Zhisheng as it believes he is being detained solely as a result of his legitimate and peaceful human rights activities.
On 12 January 2013, human rights defender Mr Vitaly Ponomarev received several anonymous death threats through electronic mail. Vitaly Ponomarev is the head of the Central Asia programme of Human Rights Centre (HRC) Memorial, which was founded in 1999 and has a major focus on documenting human rights violations in Central Asian states, particularly Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan, in close cooperation with local human right defenders.
The messages received on 12 January, in Russian and Uzbek languages and originating from an IP address in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, threatened Vitaly Ponomarev with death if he moved to the south of Kyrgyzstan, and also issued death threats against his family members living in Moscow. HRC Memorial has lodged a complaint to the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation and requested an investigation to be launched into the threats. The messages follow
the publication on web site of Memorial on 27 December 2012, of a report containing information about reported torture by Uzbekistan’s security services against Uzbek citizens on the territory of the Russian Federation.
Front Line Defenders believes that the death threats issued against Vitaly Ponomarev are directly linked to his work.
In an earlier post of 18 December I reported that Sayed Yousif Al-Muhafda was detained (again). After the arrest of most leaders, he was one of the few left to continue the work of the courageous group, the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, and came to Geneva in October last year to represent the NGO as 2012 nominee of the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders.
A court in Bahrain on Thursday released him on bail pending trial for charges of spreading false news to harm security, according to Amnesty International. Al-Muhafda is scheduled to appear in court on January 29 2013 when witnesses are expected to testify. In view of earlier experience with HRDs on trial in Bahrain one should not expect too much.
Via Brussels-based Protection International we have learned that the appeal court in the central city of Gitega, Burundi, imposed a heavy three-year jail sentence on the journalist Hassan Ruvakuki instead of overturning his conviction. The court changed the charge on which Ruvakuki is convicted to “participation in an association formed with the aim of attacking persons and property.” In June, a lower court sentenced him to life imprisonment on a charge of terrorism. Reporters Without Borders regards today’s decision as a sign that certain Burundian officials were determined to punish Ruvakuki at all costs. Several sources in Gitega reported that the appeal court had been under heavy pressure from the state security apparatus not to acquit him. Ruvakuki was accused of complicity with a rebel group when all he did was his duty as a journalist to anticipate the news. Shortly before his arrest, he went to neighbouring Tanzania to cover a Burundian rebel group that was being formed there.
In response to this incomprehensible verdict, Reporters Without Borders is launching a petition for the release of Ruvakuki, who was working for Bonesha FM, a local radio station, and the Swahili service of Radio France Internationale at the time of his arrest in November 2011. To Sign the petition control/click here.
One does near much about Oman and the impression could be that it is doing relatively well (the position of women is acknowledged to be good; there is a governmental Human Rights Commission and limited democracy) but after reports in 2012 by AI, HRW and Freedom House amongst others, Frontline now, 14 January 2013, reports the arbitrary arrest of human rights defender and blogger Said Jaddad by the Special Division of Muscat Police Station, where he is currently being detained. Said Jaddad’s work includes the documenting of human rights violations as well as writing critical blog posts about human rights violations in Oman.
On 14 January, Said Jaddad received a call from the Special Division of Muscat Police Station, requesting that he present himself to the Station. No legal basis was provided for this request. Upon his arrival, the HRD was detained. He has been denied visitation rights and access to a lawyer, while no formal charges have yet been presented. Furthermore, Said Jaddad, who reportedly suffers from heart problems, has not been provided with medical attention. He has previously been subjected to interrogation by police, on each occasion he was requested to sign an undertaking to cease working in the field of human rights, which he rejected. In February 2011, the human rights defender was threatened if he did not cease his contact with international non-governmental organisations. Said Jaddad has also been officially banned from publishing in the Omani media, including in newspapers, such as Al Zaman and Ru’aya.
Front Line Defenders expresses serious concern at the arbitrary detention of Said Jaddad, and at his physical and psychological integrity, in particular given his reported medical condition. Front Line Defenders believes Said Jaddad’s detention to be solely motivated by his human rights work and views this act as part of an ongoing crackdown on human rights defenders in Oman, including continued acts of judicial harassment. For further information on this situation, please see Front Line Defenders’ appeal dated 15 June 2012 http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/node/18650 .
Phyllis Bennis, a Fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies and of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam, wrote in her blog through Al-Jazeera, on 9 January 2013, a very informative piece under the title: “Human Rights Watch: Time to stand with human rights defenders” with the provocative byline: It is disappointing to see HRW’s unwillingness to stand with those who are working to promote and defend human rights.
In short, the pro-Israeli, UN-bashing UN Watch discovered that the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, US lawyer Richard Falk, was still ‘on the Board’ of HRW. HRW quickly replied that he was only a member of HRW’s local support committee in Santa Barbara, California, where he lives and that it was an oversight that he still held this honorary position and that it was rectified (“longstanding policy, applied many times, that no official from any government or UN agency can serve on any Human Rights Watch committee or its Board. It was an oversight on our part that we did not apply that policy in Richard Falk’s case several years ago when he assumed his UN position”). UN Watch of course cried victory implying that Falk was expelled an enemy of human rights or because he is anti-Semitic.
The author of the blog finds fault with HRW’s meek response that did indeed not amount to a strong defense of Richard Falk’s credentials, impartiality and expertise. Should HRW not have made clear that substantively it stands with Richard Falk, that he was removed for technical reasons only and would be welcomed back as soon as he ceases to be UN Rapporteur? These are policy question that each NGO should answer for itself but in the context of UN Watch’s obsession to undermine the work of the UN in general and Richard Falk in particular a more robust stance would have been useful. I think that the similarity – even confusion – in name should also have led HRW to take a tougher public stand.
Phyllis Bennis concludes with: “Given his Middle East staff’s consistent work, there is no question that Ken Roth and the HRW board understand that human rights criticism of Israeli occupation is well-grounded in fact, and that such criticism remains a crucial element in changing the public, media and policymaking discourse in the United States. If we are ever to have any hope of changing US government policy in Palestine-Israel towards one grounded in human rights and international law, consistent human rights criticism and a willingness to stand with human rights defenders like Richard Falk when they face attack, remain crucial tools – for all human rights activists, including the leadership of Human Rights Watch.”
On 17 December 2012, a group of four armed men carried out an attack on human rights defender Mr Gunaratne Waninnayaka, the president of the Colombo Magistrate’s Court Lawyers’ Association and the convenor of People’s March. Gunaratne Waninnayaka is an outspoken campaigner for the independence of the judiciary. Over the past years, Gunaratne Waninnayaka has figured prominently in campaigns to protect the independence of the judiciary in Sri Lanka. Most recently he has been at the forefront of the campaign opposing the Sri Lanka government’s move to impeach Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake, who was a member of the Supreme Court when it delivered an adverse ruling to the government.
In the morning of 17 December, Gunaratne Waninnayaka was ambushed outside his house by four unidentified persons armed with automatic weapons who had been waiting for him to return home. As he approached his home, he saw the armed group and managed to enter his residence in his car, enter his home and block the entrances. The armed persons tried to enter the house but failed.
