Gervais Sindatuma, a former Hutu officer in the Burundi army, is in detention in Bururi barracks. AI believes he is a prisoner of conscience, detained solely on account of his ethnic origin, and fears that he is at risk of torture, “disappearance” and extrajudicial execution. He was set to become the first Hutu army officer before the 1993 coup attempt and was forced to leave the academy because of threats from Tutsi colleagues. Despite a ruling by the martial court, he was dismissed from the army and was arrested without warrant on 14 May 1996.
