Rights groups decry relocation of people picked up at sea after fleeing camps in Cox’s Bazar Hundreds of Rohingya Muslims, including children, have arrived at “a de facto detention island” in Bangladesh after being stranded at sea for weeks. Rights groups had warned that the refugees, who had been turned away from other countries in the region, were at risk of starvation and abuse by people traffickers. It is believed that other boats remain adrift. Bangladesh confirmed on Thursday that a boat carrying 280 people was being towed to Bhasan Char, an uninhabited silt island off the southern coast. The country’s foreign minister, Abdul Momen, had earlier said that refugees rescued at sea would be sent to the island to prevent any risk of spreading the coronavirus to the sprawling camps in Cox’s Bazar, where a million Rohingya live in cramped conditions. Bangladesh, which has struggled to cope with the camps, planned to start moving refugees to Bhasan Char last December, and has built rows of concrete barracks to house about 100,000 people. The relocation was put on hold following an outcry from Rohingya community leaders and international agencies. Human rights groups say the island, which can be reached only by a three-hour boat journey, has no access to basic services and is vulnerable to sea-level rise and storm surges. Phil Robertson, the deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, said there was no need to send refugees to the island to be quarantined because the UN’s refugee agency and other bodies had facilities set up for this purpose in Cox’s Bazar. Instead, families should be reunited with missing relatives as quickly as possible. “While everyone is appreciative that Bangladesh has brought forsaken Rohingya boats ashore, arbitrarily branding the passengers as ‘new arrivals’ and packing them off to a de facto detention island like Bhasan Char is not a rights respecting solution,” he said. Many of the people on board are refugees who had been living in Cox’s Bazar but who attempted to flee in search of a better life in Malaysia. “The Rohingya have repeatedly stated they do not want to be moved to Bahsan Char, but that is precisely what the Bangladesh government is forcing this group to do,” Robertson said. Serazul Hoque said he believed his 14-year-old nephew, who had been missing for more than 50 days, is among those taken to Bhasan Char. Traffickers had told the family to pay a ransom to secure Nur Kamaal’s release, but he called on Wednesday to say the Bangladeshi navy had stopped his boat and that all people on board were being taken to a different location. The family later heard news reports that refugees from the boat were being taken to Bhasan Char, but have not been able to confirm that Kamaal is among them. “We are worried about conditions there and how good the healthcare is,” Hoque said. “If he comes back to his mother then his mother can take care of him … She is worrying for her son. She is crying.” Sirajul Mostofa, the chairman of Rohingya Refugee Committee, said he was in contact with other families whose children had been taken to Bhasan Char. He said he hoped the government would reunite them with their families after the quarantine period. Mostofa said there were no words to describe the conditions on the boats, but that people risk the journey because there is no alternative. “They have no future [in refugee camps in Bangladesh], they cannot see any proper solution at all.” It is not clear how many more boats are still at sea, but Bangladesh’s navy and coast guard is on alert for others in the country’s waters. The Bangladeshi authorities rescued a separate ship last month, allowing about 400 emaciated people, mostly teenagers, to come ashore after spending two months at sea. More than 70 people may have died on the boat, it has been reported, but no official death toll has been announced. © 2020 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

A rifle hangs in the corner, refuse bags of seized cannabis strewn in the dirt at the men’s feet. Heavy chains have been fixed to the trees in the surrounding field. As we arrive, a group of teenage boys are being shackled to them by their ankles. This is the headquarters of a local branch of the Koglweogo, a network of crime-fighting volunteers that are proliferating across Burkina Faso, west Africa. For the group’s members in Poessen, a village a few hours’ drive from the capital, Ouagadougou, the afternoon has been a success. “The small kid under the shade tree has stolen money, and during the interrogation he revealed his accomplices,” said Emmanuel Tiendrebeogo, the branch president. “We’ve run our own investigation and arrested his accomplices in a village not far from here.” Burkina Faso is one of the frontlines of a security crisis in the Sahel, a semi-arid region that extends from Senegal eastward to Sudan. A popular revolution starting in 2014 removed Burkina Faso’s strongman president Blaise Compaoré and the authoritarian apparatus he nurtured over his 27-year rule. The resulting vacuum has allowed armed groups, including jihadists affiliated with Islamic State and al-Qaida, to spill over from neighbouring Mali, driving the government from swathes of Burkina Faso’s northern and eastern frontiers, and sending nearly a million citizens fleeing for their lives. It has also lightened the police footprint on the fringes of cities and in rural areas, including in Poessen. “You couldn’t even breed an animal here without dealing with thieves,” said Tiendrebeogo. Depending on who you ask, the Koglweogo – “guardians of the bush” in Mooré, a local language – are either a solution to the insecurity or a growing source of it. Advertisement Armed with one or two guns, and sometimes makeshift uniforms, men who work day jobs as farmers, masons or drivers moonlight as village detectives, judges and juries. Their ranks have swelled since the organisation was formed in 2015. “The sheer number of volunteers is huge,” said Philippe M Frowd, an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa who researches the phenomenon. “You can extrapolate and say there are 20,000 to 40,000 groups.” Koglweogo leaders say their men operate according to a code, and deliver justice more swiftly than the police, whose investigations can drag – if they show up at all. But nobody disputes their brand of justice is often brutal. “We no longer excessively beat people,” said Tiendrebeogo. “If you are arrested and say what you’ve done truthfully, you won’t be beaten. If you resist, we can try to convince you by beating you.” When that fails, they have other methods. One of the men pulls out a handful of small animal bones, and demonstrates how they are placed in the gaps between a suspect’s fingers. Plastic tape is wrapped around the hand, then pulled. “And then you will speak,” Tiendrebeogo said. “Loudly.” Politicians in Burkina Faso acknowledge the problems with crime and militancy and have largely embraced the vigilantes. “It’s the failure of the state to provide security that has prompted citizens to protect themselves,” said Zéphirin Diabré, the leader of the opposition party Union for Progress and Reform. “The Koglweogo’s contribution has been extremely useful in stopping petty crime.” But one of the walls of Diabré’s party headquarters is taken up by a banner demanding justice for the Yirgou massacre. In January last year, armed men attacked a northern village whose members mostly belonged to the majority Mossi ethnic group, killing seven people. The next day, the Koglweogo in the village, named Yirgou, launched revenge attacks against nearby communities from the minority Fulani ethnic group. The official death toll was 39, but rights group say more than 200 may have been killed. Some security analysts argue that sparking this kind of inter-ethnic violence is precisely the plan of terrorists groups in the region, to isolate Fulani communities and drive them into the arms of militants. “Before this event, we never had violence in this town,” said Mahamadou Sawadogo, a conflict researcher. “But after Yirgou, the areas all around this village descended into violence.” In a sign of the desperate state of its war against militants, the Burkina Faso government in January passed legislation to begin training and equipping volunteers, including Koglweogo members, to join the fight against the militants. “The army itself cannot do the job,” said Diabré. “When Britain was at war, even Princess Elizabeth came out and drove cars and changed wheels.” Some observers acknowledge that vulnerable villages in the north and east need assistance to defend themselves, but worry that arming an undisciplined force with its own loyalties and grudges could exacerbate the boiling ethnic tensions. “If these volunteers are under the security forces – and the security forces themselves have often shown complete and utter disregard for the rule of law in fighting terrorism – how confident can we be that volunteers are going to act lawfully?” said Corinne Dufka, the Sahel director of Human Rights Watch. Sawadogo worries it risks pushing the country closer towards all-out ethnic conflict: “It’s the worst decision, because we’ll end up fighting each other.” In March the government announced it had received reports of a fresh massacre: 43 people killed in the northern province of Yatenga. Initial speculation was that Islamist militants had committed yet another atrocity. But the victims were all Fulani, and witnesses said the killers belonged to the Koglweogo. Additional reporting by Oumar Zombre © The Guardian 2020

Before the collapse of Yugoslavia in the early 1990’s, the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina was one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse republics within Yugoslavia. According to a census taken in 1991, the population included 43% Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), 31% Serbs, and 17% Croats, and 8% other minorities. During his communist regime, the President of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito, was able to stifle nationalist sentiments in Yugoslavia. However, following his death in 1980, nationalism quickly swept across Yugoslavia and ethnic groups began vying for independence. On January 9, 1992, Bosnian Serbs self-declared an autonomous Serb region in Bosnia-Herzegovina that was later renamed to Republika Srpska. Bosnia-Herzegovina held an independence referendum on February 29, 1992. Bosniaks and Croats voted overwhelmingly for independence from Yugoslavia, but Bosnian Serbs boycotted the vote because they wished to remain within a Serb-dominated Yugoslavia. On March 3, 1992, the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina declared independence from Yugoslavia. Bosnia-Herzegovina's independence was formally recognized by the U.S. and many European nations on April 6, 1992. A few days later, the Bosnian war (1992-1995) broke out. Serbia supported the Bosnian Serb forces that swept through Eastern Bosnia and forced Bosniak residents to flee from areas within Republika Srpska. The Serb forces laid siege to Sarajevo for 44 months, the longest siege of a capital city in modern warfare. Sarajevo was cut off from food and medical supplies, and its streets were turned into a deadly free-fire zone where Serb snipers targeted Bosniak civilians from their positions in the surrounding hills. The Markale Market Massacres were committed by Serb forces against civilians during the siege, when several people were indiscriminately killed in the city’s historic marketplace. The Bosnian war was characterized by mass killings, mass rapes, torture, and displacement. At least 100,000 people were killed during the war, most of whom were Bosniaks. On April 16, 1993, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution to establish demilitarized safe zones in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The U.N peace-keeping force sent to protect the safe areas, UNPROFOR, failed to exercise force against Bosnian Serbs and ultimately stood by as atrocities were committed against Bosniaks. Any forceful action required approval from the former U.N. Chief of Mission, Yasushi Akashi, who consistently shot down these requests in favor of negotiation. His refusal to authorize airstrikes against Serb snipers in Sarajevo is just one example of several weak pacifist responses taken by the U.N. that resulted in the Srebrenica Genocide. Under the command of Ratko Mladić, Bosnian Serb forces surrounded and targeted Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica for extermination. Srebrenica had been designated a U.N. safe area, but Dutch peacekeepers failed to take any action to prevent Bosnian Serb forces from overtaking the town. The Srebrenica Genocide began on July 11, 1995, resulting in the systematic extermination of 8,372 Bosniak men and boys and the deportation of over 25,000 women, children, and the elderly. The genocide in Srebrenica was the worst atrocity committed in Europe since WWII. The Srebrenica Genocide finally mobilized NATO, which bombed Bosnian Serb forces and Belgrade. After several airstrikes, Bosnian Serb and Serbian leaders agreed to peace talks in Dayton, Ohio. The Dayton Peace Agreement, signed on November 21, 1995, officially ended the Bosnian War. The country was split into two entities, The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Republika Srpska. The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is mainly populated by Bosniaks and Croats; and Republika Srpska by Bosnian Serbs. After the genocide, Bosnian Serbs engaged in a well-organized attempt to coverup their crimes through reburials from primary mass graves to secondary or tertiary graves. The International Commission on Missing Persons has used DNA analysis to identify remains and inform families. Each year on July 11th, a commemoration is held at the Srebrenica Genocide Memorial in Potočari and remains are reinterred at the cemetery. Although the main architects of the Srebrenica Genocide, Slobodan Milošević, Radovan Karadžić, and Ratko Mladić were captured and prosecuted for genocide and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), genocide denial continues to divide Bosnia-Herzegovina. To this day, genocide deniers from Republika Srpska and Serbia practice historical revisionism by minimizing the number of victims, accusing the ICTY and U.N. of bias against Serbs, and glorifying war criminals. Denial of the genocide by Bosnian Serb and Serbian politicians has stoked the flames of nationalist rhetoric and obstructed reconciliation in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Genocide Watch strongly supports the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) and local courts in Bosnia that are prosecuting war criminals. Genocide Watch urges the European Union to promote accession of Bosnia-Herzegovina to the European Union and to assist Bosnia in political and economic reforms. Because genocide denial has exacerbated ethnic tensions in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Genocide Watch considers the country to be at Stage 6: Polarization and Stage 10: Denial. Download Alert

Sudanese pro-democracy protesters who spent four months on the streets rallying against the country’s autocratic president are now defying the military leaders who overthrew him on Thursday. Thousands kept up their sit-in outside the military headquarters in Khartoum overnight and into Friday morning despite a curfew imposed by the army after the arrest of Omar al-Bashir. Organisers of the demonstration said they would keep up the campaign. It was not clear if the army would move against the protesters. The mood in the crowd appeared festive, with protesters playing music and chanting “down again” – a reference to the defence minister, Ahmed Awad Ibn Auf. Auf, who is on a US sanctions list in relation to the genocide in Darfur, was sworn in as the head of a new military transitional council, which said it would take charge for the next two years. In a televised address on Thursday, Auf announced “the toppling of the regime” and said Bashir had been detained in “a secure place”, bringing an end to his three decades in power. Washington said Khartoum should “exercise restraint and allow space for civilian participation within the government”. The state department spokesman Robert Palladino told reporters: “The Sudanese people should determine who leads them and their future and the Sudanese people have been clear and are demanding a civilian-led transition.” The EU urged the army to carry out a “swift” handover to civilian rule. Auf said the country’s borders and airspace would be shut until further notice. Footage was later broadcast on state television of him taking the oath to become head of the council, alongside his new deputy, the army chief of staff, Lt Gen Kamal Abdul Murof Al-mahi. Bashir, who swept to power in a coup in 1989, was one of Africa’s longest-serving presidents. He is wanted by the international criminal court on charges of genocide and war crimes. Organisers of the protests, which have rocked Sudan since December, have vowed to press on until the whole regime is swept aside. The Alliance for Freedom and Change group said the regime had kept “the same faces”, and urged demonstrators “to continue their sit-in in front of army headquarters and across all regions and in the streets”. Alaa Salah, who has become an icon of the protest movement after a video of her leading demonstrators in chants went viral, said: “Change will not happen with Bashir’s entire regime hoodwinking Sudanese civilians through a military coup.” The military takeover on Thursday meant “we have not achieved anything”, said Adel, a protester outside the army headquarters, where defiant demonstrators have braved teargas and gunfire to keep up the sit-in. “We will not stop our revolution. We are calling for the regime to step down, not only Bashir,” he said. Copyright 2019 Agencies, the Guardian

‘President for life’ knows he is protected by France while Chadians die of hunger. Once a year, there is a ranking of the conditions of the world’s nations. It’s like a country’s report card, with health, education and living standards as key indicators. The UN’s Human Development Index tells citizens – and campaigners like me – how well or badly a country is doing. Since 1990, the year Idriss Déby seized power, ousting his mentor Hissène Habré in a bloody war, Chad – a landlocked former French colony that separates the Sahara in the north from the savannah in the south – has consistently ranked at the bottom of the index, fluctuating between 160 and 187 (out of 189). Yet Chad should be a stable and rich country. It sits atop reserves of some of the world’s most precious natural resources, including uranium and gold, and pumps about 130,000 barrels of crude oil a day, generating billions of dollars in annual revenues. But, not surprisingly, very little has trickled down to the population, who remain desperately poor. In October, the Global Hunger Index listed Chad as experiencing “alarming” levels of hunger. This heartbreaking level of poverty and 68-year-old Déby’s misrule are not coincidental. It’s part of a pattern causing devastation across the continent. True, the autocrat organises regular multi-party elections, but no election has ever produced reform or a change in power. Déby rules, and controls access to – and revenues from – oil, with absolute power. He is in effect “president for life” and does not tolerate any challenge from the public, opposition parties or civil society groups. In fact, during his 30-year reign every state institution – the courts, the media, the opposition, civil society – has been destroyed; an old-style way to keep himself in power. The country’s oil money – 80% of which was earmarked for agriculture, health, education and infrastructure – seems to have been diverted to almost anything but to lift Chadian people out of poverty. Déby’s government has not only squandered hundreds of millions of petrodollars, leaving Chadians with only debts and broken institutions, but also indulged in vast spending – and even borrowing – to equip his security forces with the latest weapons to repress citizens, opponents and campaigners demanding food and reforms. The outcome is difficult to ignore. In a country of 15 million, there are about 100 hospitals, and a few hundred qualified doctors. According to the UN, 8% of infants do not survive their first year and 20% do not live to see their fifth birthday. Of the population, 70% cannot read or write, 80% live in total poverty on less than a dollar a day, and 90% are unemployed. The average citizen lives to the age of 53. In 2019, Transparency International placed the country 162 (out of 180) in its annual list of the most corrupt countries in the world. On top of all this, Lake Chad – the principal life source of the Sahel – is shrinking in the climate crisis, placing the poverty-ravaged population at even greater risk of famine. For a country that is in an unusually dangerous neighbourhood – with Boko Haram in Nigeria in the east and Isis in the north – this is troubling. It should concern us all. But Déby’s main backer, France, remains quiet, raising uncomfortable questions: when will France decolonise and stop supporting brutal leaders like Déby – or, for that matter, Ali Bongo in Gabon, Alassane Ouattara in Ivory Coast or Faure Gnassingbé in Togo – holding their people and their country in the past, both economically and politically? Indeed, in 2017, Déby told Le Monde he was made – and thus agreed – to remain in power under French pressure. The following year, Chad’s parliament revised the constitution to allow him to retain the office until 2033, when he will be 81. Unsurprisingly, this week he went a step further to cement his autocracy and at the same time further eroded the prospect of change. To mark Chad’s 60th anniversary, on 11 August he made himself “Maréchal du Tchad”. He even dressed like Mobutu Sese Seko, another kleptocrat, when he made himself “Maréchal du Zaire”. It is all a desperate attempt to strengthen the idea that he personally embodies Chad’s stability and security in the global anti-jihadist fight in the Sahel, which has made it increasingly difficult for many to imagine a peaceful transition from him to any successor. In my opinion, Déby – who has total control of the government, and is showing no signs of slowing down – is actually Chad’s greatest threat to stability, democracy and development. He behaves the way he does because he doesn’t need the consent of his people and he knows internationally he is protected by the French while Chadians die of hunger. Published by The Guardian August 14, 2020. © 2020 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies.

This month the president of Ivory Coast caused outrage which spilled into bloodshed on the streets of the capital, Abidjan, when he announced he would seek a third term in office after all. Tensions are running high in the country after months of violence surrounding the disputed presidential election in 2010. Just five months ago, the 78-year-old Alassane Ouattara had announced his retirement, pledging to “transfer power to a new generation”. So why is Ouattara now so afraid to relinquish power? Why did he not proudly allow Ivory Coast’s first-ever peaceful transfer of power to take place, which could have been his greatest legacy, nine years after a bloody civil war? And if he becomes another life president – against the constitution – how many more people will be plunged into hardship and worsening crisis? These are the salient questions that many people in Ivory Coast are asking – and rightly so. The resistance to giving up power in Africa is not unique to Ivory Coast. It is a growing trend across the continent, causing joblessness, conflict, corruption, economic decline, and human rights abuses. Even Paul Kagame, the west’s standard-bearer for “good African leadership”, changed the constitution to cling to power. In fact, according to the Economist’s 2019 Democracy Index, more than half of Africa’s 55 countries are ruled by a “life president” or – in the words of the report’s authors – “authoritarian regimes”. What makes Ouattara’s decision to run for a third unconstitutional term particularly troubling is that the political climate in Ivory Coast is ripe for electoral crises. A full-scale civil war could make parts of the country’s south-east regions, where opposition to Ouattara is strongest, ungovernable, leading to further deterioration of socioeconomic conditions in the country. This is especially worrying for a country ravaged by on-off civil unrest since the 2010 civil war that killed 3,000 and displaced approximately 300, 000 people. Last week at least five people were killed and more than 100 injured in three days of pre-election street clashes between opposition and security forces, heightening the tense atmosphere. Ivory Coast, the world’s top producer of cocoa beans, should be one of the most economically prosperous countries in Africa. According to data from the International Cocoa Organisation, the country produces 45% of the cocoa in the $100bn (£76bn) global chocolate industry. But because of life presidency and post-electoral violence, poverty levels remain high, with nearly half of the 25 million Ivorians living on $1.22 a day. Life expectancy stands at 54. Women make up more than 50% of those who are unemployed and at least 12% of the population is food insecure. Out of 189 countries, Ivory Coast is ranked 165 on the 2019 UN human development index, and 165 out of 189 on the gender inequality index. As a young man, Ouattara – who draws support from the largely Muslim north-west regions – was scathing about those who failed to relinquish power. In March he said he would not run for a third term in the elections on 31 October. He nominated his former prime minister, Amadou Gon Coulibaly, to replace him – a move that was seen as an attempt to maintain his influence through a close ally, but which was nonetheless welcomed as a small step forward. Coulibaly died of a heart attack in July. His decision now to seek a third unconstitutional term has come as a shock to the rest of the world. Will the international community act in time to prevent further post-electoral violence that could even spiral into another civil war? Ouattara, who still enjoys the support of France, is defiant; becoming the latest in a long line of African leaders to push past a constitutionally imposed two term limit, a well-trodden path for life presidency. He believes he is indispensable to the welfare of his people and wellbeing of Ivory Coast, that there is no one among the 25 million Ivorians better suited for the job than him. It’s reminiscent of Cameroon’s ailing president, Paul Biya, who holds Africa’s record for the longest-serving “life president” at 42 years. Compounding the security challenges is Ouattara’s refusal to reform the electoral commission – long considered biased in his favour – to even up the playing field and spare the people potentially horrific electoral violence. Ouattara doesn’t want to relinquish power because he doesn’t trust those around him and he is worried about accusations of the funnelling of government funds, among other things. The businesses that he and his family have built up in Ivory Coast and abroad have brought them millions of dollars. Whether Ivorians will continue to peacefully take to the streets to ask him to leave is an open-ended question. But what is clear about Ouattara’s decision to run for an unconstitutional third term is that the future of Ivory Coast and the political future of the entire region are at risk. The seeds are being sown for crises that have been the hallmark of Ivory Coast since independence from France in 1960. First published by The Guardian August 20, 2020. © 2020 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies.

Reported video confessions could be used as evidence in international criminal court. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees remain in Bangladesh after fleeing the violence in Myanmar. Photograph: Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images Two Myanmar soldiers have detailed a campaign of blanket killings, rape and mass burials of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state in video testimony that could be used as evidence of crimes against humanity in the international criminal court (ICC). The confessions, seen by the New York Times and the human rights organisation Fortify Rights, reportedly show Pte Myo Win Tun and Pte Zaw Naing speaking about what they say were orders for them to “kill all you see”, as well as destroying dozens of villages. Myo Win Tun said: “We indiscriminately shot at everybody. We shot the Muslim men in the foreheads and kicked the bodies into the hole.” He said he had raped a woman, and buried eight women, seven children and 15 men in one mass grave. Zaw Naing Tun described how he had been ordered by his commanding officer to “exterminate” Rohingya people. He said he had kept watch while more senior soldiers raped Rohingya women. It is the first time Myanmar military personnel have confessed to carrying out a campaign of violence against the minority ethnic group starting in August 2017, a campaign the UN and human rights organisations have said had genocidal intent. Their testimony corresponds with individual accounts given by Rohingya refugees, hundreds of thousands of whom who fled over the border to Bangladesh as their families were attacked and homes set alight, and with reports by a UN fact-finding mission and Amnesty International. The two soldiers had reportedly deserted the military and crossed over into Bangladesh, where they were held by the Arakan Army, an insurgent group fighting against Myanmar government troops in Rahkine state. This week the soldiers were transported to The Hague in the Netherlands. The soldiers would be questioned there by ICC officials who are investigating whether Myanmar committed crimes against humanity by the mass persecution and forced deportation of Rohingya Muslims. Their testimony could be used as evidence or they could be called as witnesses. Myanmar is already facing charges of genocide at the international court of justice (ICJ), also based in The Hague. The soldiers’ testimony contradicts the repeated denials by Myanmar’s military and government, including the state counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, that genocide occurred in Rakhine. They have argued that the military operation was only targeting Rohingya militants who had attacked police border posts. The case against Myanmar opened at the ICJ in December, where graphic accounts of mass murder and rape by the military were relayed to the court. Aung San Suu Kyi, a winner of the Nobel peace prize, addressed the court, asking for the case to be dropped and pledging to court martial any personnel who had committed human rights abuses. However, few military figures have been put on trial for their role in the violence and those who have, and have been found guilty, have only received short prison sentences. The 750,000 Rohingya people who fled the country have still not been able to return to their homes because of continued fears for their safety, despite promises by the Myanmar government to repatriate them safely. They continue to live in squalid conditions in refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh, where they are denied the right to work. The ICC told Reuters the soldiers were not in its custody. A statement from the ICC prosecutor’s office said: “The office does not publicly comment on speculation or reports regarding its ongoing investigations, neither does the office discuss specifics of any aspect of its investigative activities.” © 2020 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

Girls in Uttar Pradesh targeted in assaults aiming to reinforce caste and gender hierarchies, say activists Activists protest in New Delhi after a series of rape cases in 2018 but India remains the most unsafe country for women in the world. Photograph: Sajjad Hussain/AFP via Getty Images A spate of brutal rapes and murders of young girls in a single district of India over the past month has provoked outrage and exposed the ongoing use of sexual violence as a tool of oppression and revenge against lower caste communities. Over the past month, the Lakhimpur Kheri district of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh has witnessed four incidents of girls being raped and brutally murdered. At least two of the girls were Dalits, the lowest caste in the Hindu system of social hierarchy, who were previously referred to as “untouchables” and cast out from society. Last week, a 14-year-old girl Dalit girl was found hanging from a tree in a village, having been raped and murdered. Just a few days before, a three-year-old girl was raped and strangled to death. On 14 and 24 August, two girls, a 13-year-old and a 17-year-old, were both raped and killed in Lakhimpur Kheri. “These cases of extreme sexual violence are more examples of the dominant caste wielding power over Dalit women who are perceived as weak and vulnerable and available,” said Manjula Pradeep, director of campaigns at the Dalit Human Rights Defenders Network. She added: “Dalit women are seen as impure and deprived when they access basic amenities but their bodies are also used as objects to take revenge on the Dalit communities and keep them oppressed. With more Dalits demanding their rights, these kinds of incidents we have seen in Lakhimpur Kheri are increasing.” Local activists said the assaults carried out against the Dalit girls went ignored by police until the issue was raised by activists and members of the opposition political party, who said the incident of the 13-year-old had “shaken humanity”. Activists have also struggled to enter the village to intervene in the cases as upper caste members of the village had reportedly blocked access. The state of Uttar Pradesh already has the highest number of reported cases of violence against Dalits but during coronavirus lockdown there was a reported spike of attacks on Dalits by upper caste Thakurs. However, no arrests have been made. “The recent spate of rape and murder cases in the Lakhimpur Kheri district indicates an endemic problem of sexual violence and the state government needs to do much more to address this crisis,” said Divya Srinivasan, a south Asia consultant for women’s rights organisation Equality Now. “In many instances, sexual violence committed against Dalit women and girls is perpetrated by men from dominant ‘upper castes’, who use sexual violence as a tool to assert power and reinforce existing caste, social and gender hierarchies,” said Srinivasan. Srinivasan emphasised that these entrenched hierarchies of power gave attackers of Dalit women a worrying sense of impunity. Assaults on lower caste women were rarely investigated or prosecuted, and in the case of Dalit victims, rarely prompt much media coverage or public outrage. India remains the most unsafe country for women in the world, with a woman raped every 20 minutes. Lower caste women in particular bear the brunt, with little to no access to justice. It first came to light in a 1999 report by Human Rights Watch that documented how Dalit women in Bihar were raped and then had their breasts cut off and were shot in the vulva. Official statistics show that at least four Dalit women are raped in India every day, though the real number is thought to be much higher as the communities often do not report the rapes due to pressure from higher castes or because police refuse to file the cases. Recent incidents include a 19-year-old Dalit girl in Gujarat who was sodomised and her body hung from a banyan tree in January, and a 16-year-old Dalit girl in Gujarat who had been repeatedly raped and gang-raped and then thrown from a water tank in April. An upcoming joint report by Equality Now and Swabhiman Society found that Dalit women are subjected to more severe or aggravated forms of sexual violence, such as gang-rapes or rape with murder. The issue of sexual violence has become more prominent in recent years, particularly following the 2012 Delhi bus gang-rape case, and again last year after the brutal gang-rape of a vet in Hyderabad. Despite harsher punishments introduced for sexual violence, reports of rape and assault continue to rise. See article here. © 2020 The Guardian News and Media Limited

Genocide Watch is issuing a Genocide Warning for Belarus. Since 2006, opposition leaders and protesters have been violently suppressed for challenging Lukashenko's regime. After another rigged election on August 9, 2020, over 200,000 Belarusians participated in mass protests and strikes across the country calling for Lukashenko's resignation. The police have beaten and arrested protesters using clubs and rubber bullets. The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (Byelorussian SSR) was a founding member of the Soviet Union. After Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, hundreds of cities and villages in Byelorussian SSR were destroyed, and the capital, Minsk, was left in ruins. Over 2 million Belarusians died, and more than one million buildings were destroyed. Thousands of Jews and Roma people were exterminated at a Nazi concentration camp located in Maly Trostenets. During Stalin’s regime, thousands of Belarusian civilians were killed as part of a large-scale political repression campaign across the USSR. In 1988, mass graves of victims of Soviet repression were discovered in Kurapaty Forest. The discovery of mass graves shocked Belarusians who participated in mass demonstrations calling for independence, which was finally declared on August 25, 1991. Belarus’s first and only president, Alexander Lukashenko, has ruled the country for 26 years. He amended the constitution to give himself more power and to prolong his term in office. After Lukashenko won a rigged election in 2006, thousands of protesters joined the “Denim Revolution” in Minsk to demand fair elections. Belarusian riot police were deployed to violently suppress the protesters, injuring and arresting hundreds. When Lukashenko won another rigged election in 2010, protests again took place in Minsk. In Belarus, opposition leaders frequently face jail terms on baseless charges. Prominent opposition leaders Yury Zakharanka, Viktar Hanchar, Anatol Krasouski, and journalist Zmitser Zavadski, who spoke out against Lukashenko, were “disappeared,” presumably murdered. Preceding Belarus’s 2020 presidential election, mass demonstrations occurred across the country to protest the arbitrary arrests of opposition leaders. Amnesty International reported that 195 people were arrested in May 2020 and over 360 people were arrested in June 2020. Torture of protestors by the KGB, the secret police, has been rampant. Belarus’s presidential election was held on August 9, 2020. Lukashenko’s opponents, Viktor Babariko, Sergei Tikhanovsk, and Svetlana Tikhanovskaya all faced significant threats leading up to the election. Babariko and Tikhanovsk were both arrested and barred from running. Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, Sergei Tikhanovsk’s wife and Lukashenko’s only remaining opponent, was forced to flee the country with her family following the election. According to official election results, Lukashenko received 80% of the vote. However, the official results were declared fraudulent by the European Union. Since the election, protests and strikes have erupted across Belarus calling for Lukashenko’s resignation. Over 200,000 Belarusians have participated in daily peaceful protests that are violently suppressed by authorities. The police have beaten and detained thousands of protesters using clubs, rubber bullets, and flash grenades. At least two protesters have died. Two women opposition leaders have been exiled. Because the Lukashenko regime in Belarus is deploying riot police to beat, arrest, and torture opposition leaders, protesters, and media, Genocide Watch considers Belarus to be at Stage 8: Persecution. · Genocide Watch condemns Lukashenko’s regime for arresting opposition leaders and protesters. · Genocide Watch supports EU sanctions against Belarusian officials responsible for election fraud and police violence against protesters. The U.S. Global Magnitsky Act sanctions should similarly be imposed. · Lukashenko must resign, new elections must be held, and Belarus’s Soviet-style governmental system needs to be overthrown. All protestors should be released immediately.

On September 18, 2020, Genocide Watch partnered with The Antiquities Coalition and Blue Shield International to submit an Amicus Curiae brief to the ICC. The observations were submitted in the appeal for the Prosecutor v. Bosco Ntaganda case. Bosco Ntaganda, the Former Deputy Chief of Staff and Commander of Operations for the Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (FPLC), was accused of 13 counts of war crimes and 5 crimes against humanity committed in the Ituri province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Ntaganda's charges for crimes against humanity included murder and attempted murder, rape, sexual slavery, persecution, forcible transfer and deportation. His war crimes charges included murder and attempted murder, intentional attacks on civilians, rape, sexual slavery, displacement of populations, conscription of children under the age of 15 for armed combat, and destruction of protected objects and property. On July 8, 2019, the ICC found Bosco Ntaganda guilty of 18 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ituri, DRC from 2002-2003. He was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment on November 7, 2019. The verdict and sentence is currently subject to appeals. Amicus Curiae Brief Genocide Watch's Dr. Gregory H. Stanton collaborated with individuals, Dr. Patty Gerstenblith, Ms Tess Davis, and Ms Haydee Dijkstal, from The Antiquities Coalition and Blue Shield International to submit an Amicus Curiae brief to the ICC. The brief concerns the ICC Trial Court's dismissal of charges against Ntaganda for the destruction of a church and a hospital in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The Amicus brief addresses how ‘attack’ is defined under international humanitarian law, particularly in the context of cultural property. The brief submits that the Article 8(2)(e)(iv) definition of “attack” should not be narrowly interpreted and should instead recognize the continuous nature and duration of acts of violence carried out in continuing pursuit of an overall military objective. Crimes committed under Ntaganda’s command, both during and after the immediate “conduct of hostilities”, occurred in the context of continuing UPC/FPLC operations and thus, were part of a continuing attack. Destruction of the church at Sayo and pillaging of the Mongbwalu hospital resulted from the same orders to attack that came directly from Ntaganda. Read the entire Amicus Curiae Brief here. © 2020 Genocide Watch

US opposition may be softening after lobbying by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky Volodymyr Zelenskiy is said to ‘care deeply’ about holding the Russian leadership accountable.Photograph: Sergey Dolzhenko/EPA A draft resolution is circulating at the United Nations in New York for a Nuremberg-style tribunal to hold the Russian leadership accountable for crimes of aggression in Ukraine amid signs that US opposition to the proposal may be softening in the face of lobbying by the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Beth Van Schaack, the US ambassador for global criminal justice, said this week: “It’s something that President Zelenskiy cares deeply about. This is something Ukraine wants, and I think that’s going to carry a lot of weight. The question is, will they have the votes at the general assembly?” She added: “So far, all of the [general assembly] resolutions on Ukraine have prevailed. The numbers have been quite strong.” The international criminal court has already started investigating war crimes in Ukraine, but Ukraine’s leadership argues that the ICC is hampered in that while it can try those charged with individual war crimes, it cannot prosecute the Kremlin leadership over the broader crime of aggression since Russia is not a signatory to the relevant statute. Van Schaack, speaking in London at a Lawyers for Justice in Libya event, said the US had not taken a firm position on a special tribunal. However, she believed there was merit in holding trials in absentia of Russians accused of war crimes if it was not possible to extradite them. She said it was possible the US could declassify intelligence to help reveal those most responsible for preparing and conducting a war that she said had clearly breached the UN charter. Her remarks suggest that a key figures in the Biden administration are now more open to setting up a special tribunal focused on the Russian leadership’s role in directing the invasion of Ukraine. “We’re looking at all the angles, and certainly supportive of taking some interim steps, particularly when it comes to preserving evidence,” she said. Van Schaack said two options were being considered. The first is a bilateral treaty between Ukraine and the United Nations, “blessed in some respect by the general assembly, bringing the political support of the entire international community and setting up a standalone tribunal”. The second option, she said, is a domestic court set up by Ukraine with the EU or the Council of Europe adding an international element, possibly endorsed by a vote at the UN general assembly. In both cases, the vision would be to try the crime of aggression. “It would be a limited number of defendants, probably the top political leadership and maybe some top military actors as well,” she said. In a breakthrough for Ukrainian diplomatic lobbying, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, last week backed a specialised tribunal for the first time. The tribunal already has strong French, Baltic and Dutch support, but the position of the US and the UK has been less clear. Opponents of the plan fear the move would be divisive diplomatically, diminish the status of the ICC, or cut across its work and act as a deterrent to the current Russian leadership reaching a peace deal. There is also concern that heads of state and foreign ministers can, under international law, claim functional immunity from prosecution in domestic courts. Ukraine’s first lady, Olena Zelenska, last Wednesday presented the case for a special tribunal to British parliamentarians, urging Britain to recognise that the tribunal would be complementary to the ICC’s work. But on the same day the UK’s attorney general, Victoria Prentis, setting out the British role in helping Ukrainian prosecutors, made no reference to the crime of aggression. A meeting of G7 justice ministers was silent on the issue. The special tribunal was first proposed by the British KC Philippe Sands, winning the backing of the former British prime minister Gordon Brown. Sands argues that the “only people truly responsible are the leaders, and the crime of aggression is the only way to get to the top table. The crime of crimes is the crime of aggression.” He said he sensed that in recent weeks the major powers were moving on the issue. On 14 November, the general assembly voted by 94 to 14, with 73 abstaining, to back the principle of Russia paying reparations, and agreed to establish a claims register in The Hague, staffed by UN prosecutors, to compile state and individual compensation claims. Van Schaack said there was the possibility of “in absentia” cases of Russian war crimes being heard, saying that Ukraine’s court system allows for that. “There is nothing inherently wrong with in absentia proceedings so long as they meet due process standards. Are they satisfying to survivors? Are they satisfying to observers of justice? Probably not. But they do provide a forum for victims to testify,” she said. “They do provide an opportunity to pull together evidence to create a historical record, and then if those individuals do fall within custody they are entitled to a retrial, which can then start a process which is truly adversarial. So I see the merit in initiating cases even though you are not sure you are going to get custody over a defendant.” Ukraine wants the new tribunal to begin working no later than September 2023, since by then it believes it will have compiled at least 26,000 war crimes that led to the deaths of 7,500 civilians, including 400 children. © 2022 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

By Lili Bayer Hungary's prime minister, Viktor Orbán, attends a leaders’ summit in Brussels in December last year. Photograph: Yves Herman/Reuters The European Commission has announced it is taking the first step in legal action against Hungary over a new law that it says violates the principle of democracy, upping tensions with Budapest as the continent enters a fraught election season. The Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has for years clashed with Brussels over democratic norms. In recent months the relationship has further soured amid concerns that an increasingly isolated Hungarian government is pursuing a Russia-friendly foreign policy and undermining western unity. While Budapest has argued it is carrying out reforms in line with EU requests, critics say Orbán is moving to further consolidate his power at home. In December, Hungary’s parliament approved a law that creates a new sovereignty protection office with broad powers to investigate Hungarians active in public life. The new office, which is led by a figure with close links to the ruling Fidesz party, can ask Hungary’s intelligence services for information on individuals and organisations, all without judicial oversight. In a statement on Wednesday, the European Commission said it had decided to send a letter of formal notice to Hungary for violations of EU law. “The commission considers that the Hungarian legislation at stake violates several provisions of primary and secondary EU law,” the commission said. It provided a long list of EU standards that it believes the new law undermines, including “the principle of democracy and the electoral rights of EU citizens” as well as “the right to protection of personal data, the freedom of expression and information, the freedom of association, the electoral rights of EU citizens, the right to an effective remedy and to a fair trial”. The move comes at a tense moment in Brussels’ complex relationship with Budapest, as a portion of Hungary’s EU funding remains frozen over rule of law concerns and as the bloc prepares for elections to the European parliament in June. There has been significant criticism of the new law inside and outside Hungary. Independent Hungarian media outlets have warned that the law is “capable of severely restricting the freedom of the press”, while leading civil society groups have cautioned it is “part of the government’s attempt to silence all critical voices”. The US government has also criticised the law. In an interview with the Guardian last month, the US ambassador in Budapest, David Pressman, said the creation of the new sovereignty protection office represented “a serious step backwards in Hungary’s democracy”. The European Commission said Hungary had two months to reply to its letter. © 2024 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies.