Survivors decry new amnesty bill that would free perpetrators of crimes against humanity during 1960-1996 civil war. Photographs of people disappeared and killed during Guatemala's civil war are laid out at a memorial site where hundreds of remains were exhumed [Sandra Cuffe/Al Jazeera] By Sandra Cuffe Julia Poyon was three years old when Guatemalan soldiers broke down the door to her family’s home and took her father away. Now decades later, Poyon says her only hazy memory of him is from a joyful night before his 1981 abduction. “We went to church one night and I remember he carried me on his shoulders,” Poyon told Al Jazeera. “I remember he was wearing a hat. I can’t remember his face.” Felipe Poyon Saquiquel was a Maya Kaqchikel farmer and catechist living in a village near San Juan Comalapa, 80 kilometres (50 miles) from Guatemala City. When the military grabbed him out of bed on May 8, 1981, they told his wife that it was just for questioning. Poyon Saquiquel knew otherwise. “Take good care of our children,” he called out to his wife as he was hauled out the door, according to Poyon’s mother. Never seen again, he became one of an estimated 45,000 people who disappeared during the civil war that raged between the Guatemalan military and leftist guerrilla forces between 1960 and 1996. Wednesday marks 25 years since peace accords ended the 36-year armed conflict, but the struggle for truth, justice and reparations — led primarily by Indigenous people who make up the majority of the war’s victims — continues amid fresh challenges and backlash. “We are still seeking justice,” Poyon said after a ceremony in June on the grounds of a former military base in San Juan Comalapa, which is now home to a memorial for victims of enforced disappearances. It is also where the remains of 220 people were discovered in clandestine graves during exhumations in 2003-2004. The conflict An estimated 200,000 people were killed during Guatemala’s armed conflict, including in more than 600 documented massacres around the country. More than 80 percent of the victims were Indigenous Maya civilians, and the military was responsible for more than 90 percent of atrocities, according to a United Nations-backed truth commission, which also concluded that state actors committed acts of genocide. As part of the peace process, Congress passed a National Reconciliation Law in mid-December 1996, extinguishing criminal responsibility for many political and common crimes committed on all sides in the context of the conflict. But the amnesty provisions in the law explicitly excluded genocide, torture, and enforced disappearance, as well as any other crimes with no statute of limitations under national or international law. Finalised later that month on December 29, 1996, the peace accords included commitments not only to truth and justice but also to addressing the root causes of the conflict, including systemic racism and other longstanding inequalities. Graves on the grounds of a former military base in San Juan Comalapa hold the remains of 172 unidentified victims of the 1960-1996 civil war in Guatemala [Sandra Cuffe/Al Jazeera] But those issues are as present as ever in the Central American nation, said relatives of the disappeared and human rights leaders at a peace accords commemoration earlier this month. “Fulfilment of the peace accords is fundamental for dealing with the structural problems that remain in the country,” Mika Kanervavuori, the representative in Guatemala for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said during the December 15 event. Prosecuting perpetrators The past decade has seen progress in bringing perpetrators of conflict-era atrocities to justice, however, with high-ranking former military officials convicted of enforced disappearance, sexual violence, and other crimes against humanity. Others are on trial, including for genocide. In 2013, former military dictator Efrain Rios Montt was convicted of genocide. The conviction was overturned and he died before a partial retrial concluded, but a tribunal ruled in 2018 that the military committed genocide during his rule. Another landmark case advanced this year when 11 ex-military officers were arrested in May for crimes against humanity, murder, enforced disappearance, and other crimes documented in the “Diario Militar”, a death squad diary. The military intelligence dossier, leaked in 1999, documented 183 cases of enforced disappearances between 1983 and 1985. Most of the victims were student organisers, union leaders, guerrilla group members or sympathisers, writers, and other dissidents. In many cases, the dossier details ended with “300” — the code for execution. “Thinking differently in those years was considered criminal here in Guatemala,” said Maria Elisa Meza, whose father, mother and aunt were killed by the military in the 1980s. Gustavo Adolfo Meza Soberanis, Meza’s father, is listed in the death squad diary. A 26-year-old doctor who assisted and treated guerrilla group members, he was abducted on September 7, 1983, when Meza was only a few months old. His remains have not been found. “From what people told me about my dad, his sense of humanity was wide awake. He was someone who always fought for those less fortunate,” Meza, a member of the HIJOS movement of children of the disappeared, told Al Jazeera. Amnesty bill Meza and other relatives of victims celebrated when a judge ruled the accused would face trial, but a backlash had already begun. A week and a half after the initial death squad diary arrests, nine legislators from the ultra-conservative Valor Party presented a bill that would free all ex-military personnel and paramilitary patrolmen convicted or accused of crimes during the armed conflict. Zury Rios, the daughter of former dictator Rios Montt, is a leader in the party. She was Valor’s presidential pick in 2019, but was barred from running due to a constitutional prohibition on relatives of people who took power by force. A court permitted her to run in 2015, though, and she is expected to try again in 2023. The party’s amnesty bill was presented on the floor of Congress on September 22 and sent to legislative committees for review. In practice, there is no set timeline for when, if ever, bills are brought to a vote. “What they seek is impunity,” said Feliciana Macario, one of the coordinators of the Indigenous-led National Platform of Victims of the Internal Armed Conflict. “Now what they aim to do is legalise crimes against humanity through an amnesty.” Relatives of victims of conflict-era killings and disappearances protest against a 2021 amnesty bill outside Guatemala’s Congress [Sandra Cuffe/Al Jazeera] In their preamble to the proposed “Law of Consolidation of Peace and Reconciliation”, the lawmakers argued that there was no genocide in Guatemala and that enforced disappearance, torture, and other crimes against humanity should not have been excluded from amnesty provisions in the National Reconciliation Law. “I think that when the peace accords were signed, and we had tools to seek justice, we felt relief in our hearts. But now, seeing these attitudes, we feel sadness because it is hard to see that path to achieve justice,” Macario told Al Jazeera. Fight continues A similar amnesty bill was presented in 2017, but it sparked protests, legal challenges, and international alarm when it made headway in 2019. The Constitutional Court ultimately ruled in favour of victims and human rights groups and ordered Congress to desist and shelve the bill. New, and in several cases controversial, constitutional Court judges were seated for five-year terms earlier this year, however, and the court’s current president was previously the Valor Party’s intended 2019 vice-presidential candidate. Independent judges and prosecutors have faced threats and persecution in Guatemala, and several fled into exile this year. In October, Hilda Pineda, the head of a Special Human Rights Prosecutor’s Bureau at the helm of landmark civil war-related cases over the past decade, was transferred to a new bureau for the prosecution of crimes against foreign tourists. The move was one of 11 simultaneous appointments aimed at institutional strengthening and effectiveness, the attorney general’s office said then. But the National Platform of Organisations of Victims of the Internal Armed Conflict and human rights groups condemned Pineda’s transfer, saying it undermined ongoing crimes against humanity cases. They filed a court action last month to challenge the transfer. “I think that as relatives [of victims], all of the moments we have lived through have given us the strength to move forward and keep fighting until we achieve justice,” said Macario. “We will continue, we are standing, and we will keep struggling.” © 2022 Al Jazeera Media Network

Taliban spokesman says dozens of criminals, kidnappers and smugglers arrested in operations across Kabul and other cities. We are trying to take steps against kidnappers, thieves and looters, spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said [Hussein Malla/AP Photo] The Taliban are conducting a huge security sweep of Kabul and other Afghan cities, their spokesman said on Sunday, going house-to-house in search of weapons and criminals blamed for a recent spate of robberies and kidnappings. The operation, which started on Friday, has alarmed many who fear being targeted because of their association with the previous Western-backed regime or the US-led foreign forces who finally withdrew on August 31. Some irate residents posted videos on social media showing homes they said had been trashed during Taliban searches, but several people told AFP their encounters had been polite and cursory. “It was just my nephew at home when they came and they made a big mess,” said one resident, who asked not to be named, showing AFP a series of pictures that revealed considerable disruption. The Taliban called the sweep a “clearing operation”. “We are trying to take steps against those kidnappers, thieves and looters who have weapons in their hands and threaten the lives of the people,” spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told a news conference. He said authorities had discovered two kidnap victims during the operation, and also freed two teenage girls who they found chained in a basement. Mujahid said light and heavy weapons, explosives, radio equipment and drones had been seized, as well as vehicles belonging to the military or government. Patrols stepped up Six people suspected of being members of the ISIL (ISIS) group had been arrested, he said, along with nine kidnappers and 53 “professional thieves”. “We want to assure the residents of Kabul that these operations are not against the common people,” Mujahid said. “The residents of the city should be confident the search is going on carefully.” The Taliban have also stepped up street patrols in the capital and established temporary roadblocks at key intersections, where they search vehicles at random or check the identities of those inside. Dozens of newly trained policewomen were involved in the sweep in case there were no men at houses being searched, Mujahid said. Social media showed images and video clips of doors and wardrobes that had been bashed in, cushions and mattresses slashed open, and belongings strewn across floors. “The intimidations, house searches, arrests and violence against members of different ethnic groups and women are crimes and must stop immediately,” tweeted Andreas von Brandt, the European Union’s ambassador to Afghanistan. “Despite Putin’s war we are watching you,” he added, referring to the Russian invasion of Ukraine that has dominated news cycles for the past few days. “Focus on securing Europe from Putin,” replied Muhammad Jalal, a Taliban official with a prolific social media presence. “Afghans know what they are doing.” © Al Jazeera 2022

Joe Biden and Michelle Bachelet were among those to praise the decision by United Nations war crimes judges to uphold the Bosnian Serb military leader’s convictions. Ratko Mladic, 78, led Bosnian Serb forces during Bosnia's 1992-95 war [Peter Dejong/Pool via Reuters] United Nations war crimes judges on Tuesday upheld a genocide conviction and life sentence against former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic in a move welcomed by the global body’s rights chief, world leaders and others. The verdict by five judges at the UN International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals at The Hague saw Mladic’s appeal against the decision of a lower tribunal rejected on all grounds. Mladic, 78, led Bosnian Serb forces during Bosnia’s 1992-95 war. He was convicted in 2017 on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes including terrorising the civilian population of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo during a 43-month siege, and the killing of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995. He had been convicted by trial and ordered to serve life in prison, but appealed against both the verdict and sentence. But the UN judges on Tuesday dismissed his appeal “in its entirety”. Their decision was final and cannot be appealed any further. The ruling was meanwhile quickly welcomed by a range of world leaders, including the UN’s rights chief Michelle Bachelet and United States President Joe Biden, among others. Here is a roundup of the reaction: Michelle Bachelet Bachelet, the UN’s human rights chief, praised Tuesday’s decision. She said in a statement it “highlights the determination of the international justice system to ensure accountability no matter how long it may take – in Mladic’s case, nearly three decades after he committed his appalling crimes”. Bachelet also urged officials and the press to “refrain from revisionist narratives, divisive rhetoric and incitement to hatred” in the wake of the ruling. “Mladic’s crimes were the abhorrent culmination of hatred stoked for political gain. Today’s decision is about his individual responsibility for his dreadful acts, not about collective punishment or apportioning guilt to any particular community,” she said. Joe Biden Biden hailed the “historic” confirmation of Mladic’s life sentence. “This historic judgment shows that those who commit horrific crimes will be held accountable,” Biden said in a statement. “It also reinforces our shared resolve to prevent future atrocities from occurring anywhere in the world,” he added. “My thoughts today are with all the surviving families of the many victims of Mladic’s atrocities. We can never erase the tragedy of their deaths, but I hope today’s judgment provides some solace to all those who are grieving.” Alice Wairimu Nderitu Nderitu, special adviser to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on the prevention of genocide, said Tuesday’s decision “provides historical certainty and finality for victims and survivors”. “It also sends a hugely important message throughout the Western Balkans where we see genocide denial and the glorification of convicted criminals such as Mladic not only persisting but increasing,” Nderitu said in a joint statement with Bachelet. Heiko Maas Germany’s foreign minister backed the judge’s decision to confirm the life sentence for Mladic as a “triumph”. Heiko Maas tweeted that he was “relieved” by The Hague tribunal’s verdict and hoped the rejection of Mladic’s appeal would be “a certain consolation for the victims and the bereaved”. Charles Michel The President of the European Council described the ruling as an important step to provide justice to the victims of the genocide. “It will help us all put the painful past behind us and put the future first,” Michel said on Twitter. Jasmin Mujanovic Mujanovic, a political scientist who specialises in southeastern European affairs, welcomed the court’s decision to uphold Mladic’s convictions and the latter’s continued imprisonment. But he criticised the ruling to reject an appeal by prosecutors of Mladic’s acquittal on one other count of genocide linked to ethnic purges early in the Bosnian war. “The court has again failed to recognise that the genocide in Bosnia was not localised to Srebrenica,” Mujanovic tweeted. “But he’ll [Mladic] leave the world alone, caged. A kinder death than he gave his victims.” Arnesa Buljusmic-Kustura Buljusmic-Kustura, a writer and lecturer on genocide, fascism and ethnonationalism, said she had “mixed feelings” on Tuesday’s developments, which saw Presiding Judge Prisca Matimba Nyambe of Zambia dissent on several of the court’s rulings concerning Mladic. “Life sentence. Life in prison. But he gets to have a life while thousands of our people never will,” she tweeted. “I have mixed feelings. Particularly given that the presiding judge dissented. This isn’t the end, really. As it will just further fuel the Serb ethno-nationalists.” © 2021 Al Jazeera Media Network

It is the first major human rights report since the Taliban seized power from the former US-backed government in August. Taliban members take security measures and block roads after a bomb attack near the largest hospital in Afghanistan's capital Kabul at Wazir Akbar Khan region on November 02, 2021 [File: Bilal Güler/Anadolu Agency] A new United Nations report has said nearly 400 civilians have been killed in attacks in Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, more than 80 percent by a group affiliated with ISIL (ISIS). It is the first major human rights report since the Taliban seized power from the former US-backed government in August, triggering concerns in the West about a broader rollback of rights for women, journalists and others. It covers the period from August 2021 to the end of February and said that 397 civilians were killed mostly in a series of attacks by the Islamic State in Khorasan Province, ISKP (ISIS-K) group. More than 50 people with suspected ties to the armed group had been killed in the same period, it said, with some tortured and beheaded and left by the roadside. Afghan men inspect the damage inside a Shia mosque in Kandahar [File: Javed Tanveer/AFP] “The human rights situation for many Afghans is of profound concern,” said Michelle Bachelet, High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a speech introducing the report to the top rights body in Geneva on Monday. “Several suicide and non-suicide attacks were perpetrated by ISKP against Shia Muslims, mostly from the Hazara ethnic group,” she added. ISKP, which first appeared in eastern Afghanistan in late 2014, is thought to have spread in the wake of the Taliban takeover and has been blamed for several attacks in recent months, including one at Kabul airport last August. Women’s rights In the same speech, Bachelet said that Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers had curtailed women’s rights and freedoms. She called for women to be allowed to “fully participate” in public life. Bachelet also referred to “a number of disturbing cases of enforced disappearances” of activists and protesters and expressed concern about restrictions on freedom of expression. “I remain concerned by the progressive erosion of civic space,” she said. Students attend a class in the Badakshan University [File: Omer Abrar/AFP] Under their previous rule from 1996 to 2001, the Taliban barred women and girls from education. They have said they have since changed that policy. The Geneva-based Rights Council is set to appoint a special rapporteur on Afghanistan to probe alleged violations by the Taliban and others at the end of its current month-long session. ‘Devastating’ crisis Moreover, Bachelet said the country was facing “a devastating humanitarian and economic crisis” that hampers the Afghan people’s economic, social and cultural rights. “More than half the population now suffer extreme levels of hunger. An increase in child labour, child marriage, and the sale of children has been observed,” Bachelet noted. According to the UN, nearly nine million Afghans are at risk of famine. The foreign aid that once propped up the country has been slow to return in the wake of US sanctions. The country’s economy is near collapse after international financial institutions cut funding and the US froze Afghanistan assets. US President Joe Biden earlier this month decided to withhold about $7bn in Afghan assets, repurposing half of the money as compensation to the victims of the 9/11 attacks. The rest will be contributed to UN agencies like the World Food Program. Aid agencies and experts have called for the lifting of sanctions against the Taliban, saying the measures are worsening the humanitarian crisis. © Al Jazeera 2022

In its first broad human rights report since Myanmar’s coup, UN says army has shown flagrant disregard for human life. The UN report said it was based on interviews with many victims of abuse and witnesses [KNDF via AP] Myanmar’s military has engaged in systematic human rights violations, many amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity, the United Nations said in its first comprehensive human rights report since last year’s coup. Security forces have shown a flagrant disregard for human life, using air raids and heavy weapons on populated areas and deliberately targeting civilians, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said on Tuesday. Many victims were shot in the head, burned to death, arrested arbitrarily, tortured, or used as human shields, she said in a statement on the report, which urged “meaningful action” by the international community. “The appalling breadth and scale of violations of international law suffered by the people of Myanmar demand a firm, unified, and resolute international response,” Bachelet said. The military has said it has a duty to ensure peace and security. It has denied atrocities have taken place and has blamed “terrorists” for causing unrest. The military has failed to consolidate power after its overthrow of Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in February 2021 triggered a backlash of a kind not seen in decades. Western countries have imposed broad sanctions on the military and its businesses after anti-coup protests were lethally suppressed by troops, with thousands of people arrested and many prosecuted, including Aung San Suu Kyi, who has since been convicted of crimes that include incitement. ‘Systemic attacks’ The UN report said it was based on interviews with many victims of abuse, as well as witnesses, whose accounts were corroborated with satellite imagery, verified multimedia files and open-source information. The army has met sustained resistance in the countryside from militias allied with the deposed government. The UN report said troops had carried out mass killings in the Sagaing region, with some victims found dead with their hands and feet tied. In Kayah State, burned bodies of women and children were found, some in positions indicating they had tried to escape and were burned alive, it said. The report found detainees were tortured during interrogation, including suspension from ceilings, electrocution, injection of drugs and some subjected to sexual violence, including rape. “We have really been able to identify a pattern over the past year, which indicates that this is planned, coordinated, systemic attacks; that there are clear indications that they would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity,” UN human rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva. “This is the clearest yet indication of the commission of these crimes.” In the past year, the military has year scolded the UN and its independent experts for interference and what it calls reliance on distorted information from partisan groups. The report said that at least 1,600 people had been killed by security forces and their affiliates, while more than 12,500 people had been detained. At least 440,000 others have been displaced and 14 million are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance, the delivery of which has largely been blocked by the military in new and pre-existing areas of need, said the report. Myanmar’s human rights record had been under the spotlight even before the 2021 coup. The majority of the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority was forced to leave in 2017 after being persecuted by the Myanmar military in a campaign that involved the burning of Rohingya villages and the killing of civilians. At the time, the UN labelled the actions of the Myanmar military “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”. © 2022 Al Jazeera Media Network

The violence in Benishangul-Gumuz is separate from the ongoing war in Tigray. Map showing Benishangul-Gumuz in western Ethiopia, and Tigray in northern Ethiopia. (Al Jazeera) At least 53 people have died in western Ethiopia after an unidentified armed group attacked a civilian convoy and its military escort in a region plagued by ethnic violence. The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission said on Sunday that the previously unreported attack occurred on March 2 in Metekel, in the Benishangul-Gumuz region. Twenty soldiers and three civilians were killed in the ambush, while 30 attackers died during the day-long gun battle that followed. Eleven more people were killed the following day – including one who was burned alive – as security forces rounded up suspects and carried out summary killings, according to the rights group. The commission investigated the incident after a video posted on social media on Friday showed armed men, some in military uniforms, using a stick to poke a man back onto a burning pile of bodies after he tried to escape. The government said on Saturday it would act against the perpetrators. According to the commission, the government soldiers stopped a bus, pulled out eight ethnic Tigrayan civilians who had just been released from prison and accused them of orchestrating the attack. Security officers arrested and beat the men, then they shot them, along with two men from the local Gumuz ethnic group, and burned their bodies, the commission said. Security officers told the commission that they found cash and a satellite phone with the Tigrayan suspects. Security forces discovered another Tigrayan man hiding in a car, tied him up and threw him onto the pyre, the commission said, noting the presence of Ethiopian soldiers and uniformed forces from the Amhara region and Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’ Region. The rights body did not say which security forces killed the civilians. Spokesmen for the two regions were not available for comment. A military spokesman and government spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The violence in Benishangul-Gumuz, home to several ethnic groups, is separate from the war in Tigray, a northern region that has been fighting central government rule for more than 16 months. The United Nations has said at least 15,000 Tigrayan civilians were arrested or imprisoned under a state of emergency declared in November and lifted last month. © 2022 Al Jazeera Media Network

UN human rights body highlights names of 142 individuals who warrant an investigation for a ‘range of crimes’ under international law. At least 440 civilians were killed in brutal fighting between rival armed groups in the country's southwest between June and September last year, according to the UN [File: Andreea Campeanu/Reuters] Members of South Sudan’s government committed human rights violations “amounting to war crimes” in the country’s southwest, the UN has said, including for abuses against children. The world’s newest nation has suffered from chronic instability since independence in 2011, with the UN warning last month that it risked a return to war as interethnic violence and political infighting threaten an already fragile peace process. The UN Commission on Human Rights (OHCHR) in South Sudan released a new report on Friday, saying it had “reasonable grounds to believe that members of the Government of South Sudan have engaged in acts … amounting to war crimes” in the southwestern districts of Central Equatoria and Western Equatoria. “It [the commision] has drawn up a list of 142 individuals who warrant investigation for a range of crimes under national and international law,” Chair of the Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan Yasmin Sooka told the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva in a statement. The report described grave rights abuses, ranging from mass rapes and sexual slavery of women to the deliberate killing of dozens of children, including at least one infant who was beaten to death by soldiers in front of his mother. “The notion that the localised violence is not linked to the State or to national-level conflicts, as suggested by the Government and South Sudanese military elites, is a fallacy,” Sooka said. “These localised killings, massacres, torture, abductions, detentions, looting, burning of villages, and forced displacement, as well as the rape, and sexual violence, are a reflection of the intense political contestation for power … at a national level.” “Nearly all 14 of the UN’s risk factors for atrocity crimes are now present in South Sudan,” Sooka added. At least 440 civilians were killed in brutal fighting between rival armed groups in the country’s southwest between June and September last year, a joint report by the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) and the OHCHR said earlier this month. That report blamed forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and rival troops under Vice President Riek Machar, as well as “their respective affiliated militias”, for the violence. Continuing instability Oil-rich South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in June 2011, but has been engulfed in ethnic violence since December 2013, when forces loyal to Kiir began battling those loyal to his deputy, Machar. The brutal civil war that ensued killed nearly 400,000 people and displaced millions. Numerous attempts at peace failed, including a deal that saw Machar return as vice president in 2016, only to flee months later amid renewed fighting. A second peace deal signed in 2018 has largely held, with warring parties forming a coalition government in 2020, and Kiir and Machar trying – for the third time – to run the country as president and vice president. © Al Jazeera 2022

Tensions arise after Pristina asks people entering Kosovo with Serbian IDs will have to replace them with a temporary document during their stay. Kosovo proclaimed independence from Serbia in 2008 but ethnic Serbs who make up the majority in the northern region do not recognise Pristina's authority [File: Valdrin Xhemaj/EPA] Aug. 1st 2022 Kosovo’s government has postponed for a month the implementation of new border rules that sparked tensions in the north of the country where ethnic Serbs blocked roads and unknown gunmen fired on police. Police closed two border crossings with Serbia on Sunday after the incident during which no one was injured, a police statement said. Kosovo proclaimed independence from Serbia in 2008 but ethnic Serbs who make up the majority in the northern region do not recognise Pristina’s authority. They remain politically loyal to Serbia which still provides financial support. The latest tensions came after the government in Pristina said from Monday, people entering Kosovo with Serbian IDs would have to replace them with a temporary document during their stay in the country. The government also said ethnic Serbs who have vehicle registration plates issued by Serbia would have to change them for Kosovo licence plates within two months. Prime Minister Albin Kurti said on Sunday it was a reciprocal move since the government in Belgrade requires the same from Kosovo citizens entering Serbia. But, after meeting United States Ambassador to Kosovo Jeffrey Hovenier, who told reporters he sought from Pristina that implementation of the new regime be postponed for 30 days, the government pledged to do so. It said in a statement it would postpone the implementation of the two decisions until September 1, seeking that “all barricades are removed and full freedom of movement is established” on Monday. European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell hailed the decision and said on Twitter he expected “all roadblocks to be removed immediately”. He added that open issues should be addressed through EU-facilitated dialogue and focus on comprehensive normalisation of relations between Kosovo and Serbia. On Sunday evening, hundreds of ethnic Serbs parked trucks, tankers and other heavy transport vehicles on roads towards the Jarinje and Brnjak crossings with Serbia, blocking traffic, an AFP correspondent said. Large crowds of local Serbs gathered near the barricades with the intention to remain there. “The atmosphere has been brought to a boil,” Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic had said earlier in the day, warning that “Serbia will win” if Serbs are attacked. Kurti accused Vucic of igniting “unrest”. NATO-led peacekeepers from the KFOR mission in a statement labelled the security situation in Kosovo’s north as tense. They said in a statement on Sunday that they were prepared to intervene “if stability is jeopardised”. The region saw the last major tensions in September when hundreds of ethnic Serbs staged daily protests and blocked traffic at the two border crossings. EU-led talks between Kosovo and Serbia launched in 2011 have so far failed to achieve any normalisation of ties. Kosovo is already recognised by about 100 states, including the United States and most EU countries, but Serbia refuses to do so. SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

Thirty years after the war in Georgia’s breakaway territory of Abkhazia, victims are still waiting for justice. Venera Meshveliani, 86, is an internally displaced woman from Akhaldaba, Abkhazia who witnessed her husband being killed during the conflict 30 years ago [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] By Priyanka Shankar Published On 5 Aug 2022 Tbilisi and Tskaltubo, Georgia – In 1993, Venera Meshveliani was one among more than 300 people who were held hostage by Russian soldiers for around three weeks in Abkhazia, a breakaway region in northwestern Georgia that borders Russia. “I can never forget the sound of soldiers’ trampling feet and the foul, damp smell of the school building we were held hostage in. Everything I witnessed and experienced there was genocide,” said Meshveliani, an 86-year-old ethnic Georgian who hails from the Abkhazian village of Akhaldaba. Most countries recognise Abkhazia as Georgia’s land but Russia and a few of its allies view the territory as a state of its own. “Every night they would humiliate us by stepping over us. They would then take the younger girls outside and rape them,” Meshveliani told Al Jazeera from her one-bedroom apartment in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital. People stand near apartment blocks hosting internally displaced Georgians from Abkhazia in Tskaltubo, Georgia, on July 21, 2022 [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “Many of the young girls raped were also my students. I used to be their mathematics teacher in the village before the war. How am I to forget the brutalities they had to experience?” she said, tearing up. “There was one girl from the fifth grade who was bleeding all over and grabbed my feet and asked me if it was worth living. Just as I tried to convince her to pull through, another young girl was brought back to the school building after being raped and looked like she was going to faint from all the trauma. “She begged for water and one short but stern-looking Russian soldier, whose face I can still remember, climbed up the windowpane above the young girl, urinated into her mouth and said: ‘Here’s your water. This is what Georgians deserve.’ It’s been more than 30 years but these criminals have not yet been prosecuted.” After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the conflict Georgia-Abkhazia conflict intensified with Abkhazians keen to establish autonomy from Georgia and protect their identity and culture. “Before the war broke out, everything was very peaceful in our region. Our village Akhaldhaba was really beautiful and we were all rich but also hard working. But there were people in Abkhazia who were pro-Russian and they had begun planting seeds of hostility against Georgia before the war broke out,” Meshveliani said. The Kremlin supported Abkhazia’s demands and tensions soared into what became the deadliest post-Soviet era conflict, which began in August 1992 and lasted for about a year, between ethnic Georgians in Abkhazia and separatist Abkhaz and Russian forces. According to an unpublished report by Georgia’s prosecutor’s office, the conflict killed about 5,738 people. More than 200,000 people, mostly ethnic Georgians, were displaced and they continue to live outside the region. Venera Meshveliani leafs through the diary in which she has documented the war crimes that she witnessed during the 1992-1993 war in Abkhazia [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] Abkhazia’s declared independence from Georgia in 1999 remains unrecognised by Tbilisi and frictions are ongoing. Moscow recognised Abkhazia as independent after the 2008 Georgia-Russia war and signed an agreement with Abkhazia to take control of its frontiers in 2014. But Meshveliani said geopolitical tensions have blocked a pathway that could see the war crimes of the early 90s addressed. “My husband was killed right in front of my eyes. I also remember one house towards the edge of my village where the owners of the house had been killed and their heads had been cut off and kept on the dining table. Don’t such brutal monsters deserve to be punished?” she said. A photo shows Venera Meshveliani’s husband at her home in Tbilisi, Georgia, on July 24, 2022. Meshveliani, whose husband was killed in front of her eyes [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] ‘The world has not yet termed these crimes as genocide’ According to Malkhaz Pataraia, the head of the Tbilisi-based platform Abkhaz Assembly, which advocates for displaced Georgians from Abkhazia and South Ossetia (another disputed region Georgia considers as its territory), “the aggressor” has not been identified correctly by the Georgian government and the West. “Our government has been cautious of the Kremlin but right after the fall of the Soviet Union, the West also believed diplomatic dialogues would work with the Kremlin. This delayed severe punishments against war crime perpetrators,” Pataraia, who is also an internally displaced ethnic Georgian from Abkhazia, told Al Jazeera. While the United Nations Observers’ Mission in Georgia, Human Rights Watch and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have recognised the crimes ethnic Georgians in Abkhazia had to face as “ethnic cleansing”, Pataraia is frustrated that the world has not yet termed these crimes as genocide. Malkhaz Pataria, 59, head of the Tbilisi-based Abkhaz Assembly, spends his days advocating for Abkhazia victims [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “In three documents of the OSCE, the war crimes that occurred in Abkhazia are referred to as ethnic cleansing. As a lawyer, I can tell you that phrases like ‘ethnic cleansing’ are just politically correct terms to use because they have no normative grounds,” he told Al Jazeera. “Only genocide has normative grounds because there are international conventions for victims of genocide and that guarantees justice to victims of war crimes. “But after Russia’s full-blown invasion in Ukraine, many things have changed and shifted in the world. And people have left their motives for political correctness and they’ve started properly naming things for what they actually are. So this might lead to the world recognising what happened in Abkhazia properly,” he said. While two national investigations have been opened by Georgia to deliver justice to victims of war crimes from Abkhazia, Georgian government officials claimed that Moscow was not cooperating and discontinued the case. This made many, like Mkshinvalli, feel as though their trauma was destined to be forgotten. Children ride bikes past a police checkpoint in Kvemo Akhalsopeli, at the border between Georgia and South Ossetia, on July 22, 2022 [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “Until this day, it really hurts me that we (ethnic Georgians) are ignored. I encourage every internally displaced person to write and speak out about what they have gone through because that is the only way our perpetrators will be prosecuted,” Mkshinvalli said, as she showed this reporter a diary where she has documented everything she experienced. More than 190km (118 miles) from Tbilisi, in the former Soviet Union spa town of Tskaltubo, 68-year-old Suliko said: “I came to Tskaltubo in September 1993. Everything in my [Abkhazian] village was horrible. I had to flee. Our entire village was surrounded for three days but we managed to take our children and escape. “My uncle, who was disabled, was burned alive in his house. My mother also died in this war and she has no grave … I don’t want to talk about this anymore. It has been 30 years and nothing has changed for us.” Suliko, who hails from Akhaldaba, Abkhazia, says the plight of IDPs has remained the same for 30 years [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] Nodar Gurchiani, a 77-year-old who fought in the army against Russian soldiers in the Abkhazian war, chipped in. “Most of us have been living in wretched living conditions for all these years. I feel like a guest living in this settlement in my own country,” he said. Al Jazeera contacted Georgia’s current Prime Minister, Irakli Garibashvili, for comment, but had not received a response by the time of publishing. Nodar Gurchiani, 77, sits with other internally displaced Georgians from Abkhazia in Tskaltubo, Georgia, on July 21, 2022 [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] As the 30th anniversary of the onset of the conflict approaches on August 14, Tamar Sautieva, a social worker who fled Abkhazia as a three-year-old, called for equality within the wider Georgian society. She currently lives with her family in a settlement for internally displaced people in Tbilisi. Tamar Sautieva, 32, a social worker, is calling for equality for IDPs [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “When I first came to Tbilisi, schools refused to take us in because we were IDPs [Internally Displaced People]. The stigma towards us still exists. Some also think that the government has done us a favour by giving us housing facilities and consider us a burden to society,” she told Al Jazeera. Tamar Tolordava, 31 and an assistant professor at Georgia’s Ilia University, said: “Sometimes it feels like we are refugees in our own country. As young IDPs we’re keen to fight for our rights and tackle the stigma. I’m hopeful that with everything happening in Ukraine, our own society will wake up and acknowledge our trauma.” On August 7, members of the Abkhaz Assembly, the Georgian political party European Georgia, local media outlet Tabula Media and NGOs Voter Education Society and Liberty Institute will launch a campaign in Tbilisi to raise awareness about this sense of discrimination and call for those behind war crimes to be brought to justice. Tamar Tolordava, 31, an internally displaced Georgian from Abkhazia, said the world is waking up to Russia’s war crimes as the conflict in Ukraine worsens [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “Before Bucha in Ukraine, there was Abkhazia in Georgia. We feel with war crimes in Ukraine getting investigated, it is a good opportunity for the world to rename what Russia did to Georgians in Abkhazia as ‘genocide’,” Pataraia told Al Jazeera, referring to the Ukrainian town where Russians allegedly committed atrocities. While she is aware that justice could still take years, Meshveliani is also participating in the campaign. An exterior view of a former Soviet Union spa building hosting internally displaced Georgians from Abkhazia in Tskaltubo, Georgia [Valeria Mongelli/Al Jazeera] “Even while being held hostage, I was positive we would make it out alive. Many people tried killing themselves but I managed to stop them. I also protected children by putting them in sacks and sitting on them so that they would be hidden and wouldn’t be attacked further. All of them have now grown up and are still alive. That makes me happy,” she said. “Today, the West seems to have woken up so I’m hopeful that from this year our cases will be spoken about and they might actually call this genocide.” © 2022 Al Jazeera Media Network

Democratic Republic of the Congo says ‘children were killed’ in attack it blames on rebels in country’s restive east. Democratic Republic of the Congo youth get the first steps of basic military training in Goma, eastern Congo, November 7 (© AP Photo). The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has said 272 civilians were killed in a massacre in the eastern town of Kishishe last week, raising the death toll from a previous estimate of 50. The new death toll was announced on Monday by Industry Minister Julien Paluku, who spoke at a press briefing with government spokesperson Patrick Muyaya. “I cannot give details of the attack. An investigation has been opened by the attorney general and we are awaiting the results of the investigators,” said Muyaya. “What we do know is that children were killed in an Adventist church and a hospital,” he said. The government had blamed the massacre on the M23 rebel group, which denied responsibility, calling the allegations that it targeted civilians “baseless”. The United Nations said last week it had received reports of a high number of civilian casualties that occurred during clashes between the M23 and local militias in Kishishe on November 29 but did not give any figures. The UN’s peacekeeping mission in the DRC denounced reports of the atrocities last week, saying they could amount to “crimes under international humanitarian law” if confirmed. “We denounce these appalling acts and call on all competent authorities to investigate without delay and bring the perpetrators to justice,” the mission wrote on Twitter. The DRC army and the M23 — a predominantly Congolese Tutsi rebel group — have been locked in fighting for months in the country’s restive east, and the alleged attack will likely shatter a fragile ceasefire agreement in the region reached last month. The UN has previously warned that the fighting is leading to the displacement of tens of thousands of people amid deteriorating humanitarian conditions. “The newly displaced are joining the ranks of about 200,000 IDPs [internally displaced people] forced to flee their homes since late March when the latest surge in violence began,” the UN said in a statement last month. “Meanwhile, as the security situation in eastern DRC deteriorates, humanitarian access is becoming increasingly more restricted.” The M23 rebels are named after a peace agreement they signed with the Congolese government on March 23, 2009, when they were fighting as part of a group calling itself the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP). Many CNDP fighters were integrated into the Congolese army, officially known by its French initials FARDC. The rebels largely belong to the minority Tutsi ethnic group and have close ties to the Tutsi in neighbouring Rwanda. The Rwandan government denies accusations that it backs the rebels. © 2022 Al Jazeera Media Network

By Charlotte Van Campenout General view of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, Netherlands January 23, 2020. REUTERS/Eva Plevier/ File Photo AMSTERDAM, July 3 (Reuters) - Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Britain and the Maldives are allowed to intervene in Gambia's Myanmar genocide case with the International Court of Justice, the ICJ said in a statement on Wednesday. The countries had asked to intervene in the case at the ICJ, also known as the World Court, in November 2023. "The seven States concerned will... be allowed to submit their written observations on the subject-matter of their interventions," the ICJ also said in the statement. "The Court will determine at a later date whether they should be authorized to make observations in the course of the oral proceedings." In 2017 Gambia, a predominantly Muslim West African country, filed a case against Myanmar at the ICJ accusing it of committing genocide against the Rohingya, a minority Muslim group in Myanmar. A United Nations fact-finding mission concluded that a 2017 military campaign by Myanmar that drove 730,000 Rohingya into neighbouring Bangladesh had included "genocidal acts". Myanmar has denied genocide, rejecting the U.N. findings as "biased and flawed". It says its crackdown was aimed at Rohingya rebels who had carried out attacks. The World Court rejected Myanmar's objections to the genocide proceedings in July 2022, paving the way for the case to be heard in full but no date has yet been set. Reporting by Charlotte Van Campenhout, Stephanie van den Berg; Editing by Jan Harvey © 2024 Reuters

© Provided by Asian News International (ANI) Stockholm [Sweden], July 1 (ANI): On the 103rd anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the party is facing severe criticism from human rights organisations and ethnic groups for alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang, also known as East Turkistan. The Swedish Uyghur Committee highlighted the grim legacy of the CCP on social media, condemning what they describe as the party’s “ruthless invasion, occupation, and colonisation” of East Turkistan. The committee’s post on Twitter, now known as X, stated, “On #CCP’s 103rd anniversary, remember their legacy stained by blood: Ruthless invasion, #occupation, and #colonisation of #EastTurkistan accompanied by their ongoing #genocide against Uyghurs/Turkic peoples.” The post further accused the Chinese government of subjecting millions of East Turkistani people, including Uyghurs, to severe human rights violations. These allegations include torture, execution, organ harvesting, starvation, indoctrination, sexual assault, and forced labour in concentration camps. The committee also highlighted the forced sterilisation of pregnant Uyghur women, the killing of unborn children, and the abduction of over a million Uyghur children by the CCP for what they termed “horrific abuse,” including organ harvesting. The Swedish Uyghur Committee’s post emphasised that the anniversary should not be viewed as a celebration but rather as a reminder of the “monstrous cruelty” perpetrated by the CCP and the “world’s complicit silence.” The CCP, which has ruled China since 1949, often uses its anniversary to highlight its achievements and reaffirm its commitment to socialism with Chinese characteristics. However, the party’s actions in Xinjiang have drawn widespread international condemnation. Numerous reports and testimonies from survivors have detailed the extent of the abuses, leading many to label the situation as genocide. As the CCP marks its 103rd anniversary, the voices calling for justice for the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in Xinjiang grow louder, demanding accountability and an end to the ongoing human rights abuses. (ANI). Copyright © 2024 Printline Media Pvt. Ltd.