Israel rejects genocide claims at ICJ, pans South Africa’s ‘grossly distorted’ charges The Times of Israel 12 January 2024 By JEREMY SHARON, TOI STAFF and AGENCIES Protesters waving flags and pictures of the hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7 Hamas cross-border attack in Israel, attend a protest outside the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, Friday, Jan. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Patrick Post) Attorneys argue ministers’ problematic comments cited by South Africa are not impacting war. They highlight Hamas’s use of civilians and IDF efforts to protect innocents. THE HAGUE — Israel’s legal team launched its response Friday morning to accusations brought by South Africa at the UN’s top court that its war against Hamas in Gaza, in response to Hamas’s October 7 terror onslaught, was a state-led genocidal campaign aimed at wiping out the Palestinian population. The legal adviser for Israel’s Foreign Ministry said at the opening of the second day of hearings that South Africa on Thursday brought “a grossly distorted story,” with “curated” allegations. “If there were acts of genocide, they have been perpetrated against Israel,” Becker said, condemning South Africa’s assertion that Israel does not have the right to self-defense against Hamas. “If the claim of the applicant is that Israel must be denied the ability to defend citizens, the absurd upshot is that under guise of genocide claims this court is trying to stop Israel defending its civilians against an organization which pursues a genocidal agenda against them,” said Becker. He said Israel was committed to complying with the law amid the war, “but it does so in the face of Hamas’s utter contempt for the law.” He argued the “appalling suffering” of civilians, both Israeli and Palestinian, is the result of Hamas strategy of hiding behind innocents. Speaking after Becker, Prof. Malcolm Shaw noted that civilians suffer in all armed conflicts “especially when a side attacks civilians and is unconcerned” by the welfare of civilians on its own side. “Not every conflict is genocidal. The crime of genocide in international law and under the Genocide Convention is a uniquely malicious manifestation and stands alone among violations of international law as the zenith of evil, the crime of crimes, ultimate in wickedness,” he said. A protester stands outside the International Court of Justice, or World Court, prior to a hearing in The Hague, Netherlands, Friday, Jan. 12, 2024 (AP Photo/Patrick Post) “If claims of genocide were to become common currency of armed conflict wherever that occurred, the essence of that crime would be lost.” Shaw said South Africa presented a “distorted picture” of comments made by Israeli politicians on the war in order to establish genocidal intent by Israel, and pointed out that only the policy decisions by the small Israeli war cabinet and the broader security cabinet are relevant in determining Israeli policy in the war in Gaza. “To produce random quotes which are not in conformity with government policy is misleading at best,” said Shaw. He cited IDF standing orders specifying the need to differentiate between military and civilian targets and numerous comments by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant declaring that the goal of the war is to destroy Hamas and that it does not target the Palestinian people. South Africa, which filed the lawsuit at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December, asked judges Thursday to impose emergency measures ordering Israel to immediately halt the offensive. A person waves a palestinian flag while passing a pro-israel protest outside the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, Friday, Jan. 12, 2024 (AP Photo/Patrick Post) Israel has rejected the accusations of genocide as baseless and said South Africa was acting as an emissary of the Hamas terror group, which seeks to eliminate the Jewish state. It says the Israel Defense Forces is targeting Hamas terrorists, not Palestinian civilians but that civilian casualties in the fighting are unavoidable as terrorists operate from within the population. South Africa’s allegation that Israel is committing genocide against Gazans is based largely on its assertion that inflammatory comments by senior Israeli cabinet ministers with a say over war policy demonstrate an intent to kill civilians. However, their case did not introduce evidence of facts on the ground to back up their claim of genocidal intent. Israel was attempting Friday to combat these arguments by demonstrating any extreme remarks have not impacted war policy and the reality on the battlefield. Protestors wave Israeli flags and hold photos of the hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7 Hamas cross-border assault on Israel, during a demonstration outside the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, Jan. 11, 2024. (AP Photo/Patrick Post) Israel was also expected to present testimonies from the October 7 Hamas-led massacre that started the war, when some 3,000 terrorists burst across the border by land, air and sea, killing some 1,200 people and seizing over 240 hostages of all ages. The brutal killings that sparked the war were largely ignored by South Africa, and evidence from the onslaught will be used to demonstrate Israel had no choice but to launch the offensive. The defense team was also set to highlight efforts made by the IDF to prevent civilian casualties, and evidence that shows Hamas has embedded its military installations and combatants in, around, and under every part of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, thereby using uninvolved Gazans as human shields. The South African presentation ignored Hamas’s use of civilian infrastructure for military purposes, which Israel has said is the cause of much of the harm to Palestinian civilians, and largely disregarded the existence of an armed conflict in which Hamas is actively fighting in the war against Israeli troops. Protesters hold signs and wave Israeli flags during a demonstration march outside the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, Jan. 11, 2024. (AP/Patrick Post) Vowing to destroy the terror group after October 7, Israel launched a wide-scale military campaign in Gaza, which the Hamas-run health ministry has said killed over 23,000 people since. These figures cannot be independently verified and are believed to include both civilians and Hamas members killed in Gaza, including as a consequence of terror groups’ own rocket misfires. The IDF says it has killed over 8,500 operatives in Gaza, in addition to some 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7. The 1948 Genocide Convention, enacted in the wake of the mass murder of Jews in the Holocaust, defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” Post-apartheid South Africa has long advocated the Palestinian cause, a relationship forged when the African National Congress’s struggle against white-minority rule was cheered on by Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organization. The court is expected to rule on possible emergency measures later this month but will not rule at that time on the genocide allegations — those proceedings could take years. The ICJ’s decisions are final and without appeal. The court has no way to enforce them but ignoring them could have significant international ramifications. Jeremy Sharon contributed to this report. Copyright 2024 The Times of Israel

Sumi Goswami was sent to the Matia detention centre on account of a technical error on the part of the Foreigners Tribunal. Her three-day experience at the centre exposes the inhumane treatment of detainees, irrespective of their immigration status. Flood-prone area where people have been excluded from the NRC list and stand at the risk of detention. ‘Detainees Sharing Cells With Criminals’: Human Rights Violations in Assam’s Detention Centres By Deepanshu Mohan, Samragnee Chakraborty, Yashovardhan Chaturvedi, Hima Trisha M., Nitya Arora, Rieshav Chakraborty and Aman Chain 20 December, 2023 The completion of construction and the commencement of operations at India’s largest detention centre, the Matia transit camp in Goalpara district earlier this year, sparked a public outcry among the people of Assam. At the risk of detention are individuals suspected to be illegal migrants from Bangladesh, categorised as foreigners, doubtful voters and people excluded from the NRC (National Register of Citizens) list. Due to the contentious issue of the citizenship crisis in Assam, detention centres have been operational in the state since 2010. Assam’s detention centres have consistently raised humanitarian concerns. The right to liberty, a non-negotiable aspect of human rights, is impeded by detention and arbitrary arrest. Furthermore, the sub-human and morally questionable treatment of the detainees within these clandestine facilities, strips them of their basic human rights. The Centre for New Economics Studies’ Azaad Awaaz team conducted primary field interviews to unpack how these detention centres in Assam work. This article explores how these detention centres act as ‘sites of exception’ and push individuals towards rightlessness, leaving those labelled stateless with scant rights to shield from the questionable treatment. The name of the interviewee has been changed to maintain confidentiality. Caught in a legal void From her own experience of statelessness, Hannah Arendt observed that the requirement for inclusion in a political community or nation-state is the predicament to guarantee even basic human rights. The denationalised, therefore, experience rightlessness as a result of statelessness. As the fissures of globalisation resulted in states drawing boundaries, pushing huge populations towards the periphery of statelessness, the detention centres have evolved as spaces where this form of rightlessness is worst experienced, with no guarantee about the quality of the life lived. A classroom of Forest Learning Centre (FLC) at Laimuti village, Chirang District, Assam. According to the Refugee Convention of 1951, the member states cannot detain, expel, or return immigrants, even if they have entered without permission. Given that India is not a member state, it is not bound by the rules placed by the Convention, and hence, it has been seen taking stringent actions against the illegal migrants, through detection, detention, and deportation. The deplorable conditions faced by detainees came to the limelight, particularly after Harsh Mander, the special monitor of the National Human Rights Commission, exposed the dire situation within the camps. The questionable treatment inflicted upon detainees is perhaps best exemplified by the case of Sumi Goswami. Sumi Goswami was sent to the Matia detention centre on account of a technical error on the part of the Foreigners Tribunal. Despite possessing all the necessary documents, she was forced to live in the detention camp for three days, after which she was released on bail. While recounting her time at the detention centre, she said, “Nobody would understand what I have gone through. Only I can. If you have not been to a detention camp, you will not understand what it is to live there. Never did I think I would have to experience this.” Talking about the living conditions there, she said, “There were about 14 to 15 people within one cell, with one attached bathroom. The first day I went there, I was surprised to notice that the doors of the bathrooms are partially built, such that your face can be seen from outside. On asking an official, I realised that it was [built in that way] to restrict the inmates from committing suicides. The foul smell from the bathroom, because of the partially built doors, made it unbearable to live there, let alone eat.” Goswami further added, “I could not sleep for two nights straight. I remained seated the whole time. Never in my life had I used the type of bed and mattress they provided me with.” Weavers at the ant weaving centre at Rowmari, Chirang District, Assam Despite the fact that the UNHRC guidelines state prisons should not be used for detention, the centres of Assam are sub-parts of normal jails, and hence, the declared “foreigners” are often placed within the same cells with the convicted prisoners. Sumi Goswami said, “I asked one of the inmates what she was doing there and she said she murdered her brother for land. I asked another woman the same question and she said she was arrested for smuggling drugs. How can you sleep peacefully in a room with criminals around you? Someone might come and kill you, you never know. Why are the D-voters kept with these criminals? What crime did they commit?” Sumi sighed as she said: “When one of the inmates told me that she was living there for ten years, I was shocked. I would not be alive if I had to live there forever.” While all detainees are compelled to live in substandard conditions, women experience even worse conditions, including complaints of sexual abuse and forced abortions, among other forms of violence. The differential experiences of women in detention will be dealt with in the next article. A comprehensive legal framework must be established, ensuring the fair and humane treatment of detainees, irrespective of their immigration status. Resolving legal ambiguities, providing an adequate legal defence, and addressing the specific vulnerabilities of detainees are essential steps to bring detention practices in Assam in line with international human rights standards. The urgency of this task is underscored by the profound impact on the lives and well-being of those affected by the current state of detention centres in Assam. All photographs have been taken by CNES researchers during field work in Assam. Deepanshu Mohan is a Professor of Economics and Director, Centre for New Economics Studies (CNES), Jindal School of Liberal Arts and Humanities, O.P Jindal Global University. Samragnee Chakraborty and Hima Trisha M. are Senior Research Analysts (CNES). Yashovardhan Chaturvedi, Nitya Arora, Rieshav Chakraborty and Aman Chain are Research Assistants with CNES. The authors would like to thank Dr. Salah Punathil, Assistant Professor at the University of Hyderabad for his guidance and support. This story by Azaad Awaaz of the Centre for New Economics Studies explores the detention centres in Assam as spaces violating human rights and disproportionately affecting migrants. These are penned down from the documented findings of a recent Azaad Awaaz edition. Click here to access the work of Azaad Awaaz, an initiative of the Centre for New Economics Studies, O.P. Jindal Global University, working on issues of social exclusion, marginalization, and discrimination experienced by vulnerable, precarious communities across India. © The Wire 2023

Most women in the detention centres are middle-aged and mothers. However, the gender-insensitive environment at detention centres do not take into account the needs of the mothers and their children who might accompany them. Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty ‘I’d Cut My Saree Into Pieces to Cover My Child’: How Women Survive in Assam’s Detention Centres By Deepanshu Mohan, Samragnee Chakraborty, Yashovardhan Chaturvedi, Hima Trisha M., Nitya Arora, Rieshav Chakraborty and Aman Chain 22 December, 2023 The case of Rashminara Begum, a three-month pregnant woman who was placed in a detention camp in Assam for failing to prove her citizenship, has garnered significant national and international attention. This situation has raised questions about the unfolding humanitarian crisis in the state, with several other pregnant women, like Begum, being sent to detention camps. Despite the fact that a maximum number of detainees are women, the differential gendered experiences have not been well captured, thus calling for scholarly attention. The Centre for New Economics Studies’ Azaad Awaaz team conducted primary field interviews to explore the ways how the social roles and subjectivities of women contribute to varied experiences during detention. This article emphasises how the state utilises the bodies of female detainees as sites of torture. Women in the limbo of citizenship and refugee crisis Women engaging in sports for peacebuilding at Basugaon village, Chirang district, Assam. Women are often caught in the web of statelessness, more so than men, because authorities often reject the documents they need to prove Indian citizenship. This issue essentially arises from the fact that poor women have fewer documents to establish their long-term ancestral residence in Assam. Consequently, an overwhelming majority of non-citizens are women, and they are subsequently detained in detention centres. Most women in the detention centres are middle-aged and mothers. Given that motherhood is given prime importance in most societies, many women take their children to detention centres with them to be able to take care of them closely. However, the gender-insensitive environment at detention centres do not take into account the needs of the mothers and their children who might accompany them, thus making the experience of female detainees more difficult to navigate. The case of Fatima Begum* can best substantiate this argument. Fatima Begum, from Cachar district, experienced 10 years of detention in three different centres with her daughter. She was sent a notice from the Foreigners’ Tribunal when she was two months pregnant. About eight months later, she was declared a foreigner as a result of not being able to produce the necessary documents. A woman grabs the Frisbee disc during the parents’ session at Basugaon village, Chirang district, Assam. By then, she had given birth to a daughter, who was less than two months old. Reflecting back on the day she was taken to the detention centre, she said, “When the police officers came to take me, I told them clearly that I would not go without my daughter. She was only 45 days old at that time, how could I go without her?” While recalling her time at the detention centre, along with her infant, she said, “I would cut my saree into pieces to cover my child.” She further said, “Initially, I would feel uncomfortable while breastfeeding in the presence of 10 other people. But slowly I got accustomed.” Bodies of the female detainees chosen as sites of abuse The partition of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan is merely an example reflecting the way in which the gender question manifests itself during sensitive border relations, conflicts or wars. The operation of detention centres in Assam, where women have reportedly been subject to physical violence of several forms, reflects how violence on the bodies of women during sensitive border relations continues to manifest even today. Given that all detainees are inherently perceived as foreigners, the authorities often perpetrate violence on the detainees to demarcate the boundaries between ‘us Indians’ and the ‘Bangladeshi other’. Shaheen Nessa*, who also lived in detention for 10 years, was three months pregnant when she was detained. She claimed that she could feel the movements of her baby before moving to the detention centre, and hence realised that the baby was healthy. However, when she turned six months pregnant, one day, the authorities forcefully pushed a tetanus injection, which she claims was the reason behind the death of her child. She said, “Even though I told them I do not want the injection to be pushed, they did not listen to me, and I gave birth to a dead boy. They have killed my child.” Nessa also recalled how her co-inmates were subject to physical violence. She said, “I have witnessed other people being tortured as well. One day, a woman did not know that rice was being served. She went late and was denied food. When she asked for food, she was beaten up.” The bodies of women become receptacles of violence at Assam’s detention centres. In a space that is unequipped to facilitate even the basic requirements of humans, the consideration of the needs and requirements of women, mothers and children only remains a distant dream. *Names of interviewees have been changed to maintain confidentiality. This is the second part of an explainer by the Centre for New Economics Studies’ Azaad Awaaz team. Read the first part here. These explainers explore the detention centres in Assam as spaces violating human rights and disproportionately affecting migrants. These are penned down from the documented findings of a recent Azaad Awaaz edition. Click here to access the work of Azaad Awaaz, an initiative of the Centre for New Economics Studies, O.P. Jindal Global University, working on issues of social exclusion, marginalisation, and discrimination experienced by vulnerable, precarious communities across India. All photographs have been taken by CNES researchers during field work in Assam. Deepanshu Mohan is a Professor of Economics and Director, Centre for New Economics Studies (CNES), Jindal School of Liberal Arts and Humanities, O.P Jindal Global University. Samragnee Chakraborty and Hima Trisha M. are Senior Research Analysts (CNES). Yashovardhan Chaturvedi, Nitya Arora, Rieshav Chakraborty and Aman Chain are Research Assistants with CNES. The authors would like to thank Dr. Salah Punathil, Assistant Professor at the University of Hyderabad for his guidance and support. © The Wire 2023

Genocide Watch 2023 Annual Report In the darkness of the black cloud of the COVID-19 pandemic, Genocide Watch found a silver lining and became an entirely virtual organization. All Genocide Watch staff are volunteers. Genocide Watch expanded our staff to include over thirty members from the US, Canada, the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, Kenya, Sweden, Finland, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Rwanda, Spain, Italy, and India.  Our Alliance Against Genocide gained a dozen new member organizations around the world. By becoming entirely virtual, Genocide Watch cut its already minimal expenses. Not a single penny is spent on rents, computers, salaries, meetings, meals, or conferences. Genocide Watch has done all its work since 1999 for a total of $120,000, about $5000 per year. Because Genocide Watch uses constant event-based monitoring, and a processual model of the development of genocide, rather than an annual statistical model based on abstract variables, it is usually the first NGO to predict a genocide. Genocide Watch has worked with NGO coalitions to persuade regional organizations to intervene and stop genocides in East Timor, Kosovo, Macedonia, Côte d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Burundi, and Iraq. Genocide Watch’s operational methodology to maintain timely and reliable information on threats of genocide has four pillars: Awareness, Education, Legal Prosecution, and Alliance and Advocacy. Awareness: Genocide Watch amplified its advocacy efforts by establishing a seventeen-member Advocacy and Alliance Team to write and distribute genocide alerts to policy makers in US, UK, and European Union governments. The Advocacy Team focused on seven projects in 2023: warning of the slow genocide against Shi'a Hazaras in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan; reauthorizing the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan with a new mandate to monitor Taliban violations of the rights of women, Hazara and other minority groups; calling attention to jihadist killings of Christians in Nigeria and the Sahel; warning about persecution of the Banyamulenge (Tutsis) in the Democratic Republic of Congo; reporting on the genocides against Kurdish people in Iraq, and proposing a resolution recognizing the Kurdish Genocides adopted by the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS); warning of genocide and displacement of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) caused by Azerbaijan's blockade, invasion, and forced deportation; advocating for UN authorization of a UN Peacekeeping Operation to stop renewed genocide in Darfur, to end the Sudanese civil war, and to arrest Generals Hemedti and Burhan for trial by the ICC. Dr. Stanton and Advocacy Staff Members Helen Graham and Daniel Russell worked with the World Hazara Council to draft a UN Security Council Resolution renewing and strengthening the mandate of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan. We met with the officers in the State Department responsible for renewing the mandate. Although the US opted for a "technical rollover" to ease renewal of the UNAMA mandate, the same day the UN Security Council passed UNAMA renewal, it also passed a tandem resolution appointing a Special Rapporteur on Afghan compliance with international law regarding women's and minority rights, with quarterly reports to the UN Secretary General. These resolutions accomplished the goals we sought. Dr. Stanton testified on the persecution of Hazaras before the all-party human rights committees of the Canadian and UK parliaments. We continued to work with Congressional staff and the White House urging them to support legislation to expand the number of Afghans that the US will accept for asylum. Genocide Watch intensified its advocacy efforts to end the persecution of the Banyamulenge (Tutsis) in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Senior Research Analyst, Thomas Shacklock, wrote a report with Ntanyoma Rukumbuzi Delphin, on the rise in hate speech in DRC against Tutsis that they sent to the State Department Africa Bureau and the U.S. missions to the U.N. and U.S. Embassy in Kinshasa.  Shacklock and Ntanyoma organized a panel on the persecution of the Banyamulenge that they presented at the biennial meeting of the International Association of Genocide Scholars held in Barcelona July 10 - 14, 2023. An important leader of the Hazara and the women’s movement in Afghanistan, Raziya Masumi, a lawyer doing advanced legal studies in the Hague, joined the staff of Genocide Watch. She is in constant contact with people in Afghanistan. She wrote and published “Report on Ten Stages of Genocide Against Hazaras and Other Shia Religious Minorities in Afghanistan” and her “The Worsening Situation of Women in Afghanistan,” which she presented to a U.N. Conference in Verona, Italy in December 2023. In 2023, Genocide Watch issued over seventy new country reports and emergency alerts. Our 2023 Research Team is led by Grace Condon. For a complete list of Genocide Watch reports and alerts, please visit our website. We issued a Genocide Emergency Alert when Azerbaijan invaded Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020, updated it when it blockaded the Lachin Corridor, and updated it again when Azerbaijan drove Armenians out of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh). On Sept. 2, 2023, the NY Times'  Nicholas Kristof cited Genocide Watch's Genocide Emergency in "Another Genocide is Underway in Nagorno-Karabakh". EDUCATION: Genocide Watch increased our website and social media reach. Davis West, a computer scientist staff member improved our Genocide Watch and Alliance Against Genocide websites. Our www.genocidewatch.com website gets an average of over 70,000 hits by separate users each month. Our Genocide Alerts are now e-mailed to over 4000 subscribers. Genocide Watch Facebook followers increased to 13,000, and Instagram to 5000 followers. Our Twitter (X) account has over 6000 followers. Genocide Watch's Timestream Team produced 28 interactive historical accounts of past and current genocides. PowerPoints of the Timestream slides are on our website. They are used by teachers and students around the world. To expand the educational reach of Dr. Stanton’s Ten Stages of Genocide model of genocide, Nat Hill, Research Director, oversaw translation of our two-page summary of the Ten Stages model into over a dozen languages. We welcomed a UK performance group Stages into the Alliance Against Genocide. Stages bases its presentations on the Ten Stages of Genocide. It has developed excellent curricular materials on genocide for secondary schools that are now available on our website. Dr. Stanton spoke virtually at several conferences on genocide. They included a U.N. webinar on the 75th anniversary of the Genocide Convention led by Dr. Alice Nderitu, Special Adviser to the U.N. Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide. He addressed a Conference on Genocide Denial sponsored by the Liberation War Museum of Bangladesh. He spoke at commemorations of genocides against the Anuak of Ethiopia, the Kurds of Iraq, and Native Americans of the USA. He gave classes for students in the UK, US, Netherlands, and Canada. Genocide Watch formed a twelve-member team to produce podcasts for education of the public about genocide. The team has produced podcasts that will be placed on our Genocidewatchblog.com website and on Spotify, Soundcloud, and Apple Music. In July 2023 staff from Genocide Watch attended the 16th Biennial Meeting of the International Association of Genocide Scholars Conference (IAGS) in Barcelona, Spain. Jordan Lambdin and Dr. Stanton of the Legal Team presented papers on the harm the term “ethnic cleansing” brings to genocide prevention. Dr. Stanton published "Ethnic Cleansing is a Euphemism Used for Genocide Denial. At the IAGS meeting, Dr. Stanton presented a paper with his critique of the ICJ's erroneous analysis of "state intent" in its Bosnia v. Serbia and Croatia v. Serbia decisions, which if not corrected, could prove fatal to the Gambia's case against Myanmar. The Foreign Minister of Bangladesh asked Dr. Stanton to draft a Memorial (legal brief) for Bangladesh to submit to the ICJ so Bangladesh can become an Intervening Party in the Gambia v. Myanmar ICJ case. At the IAGS meeting, Grace Condon presented her paper on "Femicide in Mexico." Jordan Lambdin gave a paper comparing laws against domestic violence and femicide in the US and Chilé.  Giada Corsoni gave a presentation on the growth of exclusionary extremism in European countries. Dr. Stanton gave a presentation on "The New Nazism" in Russia, Turkey, Europe, India, and the US. Legal Prosecution: To investigate and promote legal prosecution strategies for genocides, Genocide Watch's Legal Team took on four major projects: Legal scholarship to correct the International Court of Justice’s erroneous interpretation of state intent in the Genocide Convention; Research for lawsuits against Facebook in several countries for complicity in the Rohingya genocide. Work with Iraqi NGOs and UNITAD to amend Iraqi law so UNITAD casefiles can be used in Iraqi courts to prosecute members of ISIS for their genocides of Yazidis, Christians, and Shi'as in Iraq. A Report on the Kurdish Genocides to support a resolution by the International Association of Genocide Scholars recognizing these crimes as genocides. Genocide Watch reported on the seven genocides that have killed at least 400,000 Kurds since 1980. A Genocide Watch team composed of Dr. Stanton, Kyla Lucey, and the Genocide Watch photographer went to Kurdistan for research co-sponsored by KGLobby, a Kurdish NGO founded by Mrs. Awring Shaways. In Erbil, Kurdistan, Dr. Stanton, and Ms. Lucey met with members of UNITAD, with representatives of the Kurdistan Regional Government, and with Kurdish NGOs EMMA and the Coalition for Just Reparations. Kyla Lucey led the team that wrote a Report on the Kurdish Genocides with Jordan Lambdin, Manoka Y, Isabelle Hofberg, Leah Cohen, Panchami Manjunatha, and Dr. Stanton, with photography by Ted Stanton. The report includes a legal analysis of the Kurdish genocides. It supports the IAGS Resolution on the Kurdish Genocides submitted by Dr. Stanton, Sylvia Ronnau, and Mrs. Shaways. The IAGS adopted the resolution. In 2017, Genocide Watch proposed and wrote the draft UNSC Resolution that created the U.N. Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da'esh/ISIL (UNITAD). UNITAD now has a staff of 260 in Iraq that has compiled hundreds of case files that could be used to prosecute members of ISIS now in Iraqi prisons. The legal barrier to using UNITAD case files is the mandatory death penalty under Iraq's Anti-Terrorism Law. U.N. rules forbid turning over evidence to courts that impose the death penalty. Genocide Watch is seeking legislation by the Iraq parliament to provide an additional "extenuating circumstance" for sentencing under Iraq’s Anti-Terrorism Law. It would provide that when UNITAD case files are used as evidence, the Iraqi Appeals Court will be legally required to commute death penalties to imprisonment. Then UNITAD could make its case files available to Iraqi courts for prosecution of members of ISIS in Iraq’s prisons. The Alliance Against Genocide: Alliance Against Genocide Team Leader Brooklyn Quallen and her team strengthened our Alliance Against Genocide. The Alliance Against Genocide now has 102 member organizations in 31 countries. Dr. Stanton spoke at Congressional briefings organized by the Indian American Muslim Council. He attended weekly meetings of the International Religious Freedom Roundtable and spoke at the international Ministerial on Religious Freedom organized by the Roundtable. He spoke in Webinars organized by Alliance member FORSEA on threats to religious freedom in India. His appearance on an Indian internet TV program drew 300,000 viewers. He warned of early warning signs of genocidal processes in India under Modi’s Hindu nationalist government. Genocide Watch actively incorporates the voices and perspectives of genocide victims and survivor communities. Genocide Watch consults Alliance members to research and validate our reports with genocide-impacted communities. We have collaborated with institutions inside and outside the Alliance to validate reports on Sudan, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, India, Myanmar, China, Kurdistan, and the Asian American and Pacific Islander Communities. At a meeting in 2023, the former head of a leading human rights group said: “Of all human rights NGOs, Genocide Watch gets the most bang for the buck. Genocide Watch has worked with the U.N. and governments to build two international tribunals, the ICTR and the Khmer Rouge Tribunal. It chaired the Washington Working Group that persuaded President Clinton to sign the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. It persuaded the U.N. Secretary-General to create the Office of the Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide. It incorporated and led the International Association of Genocide Scholars. It founded the first and largest coalition of anti-genocide organizations, the Alliance Against Genocide.  It helped get regional governments and the U.N. to prevent and stop at least eight genocides." Thanks to our outstanding all-volunteer staff and extremely low expenses for 24 years, Genocide Watch has had a significant impact on genocide early warning and prevention. Our Alliance Against Genocide is building a global movement to predict, prevent, stop, and punish genocide. That is our purpose and our calling. We could not have persevered and grown stronger without your support. THANK YOU! With gratitude, Dr. Gregory H. Stanton Founding President

Burundi's President Evariste Ndayishimiye is welcomed upon arrival at Pulkovo airport ahead of the second Russia-Africa summit, in Saint Petersburg on July 26, 2023. © Peter Kovalev, AFP By:NEWS WIRES Burundi’s President Evariste Ndayishimiye has called on citizens to stone gay people, escalating a crackdown on sexual minorities in a country where LGBT people already face social ostracism and jail terms of up to two years if convicted of same-sex offences. “If you want to attract a curse to the country, accept homosexuality,” Ndayishimiye said in a question and answer session with journalists and the public held in Burundi’s east on Friday. “I even think that these people, if we find them in Burundi, it is better to lead them to a stadium and stone them. And that cannot be a sin,” he said, describing homosexuality as imported from the West. His comments were the latest show of widening intolerance of LGBT people in the region. Uganda passed a law in May that carries the death sentence for certain categories of same-sex offences and lengthy jail sentences for others - a move that was widely condemned by Western governments and human rights activists. The United States has imposed a range of sanctions including travel restrictions and removing Uganda from a tariff-free trade deal. The World Bank also suspended all future loans to the east African country in protest. Some lawmakers in Kenya, South Sudan and Tanzania are pushing for similarly tough anti-gay laws in their countries. The politicians in these countries see their efforts as buttressing African values and sovereignty against what they view as Western pressure on the issue. © 2023 Copyright France 24

Screams Without Words: How Hamas Weaponized Sexual Violence on Oct. 7 The New York Times Dec. 28, 2023 By Jeffrey Gettleman, Anat Schwartz and Adam Sella Photographs by Avishag Shaar-Yashuv A Times investigation uncovered new details showing a pattern of rape, mutilation and extreme brutality against women in the attacks on Israel. Gal Abdush’s parents, center, and her sisters. The photograph on the wall shows Gal and her husband, Nagi. The couple had been together since they were teenagers. At first, she was known simply as “the woman in the black dress.” In a grainy video, you can see her, lying on her back, dress torn, legs spread, vagina exposed. Her face is burned beyond recognition and her right hand covers her eyes. The video was shot in the early hours of Oct. 8 by a woman searching for a missing friend at the site of the rave in southern Israel where, the day before, Hamas terrorists massacred hundreds of young Israelis. The video went viral, with thousands of people responding, desperate to know if the woman in the black dress was their missing friend, sister or daughter. One family knew exactly who she was — Gal Abdush, mother of two from a working-class town in central Israel, who disappeared from the rave that night with her husband. As the terrorists closed in on her, trapped on a highway in a line of cars of people trying to flee the party, she sent one final WhatsApp message to her family: “You don’t understand.” Based largely on the video evidence — which was verified by The New York Times — Israeli police officials said they believed that Ms. Abdush was raped, and she has become a symbol of the horrors visited upon Israeli women and girls during the Oct. 7 attacks. Israeli officials say that everywhere Hamas terrorists struck — the rave, the military bases along the Gaza border and the kibbutzim — they brutalized women. A two-month investigation by The Times uncovered painful new details, establishing that the attacks against women were not isolated events but part of a broader pattern of gender-based violence on Oct. 7. Relying on video footage, photographs, GPS data from mobile phones and interviews with more than 150 people, including witnesses, medical personnel, soldiers and rape counselors, The Times identified at least seven locations where Israeli women and girls appear to have been sexually assaulted or mutilated. Gal Abdush’s body was found here. Kfar Aza. Gaza Strip. Israel Rt. 232. Be’eri. Center of rave. Israel By The New York Times Four witnesses described in graphic detail seeing women raped and killed at two different places along Route 232, the same highway where Ms. Abdush’s half-naked body was found sprawled on the road at a third location. And The Times interviewed several soldiers and volunteer medics who together described finding more than 30 bodies of women and girls in and around the rave site and in two kibbutzim in a similar state as Ms. Abdush’s — legs spread, clothes torn off, signs of abuse in their genital areas. A camp area on Oct. 11 at the rave site in southern Israel.Credit...Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times Many of the accounts are difficult to bear, and the visual evidence is disturbing to see. The Times viewed photographs of one woman’s corpse that emergency responders discovered in the rubble of a besieged kibbutz with dozens of nails driven into her thighs and groin. The Times also viewed a video, provided by the Israeli military, showing two dead Israeli soldiers at a base near Gaza who appeared to have been shot directly in their vaginas. Hamas has denied Israel’s accusations of sexual violence. Israeli activists have been outraged that the United Nations Secretary General, António Guterres, and the agency U.N. Women did not acknowledge the many accusations until weeks after the attacks. Investigators with Israel’s top national police unit, Lahav 433, have been steadily gathering evidence but they have not put a number on how many women were raped, saying that most are dead — and buried — and that they will never know. No survivors have spoken publicly. The Israeli police have acknowledged that, during the shock and confusion of Oct. 7, the deadliest day in Israeli history, they were not focused on collecting semen samples from women’s bodies, requesting autopsies or closely examining crime scenes. At that moment, the authorities said, they were intent on repelling Hamas and identifying the dead. Ms. Abdush’s sister showing one of the last messages Ms. Abdush sent on Oct. 7. A combination of chaos, enormous grief and Jewish religious duties meant that many bodies were buried as quickly as possible. Most were never examined, and in some cases, like at the rave scene, where more than 360 people were slaughtered in a few hours, the bodies were hauled away by the truckload. That has left the Israeli authorities at a loss to fully explain to families what happened to their loved ones in their final moments. Ms. Abdush’s relatives, for instance, never received a death certificate. They are still searching for answers. In cases of widespread sexual violence during a war, it is not unusual to have limited forensic evidence, experts said. “Armed conflict is so chaotic,” said Adil Haque, a Rutgers law professor and war crimes expert. “People are more focused on their safety than on building a criminal case down the road.” Very often, he said, sex crime cases will be prosecuted years later on the basis of testimony from victims and witnesses. “The eyewitness might not even know the name of the victim,” he added. “But if they can testify as, ‘I saw a woman being raped by this armed group,’ that can be enough.” ‘Screams without words’ Sapir, a 24-year-old accountant, has become one of the Israeli police’s key witnesses. She does not want to be fully identified, saying she would be hounded for the rest of her life if her last name were revealed. She attended the rave with several friends and provided investigators with graphic testimony. She also spoke to The Times. In a two-hour interview outside a cafe in southern Israel, she recounted seeing groups of heavily armed gunmen rape and kill at least five women. She said that at 8 a.m. on Oct. 7, she was hiding under the low branches of a bushy tamarisk tree, just off Route 232, about four miles southwest of the party. She had been shot in the back. She felt faint. She covered herself in dry grass and lay as still as she could. Volunteers with an emergency response team at the Kfar Aza kibbutz this month. The kibbutz was among the places attacked on Oct. 7. About 15 meters from her hiding place, she said, she saw motorcycles, cars and trucks pulling up. She said that she saw “about 100 men,” most of them dressed in military fatigues and combat boots, a few in dark sweatsuits, getting in and out of the vehicles. She said the men congregated along the road and passed between them assault rifles, grenades, small missiles — and badly wounded women. “It was like an assembly point,” she said. The first victim she said she saw was a young woman with copper-color hair, blood running down her back, pants pushed down to her knees. One man pulled her by the hair and made her bend over. Another penetrated her, Sapir said, and every time she flinched, he plunged a knife into her back. She said she then watched another woman “shredded into pieces.” While one terrorist raped her, she said, another pulled out a box cutter and sliced off her breast. “One continues to rape her, and the other throws her breast to someone else, and they play with it, throw it, and it falls on the road,” Sapir said. She said the men sliced her face and then the woman fell out of view. Around the same time, she said, she saw three other women raped and terrorists carrying the severed heads of three more women. Sapir provided photographs of her hiding place and her wounds, and police officials have stood by her testimony and released a video of her, with her face blurred, recounting some of what she saw. Yura Karol, a 22-year-old security consultant, said he was hiding in the same spot, and he can be seen in one of Sapir’s photos. He and Sapir were part of a group of friends who had met up at the party. In an interview, Mr. Karol said he barely lifted his head to look at the road but he also described seeing a woman raped and killed. Since that day, Sapir said, she has struggled with a painful rash that spread across her torso, and she can barely sleep, waking up at night, heart pounding, covered in sweat. “That day, I became an animal,” she said. “I was emotionally detached, sharp, just the adrenaline of survival. I looked at all this as if I was photographing them with my eyes, not forgetting any detail. I told myself: I should remember everything.” That same morning, along Route 232 but in a different location about a mile southwest of the party area, Raz Cohen — a young Israeli who had also attended the rave and had worked recently in the Democratic Republic of Congo training Congolese soldiers — said that he was hiding in a dried-up streambed. It provided some cover from the assailants combing the area and shooting anyone they found, he said in an hour-and-a-half interview in a Tel Aviv restaurant. Raz Cohen, a security consultant, survived the Oct. 7 attacks by hiding in a dried-up streambed. Maybe 40 yards in front of him, he recalled, a white van pulled up and its doors flew open. He said he then saw five men, wearing civilian clothes, all carrying knives and one carrying a hammer, dragging a woman across the ground. She was young, naked and screaming. “They all gather around her,” Mr. Cohen said. “She’s standing up. They start raping her. I saw the men standing in a half circle around her. One penetrates her. She screams. I still remember her voice, screams without words.” “Then one of them raises a knife,” he said, “and they just slaughtered her.” Shoam Gueta, one of Mr. Cohen’s friends and a fashion designer, said the two were hiding together in the streambed. He said he saw at least four men step out of the van and attack the woman, who ended up “between their legs.” He said that they were “talking, giggling and shouting,” and that one of them stabbed her with a knife repeatedly, “literally butchering her.” Hours later, the first wave of volunteer emergency medical technicians arrived at the rave site. In interviews, four of them said that they discovered bodies of dead women with their legs spread and underwear missing — some with their hands tied by rope and zipties — in the party area, along the road, in the parking area and in the open fields around the rave site. Jamal Waraki, a volunteer medic with the nonprofit ZAKA emergency response team, said he could not get out of his head a young woman in a rawhide vest found between the main stage and the bar. “Her hands were tied behind her back,” he said. “She was bent over, half naked, her underwear rolled down below her knees.” Yinon Rivlin, a member of the rave’s production team who lost two brothers in the attacks, said that after hiding from the killers, he emerged from a ditch and made his way to the parking area, east of the party, along Route 232, looking for survivors. Near the highway, he said, he found the body of a young woman, on her stomach, no pants or underwear, legs spread apart. He said her vagina area appeared to have been sliced open, “as if someone tore her apart.” Similar discoveries were made in two kibbutzim, Be’eri and Kfar Aza. Eight volunteer medics and two Israeli soldiers told The Times that in at least six different houses, they had come across a total of at least 24 bodies of women and girls naked or half naked, some mutilated, others tied up, and often alone. A paramedic in an Israeli commando unit said that he had found the bodies of two teenage girls in a room in Be’eri. One was lying on her side, he said, boxer shorts ripped, bruises by her groin. The other was sprawled on the floor face down, he said, pajama pants pulled to her knees, bottom exposed, semen smeared on her back. Because his job was to look for survivors, he said, he kept moving and did not document the scene. Neighbors of the two girls killed — who were sisters, 13 and 16 — said their bodies had been found alone, separated from the rest of their family. The Israeli military allowed the paramedic to speak with reporters on the condition that he not be identified because he serves in an elite unit. Many of the dead were brought to the Shura military base, in central Israel, for identification. Here, too, witnesses said they saw signs of sexual violence. Shari Mendes, an architect called up as a reserve soldier to help prepare the bodies of female soldiers for burial, said she had seen four with signs of sexual violence, including some with “a lot of blood in their pelvic areas.” Shari Mendes, an architect who was called up as a reserve soldier to help handle the bodies of female troops, in a container used to hold bodies before their removal to a morgue at the Shura military base in central Israel. A dentist, Captain Maayan, who worked at the same identification center, said that she had seen at least 10 bodies of female soldiers from Gaza observation posts with signs of sexual violence. Captain Maayan asked to be identified only by her rank and surname because of the sensitivity of the subject. She said she had seen several bodies with cuts in their vaginas and underwear soaked in blood and one whose fingernails had been pulled out. The investigation The Israeli authorities have no shortage of video evidence from the Oct. 7 attacks. They have gathered hours of footage from Hamas body cameras, dashcams, security cameras and mobile phones showing Hamas terrorists killing civilians and many images of mutilated bodies. But Moshe Fintzy, a deputy superintendent and senior spokesman of Israel’s national police, said, “We have zero autopsies, zero,” making an O with his right hand. In the aftermath of the attack, police officials said, forensic examiners were dispatched to the Shura military base to help identify the hundreds of bodies — Israeli officials say around 1,200 people were killed that day. The examiners worked quickly to give the agonized families of the missing a sense of closure and to determine, by a process of elimination, who was dead and who was being held hostage in Gaza. According to Jewish tradition, funerals are held promptly. The result was that many bodies with signs of sexual abuse were put to rest without medical examinations, meaning that potential evidence now lies buried in the ground. International forensic experts said that it would be possible to recover some evidence from the corpses, but that it would be difficult. Mr. Fintzy said Israeli security forces were still finding imagery that shows women were brutalized. Sitting at his desk at an imposing police building in Jerusalem, he swiped open his phone, tapped and produced the video of the two soldiers shot in the vagina, which he said was recorded by Hamas gunmen and recently recovered by Israeli soldiers. A colleague sitting next to him, Mirit Ben Mayor, a police chief superintendent, said she believed that the brutality against women was a combination of two ferocious forces, “the hatred for Jews and the hatred for women.” Some emergency medical workers now wish they had documented more of what they saw. In interviews, they said they had moved bodies, cut off zip ties and cleaned up scenes of carnage. Trying to be respectful to the dead, they inadvertently destroyed evidence. Many volunteers working for ZAKA, the emergency response team, are religious Jews and operate under strict rules that command deep respect for the dead. “I did not take pictures because we are not allowed to take pictures,” said Yossi Landau, a ZAKA volunteer. “In retrospect, I regret it.” There are at least three women and one man who were sexually assaulted and survived, according to Gil Horev, a spokesman for Israel’s Ministry of Welfare and Social Affairs. “None of them has been willing to come physically for treatment,” he said. Two therapists said they were working with a woman who was gang raped at the rave and was in no condition to talk to investigators or reporters. Yossi Landau, a volunteer with the nonprofit ZAKA emergency response team, said he had not taken pictures of the bodies because it was not allowed. “In retrospect, I regret it,” he added. The trauma from sexual assault can be so heavy that sometimes survivors do not speak about it for years, several rape counselors said. “Many people are looking for the golden evidence, of a woman who will testify about what happened to her. But don’t look for that, don’t put this pressure on this woman,” said Orit Sulitzeanu, executive director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel. “The corpses tell the story.” The woman in the black dress One of the last images of Ms. Abdush alive — captured by a security camera mounted on her front door — shows her leaving home with her husband, Nagi, at 2:30 a.m. on Oct. 7 for the rave. He was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt. She was dressed in a short black dress, a black shawl tied around her waist and combat boots. As she struts out, she takes a swig from a glass (her brother-in-law remembers it was Red Bull and vodka) and laughs. You’ve got to live life like it’s your last moments. That was her motto, her sisters said. At daybreak, hundreds of terrorists closed in on the party from several directions, blocking the highways leading out. The couple jumped into their Audi, dashing off a string of messages as they moved. “We’re on the border,” Ms. Abdush wrote to her family. “We’re leaving.” “Explosions.” Her husband made his own calls to his family, leaving a final audio message for his brother, Nissim, at 7:44 a.m. “Take care of the kids,” he said. “I love you.” Gunshots rang out, and the message stopped. That night, Eden Wessely, a car mechanic, drove to the rave site with three friends and found Ms. Abdush sprawled half naked on the road next to her burned car, about nine miles north of the site. She did not see the body of Mr. Abdush. Eden Wessely, a car mechanic, drove to the rave site looking for a missing friend but instead found Ms. Abdush sprawled half naked on the road next to her burned car. She saw other burned cars and other bodies, and shot videos of several — hoping that they would help people to identify missing relatives. When she posted the video of the woman in the black dress on her Instagram story, she was deluged with messages. “Hi, based on your description of the woman in the black dress, did she have blonde hair?” one message read. “Eden, the woman you described with the black dress, do you remember the color of her eyes?” another said. Some members of the Abdush family saw that video and another version of it filmed by one of Ms. Wessely’s friends. They immediately suspected that the body was Ms. Abdush, and based on the way her body was found, they feared that she might have been raped. But they kept alive a flicker of hope that somehow, it wasn’t true. The videos caught the eye of Israeli officials as well — very quickly after Oct. 7 they began gathering evidence of atrocities. They included footage of Ms. Abdush’s body in a presentation made to foreign governments and media organizations, using Ms. Abdush as a representation of violence committed against women that day. A screenshot from a video showing Ms. Abdush’s body.Credit...Eden Wessely A week after her body was found, three government social workers appeared at the gate of the family’s home in Kiryat Ekron, a small town in central Israel. They broke the news that Ms. Abdush, 34, had been found dead. But the only document the family received was a one-page form letter from Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, expressing his condolences and sending a hug. The body of Mr. Abdush, 35, was identified two days after his wife’s. It was badly burned and investigators determined who he was based on a DNA sample and his wedding ring. The couple had been together since they were teenagers. To the family, it seems only yesterday that Mr. Abdush was heading off to work to fix water heaters, a bag of tools slung over his shoulder, and Ms. Abdush was cooking up mashed potatoes and schnitzel for their two sons, Eliav, 10, and Refael, 7. The boys are now orphans. They were sleeping over at an aunt’s the night their parents were killed. Ms. Abdush’s mother and father have applied for permanent custody, and everyone is chipping in to help. Night after night, Ms. Abdush’s mother, Eti Bracha, lies in bed with the boys until they drift off. A few weeks ago, she said she tried to quietly leave their bedroom when the younger boy stopped her. “Grandma,” he said, “I want to ask you a question.” “Honey,” she said, “you can ask anything.” “Grandma, how did mom die?” Ms. Abdush’s parents, Eti Bracha, 56, and her husband, Eli, 60. Jeffrey Gettleman is an international correspondent and a winner of the Pulitzer Prize. He is the author of “Love, Africa,” a memoir. More about Jeffrey Gettleman Jeffrey Gettleman, Anat Schwartz and Adam Sella reported from across Israel and interviewed more than 150 people. A version of this article appears in print on Dec. 31, 2023, Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: ‘Screams Without Words’: Sexual Violence on Oct. 7. Copyright 2023 The New York Times Company

Plateau State, Nigeria Governor Caleb Mutfwang. credit Politics Nigeria “Killings in Plateau not farmer-herder clash, but genocide” – Gov Mutfwang Politics Nigeria January 1, 2024 By Jerry Wright-Ukwu Plateau State Governor Caleb Mutfwang has stated that the latest violence in the state is not a farmers-herders clash but a genocide. The governor expressed regret that the state ended the year 2023 with sadness, as more than 400 citizens were killed between April and December. In a New Year broadcast to the people, Mutfwang said that it’s unbelievable that “From small eruptions of conflict sometime in 2001, no one could have imagined that our dear state would witness such unquantifiable bloodshed of innocent lives, some known and others unknown.” He also expressed sadness that Plateau State has become the cynosure of the whole nation and the world for the wrong reasons. His words: “While it is true that we ended the year 2023 on a sad note because of the many precious lives we lost, including but not limited to over 400 between April and June 2023, as well as the over 160 in the recent Christmas genocide. “These unprovoked and simultaneous attacks in different villages were clearly premeditated and coordinated. “These series of attacks on our people are a clear case of criminality, insurgency and terrorism and must be seen and handled in that manner if we must succeed in halting this wanton destruction of lives and property. “For the avoidance of doubt, it is a misrepresentation of facts to describe these needless and unprovoked attacks on our people as a Farmer-Herder clash, as has always been the traditional narrative. Let us call a spade a spade; this is simple genocide! “Let me use this medium again to commiserate with my dear Plateau People on these monumental killings, especially the affected communities and the families of the deceased. “My heart goes out to you, and be assured that my family, the entire government and I deeply share in your grief. We will not rest on our oars but will tirelessly collaborate with the Federal Government to end these tragedies and bring succour to affected persons and communities. “As a mark of honour for the memory of the deceased, I wish to declare a week of mourning from 1st January to 8th January 2024. During this period of mourning, flags will fly at half-mast. “I urge all citizens to use these days for intense prayers to seek the intervention of the Almighty God in defending our territories and against wicked men that have risen against us. I wish to plead with our Muslim clerics to dedicate Friday, 5th January 2024, and our Christian Clergy to use Sunday, 7th January 2024, as a special prayer day for lasting peace to return to the Plateau. Monday, 8th January 2024, will be our official state day of mourning. “It is gratifying that despite these onslaughts, our spirits are not broken. Our resolve to defend our land and prosper therein has remained unshakeable. I am, therefore, confident that 2024 will reveal our inner strength and resilience in the face of these tribulations.” The governor said that despite the gloomy end of 2023, the state has recorded some tangible gains starting from 29th May 2023, when he was sworn into office. Copyright 2023 Politics Nigeria

The government banned the protest march organised by the opposition By Byobe Malenga & Emery Makumeno BBC News Police in the Democratic Republic of Congo have clashed with opposition supporters demanding that last week's presidential poll be annulled. Leading opposition candidates have denounced the election as a sham and have demanded a rerun. Several people were wounded as police fired tear gas and threw stones back at protesters in the capital, Kinshasa. The government banned the protest, saying it would not tolerate attempts to undermine the electoral process. Election officials have so far not said exactly how many polling stations opened or how many people voted in the 20 December election. About 44 million people were registered to vote at about 75,000 polling stations. With just over nine million ballots counted so far, President Felix Tshisekedi is in the lead with almost 80% of the vote as he seeks a second term. Football tycoon and mining magnate Moïse Katumbi is trailing him with about 16%. Former oil executive Martin Fayulu, who claims he was robbed of victory in the 2018 election, is in third place with about 4%..Mr Fayulu's supporters burnt tyres and clashed with police outside his campaign headquarters in Kinshasa. Police took up positions on key roads in the city and thwarted an attempted march to the headquarters of the electoral commission. Mr Fayulu said that 11 of his supporters were injured, while police reported two injuries on their side. The election was marred by logistical delays and administrative chaos, forcing voting to be extended to a second day in some parts of the country. The opposition has also accused the electoral commission of orchestrating fraud and ballot stuffing in order to pave the way for Mr Tshisekedi to be declared the winner. The commission has denied the allegations. DR Congo is roughly four times the size of France, but lacks basic infrastructure. Even some of its main cities are not linked by road. About two-thirds of the country's 100 million population live below the poverty line, earning $2.15 (£1.70) a day or less. Voters also chose parliamentary, provincial and municipal representatives, with about 100,000 candidates in total. The elections were not held in parts of the east because of insecurity. Dozens of armed groups have been competing to control parts of the region, home to much of the country's vast mineral wealth. This includes vast reserves of cobalt, a vital part of many lithium batteries, seen as essential to a future free of fossil fuels. Opposition supporters allege that the poll has been marred by rigging The election was marred by logistical delays and administrative chaos, forcing voting to be extended to a second day in some parts of the country. The opposition has also accused the electoral commission of orchestrating fraud and ballot stuffing in order to pave the way for Mr Tshisekedi to be declared the winner. The commission has denied the allegations. DR Congo is roughly four times the size of France, but lacks basic infrastructure. Even some of its main cities are not linked by road. About two-thirds of the country's 100 million population live below the poverty line, earning $2.15 (£1.70) a day or less. Voters also chose parliamentary, provincial and municipal representatives, with about 100,000 candidates in total. The elections were not held in parts of the east because of insecurity. Dozens of armed groups have been competing to control parts of the region, home to much of the country's vast mineral wealth. This includes vast reserves of cobalt, a vital part of many lithium batteries, seen as essential to a future free of fossil fuels.

Bangladesh Opposition Party Holds Protest as It Boycotts Jan. 7 Election December 10, 2023 2:40 AM Associated Press Caption: Activists of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party gather for a protest in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Oct. 28, 2023. DHAKA, BANGLADESH — Hundreds of opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party supporters protested Sunday to mark International Human Rights Day, as the country gears up for a general election on Jan. 7 that the opposition says should be held under a nonpartisan, caretaker government. The party, led by former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, is boycotting the election, leaving voters in the South Asian nation of 166 million with little choice but to re-elect Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's Awami League for a fourth consecutive term. At Sunday's protest in front of the National Press Club in downtown Dhaka, opposition activists said they do not think a fair and free election can take place under Hasina's watch. The gathering took place weeks after a massive opposition rally on Oct. 28 turned violent. The party's decision to boycott the polls comes amid a monthslong crackdown that has reportedly seen hundreds of opposition politicians jailed and critics silenced, an allegation authorities have denied. Demonstrators on Sunday carried banners that read "Human chain of family members of the victims of murder and enforced disappearances" and "We want the unconditional release of all prisoners." After the Oct. 28 rally, authorities arrested thousands of party leaders and activists including Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir. Many others have gone into hiding, and hundreds have been convicted by courts on charges of violence or subversive acts that the opposition says are politically motivated. New York-based Human Rights Watch in a report last month put the number of arrested opposition activists at 10,000 since Oct. 28 and said that at least 16 people including two police officers died during the period of violence. Ruhul Kabir Rizvi, joint secretary general of Zia's party, told a video conference from hiding that the government has arrested or punished political leaders and activists under fictitious charges to ensure a lopsided election result. He urged the people to boycott "the stage-managed election" that he said would deepen the country's political crisis and push it toward danger. "The upcoming one-sided election is not just a renewal of Sheikh Hasina's power, but a license to destroy Bangladesh," he said. While critics have slammed the election as a farce, the government has rejected allegations of a crackdown on the opposition and says the polls will be democratically held and inclusive. "Our stand is very clear. Those who are involved in acts of sabotage or arson attacks, those who attacked police and killed them, are being dealt with on specific charges. We clearly reject the claim that there has been any crackdown against the opposition party," Mohammad A. Arafat, a ruling party lawmaker and member of the International Affairs Committee, told The Associated Press. "It has no relation with the election. It's a constitutional mandate to hold the election on time. It's a matter of their choice to join the polls. But they are resorting to violence in the name of protests, rather than joining the race," he said. The election will be the country's 12th after it gained independence from Pakistan in 1971. In the 2008 election, the main challenger BNP and its allies won more than 40% of the vote, but lost to Awami League, which got an absolute majority. Subsequent elections took place in 2014 — which Zia's party boycotted — and again in 2018 under Hasina's administration, but the opposition rejected the results, saying the election was rigged. Hasina rejected the allegations. This time again, while candidates from 29 out of 44 registered political parties have filed nominations, no one from Zia's party is contesting the polls. After a review, the country's Election Commission accepted 1,985 nominations and rejected 731 for a total of 300 constituencies. Media reports say many independent candidates belong to the ruling Awami League party, which has encouraged them to contest the election to make it look competitive. The events have drawn concern from observers at home and abroad over the health of democracy in Bangladesh, even as it transforms into an economic success story under Hasina. Hasina's administration has faced pressure from Western democracies, especially from the United States, while the United Nations and the European Union have also pressed for a free, fair and inclusive election. "Specifically, we have emphasized that it is important to have free and fair elections that all stakeholders have the ability to participate peacefully. The holding of free and fair elections is the responsibility of everyone — all political parties, voters, the government, the security forces, and the media," a U.S. State Department spokesperson said in an email to The Associated Press. Analyst Iftekhar Zaman, the head of the anti-corruption group Transparency International Bangladesh, said the election may be held on time but it will be "non-inclusive" and "morally void." During the last election in 2018, Joydeb Sana, a private security guard working at a five-story apartment building in the capital, Dhaka, traveled to his ancestral village in southwestern Bangladesh to cast his vote. But on election day, he found that someone else had already cast his vote. "I don't know who did it. In the end my candidate won the election and Sheikh Hasina became the prime minister. I was happy for that, but I could not vote for my candidate, and that was upsetting," Sana told the AP. He hopes he can cast his own vote this time. "It's my right to vote for my preferred candidate. Last time I was deprived of that," he said. Copyright 2023. All Rights Reserved. VOA News and Associated Press.

The Ugandan police inform the population about the risks of terrorism By Rédaction Africanews with AFP An elderly woman and two children died when their house was burnt down on Monday by suspected Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebels affiliated with the Islamic State group, in a village in western Uganda, local authorities said on Tuesday. The attack took place in a remote village in the Kamwenge district, already the scene of an attack a week earlier attributed to the ADF in which ten villagers were killed and burnt. According to the Kamwenge district commissioner, Isiah Byarugaba, interviewed by AFP, the attackers set fire to a house in which the victims were staying. "The ADF rebels killed three people, an elderly woman and two of her grandchildren. They were burnt to death in their house last night", he said. He added that the army and police were in pursuit of the rebels. "We are on the ground to assess the situation and we are mobilizing the local community to prevent such cowardly attacks by ADF terrorists against innocent civilians", he added. Originally Ugandan rebels with a Muslim majority, the ADF have been active since the mid-1990s in the eastern DRC, where they have killed thousands of civilians. In 2019, they pledged allegiance to the EI, which now claims some of their actions and presents them as its "central African province". Uganda and the DRC launched a joint offensive in 2021 to drive the ADF out of their Congolese strongholds, but have so far failed to put an end to the group's attacks. In October, two tourists, a British man and a South African woman on their honeymoon, as well as their guide, were killed in Queen Elizabeth Park (west) in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group. In June, 42 people, including 37 pupils, were killed in a secondary school in western Uganda in an attack also attributed to the ADF. Copyright 2023  Rédaction Africanews /AFP

It is the second attack in two weeks by the RED-Tabara rebels, who have been largely inactive inside Burundi since 2021. The attack targeted nine homes in a western town along the border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo [Jerome Delay/AP] Gunmen have killed at least 20 people and wounded nine others near Burundi’s western border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), an official has told reporters. Those killed in the Friday evening raid on the town of Vugizo included 12 children, two pregnant women and a police officer, government spokesperson Jérôme Niyonzima said on Saturday. The attack was claimed by the RED-Tabara rebel group, considered a “terrorist” group by the Burundian authorities. The attack targeted nine homes in the town, close to the Lake Tanganyika border with the DRC. At least nine others wounded in the attack have been hospitalised. The RED-Tabara rebel group, which has been battling Burundi’s government from bases in the eastern DRC since 2015, claimed on the social media platform X to have killed nine soldiers and one police officer. The group denied having targeted civilians. Local residents said they heard sounds of gunfire and explosions during the attack. Witnesses who spoke to the Associated Press said the rebels appeared to be wearing Burundian Army uniforms and civilians were “left to their own devices” after the military and police fled. “We realised they were attackers when they attacked the police position guarding the border,” said Priscille Kanyange, a farmer. “Many people here were injured by bullets [as they were] trying to flee.” Another farmer, Innocent Hajayandi, who witnessed the attack, said security forces fled, “leaving the residents to their own devices”. André Kabura, a grocery shop owner who was wounded in both legs in the gunfire, said the military and police were slow to regroup and fend off the attackers. Two military and security sources told the AFP news agency the attack targeted “a military position”. “The civilians were caught in the crossfire and were killed, and then the assailants retreated to DRC,” a senior military official told the AFP on condition of anonymity, confirming the toll of 20. The attack was the second in as many weeks inside Burundi by the rebels, who have not been active inside the country since September 2021, when they carried out a series of attacks, including on the Bujumbura airport. Since then, their activities have been taking place in the DRC’s South Kivu province. But on December 11, they exchanged fire with the military in northwestern Burundi. On Friday, Burundian President Évariste Ndayishimiye told army, police and intelligence officers to remain vigilant, warning that “the enemy never sleeps even if we have security”. © 2023 Al Jazeera Media Network