Web pages about "Children"

Rape in Burundi – demand justice now!

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 15:31:20 +0100

13 year old Kaneza (not her real name) from the province of Bujumbura rural was raped by a 22-year-old man in September 2007. Kaneza didn’t tell anyone about the rape, until she found that she was pregnant. She told her uncle's wife, who immediately reported the rape to the police.

The alleged perpetrator was arrested and questioned, and confessed to the rape. Kaneza’s family thought that this would be enough to prosecute the perpetrator, though he was released several days later.

Local human rights activists have reported that the father of the perpetrator approached the Public Prosecutor of Bujumbura Rural and proposed an out-of-court settlement.

When the family spoke to the Prosecutor of Bujumbura Rural, he forced them to agree to an "amicable settlement" and cease legal proceedings. Kaneza’s family complained to the judicial authorities in Bujumbura, the capital of Burundi.

The Prosecutor was then ordered by them to re-arrest the alleged perpetrator. He didn’t do this, but instead detained Kaneza for several hours and threatened her.

Kaneza recently gave birth to a child. The man who allegedly raped her remains free.

Rape is widespread throughout Burundi, though many cases, like that of Kaneza, remain unprosecuted. Women are often too afraid to even report the crime out of fear that their families and communities will reject them.

The justice system is flawed. The police and judiciary often fail to investigate reports of rape and other sexual assaults or prosecute those accused of committing such offences.

Sometimes victims are forced to withdraw their complaints and enter into negotiated settlements with the perpetrator or his family outside of the formal judicial system. Sometimes the victim is also forced to marry her attacker.

Write to the Public Prosecutor in Burundi to demand that the alleged rape of Kaneza is investigated and the suspect brought to justice.

Omar Khadr must be immediately repatriated to Canada

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 16:51:21 +0100

Reacting to today’s release of a video publicly showing Canadian citizen Omar Khadr being questioned at the US detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Amnesty International called for Khadr to be repatriated to Canada immediately.

The video is the first of a detainee being questioned in Guantanamo and shows Khadr being interrogated by Canadian officials in 2003 when he was just sixteen years old.

While he is not shown being directly ill-treated, he is shown crying, calling out for help repeatedly and showing his wounds to the officials. He is also shown as being without legal representation.

“The treatment of Omar Khadr throughout his detention violates the USA’s obligations under international law, which requires that in all actions concerning children the best interests of the child must be a primary consideration,” said Amnesty International.

“The US has violated international standards by refusing to recognize Omar Khadr’s status as a minor and treating him accordingly.”

On 19 June, Omar Khadr appeared at a military commission pre-trial hearing in Guantanamo. A trial date in his case was set for 8 October 2008.

“No one who was a child at the time of their alleged crime should be tried by military commissions, which have no juvenile justice provisions whatsoever,” said Amnesty International. “Omar Khadr should either be repatriated and tried in Canada by an ordinary court or released.”

Amnesty International said that the entire military commission system is fundamentally flawed and the tribunals must be abandoned in all cases.

Background information
Omar Khadr was detained by the US military in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was 15 years old. He has been held in Guantanamo Bay since he was 16. He is now 21.

Successive Canadian governments have repeatedly stressed that they sought and received assurances from US authorities that Omar Khadr was being treated humanely in detention at Guantánamo Bay. However, documents released on 10 July 2008 (following a December 2007 Supreme Court of Canada decision that Omar Khadr should be granted access to some of the records of his interrogation by Canadian officials in 2003 and 2004) revealed that the Canadian government was aware that he was being subjected to so-called “stress and duress” techniques. Yet, Canadian officials still proceeded with their interrogations of Omar Khadr.

To see further information about the case of Omar Khadr, please see:

USA: In whose best interests? Omar Khadr, child ‘enemy combatant’ facing military commission, 16 April 2008, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/028/2008/en

Other relevant materials:

http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/066/2008/en
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/065/2008/en
http://www.amnesty.ca/resource_centre/news/view.php?load=arcview&article=4373&c=Resource+Centre+News

USA: Omar Khadr must be immediately repatriated to Canada

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 16:40:55 +0100

The video is the first of a detainee being questioned in Guantanamo and shows Khadr being interrogated by Canadian officials in 2003 when he was just sixteen years old.

“The US has violated international standards by refusing to recognize Omar Khadr’s status as a minor and treating him accordingly.”

On 19 June, Omar Khadr appeared at a military commission pre-trial hearing in Guantanamo. A trial date in his case was set for 8 October 2008.

Amnesty International said that the entire military commission system is fundamentally flawed and the tribunals must be abandoned in all cases.

Background information
Omar Khadr was detained by the US military in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was 15 years old. He has been held in Guantanamo Bay since he was 16. He is now 21.

To see further information about the case of Omar Khadr, please see:

USA: In whose best interests? Omar Khadr, child ‘enemy combatant’ facing military commission, 16 April 2008, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/028/2008/en

Other relevant materials:

Child "enemy combatants" face Guantánamo hearings

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 11:52:09 +0100

Two people who were under 18 at the time of their detention by the US military in Afghanistan are facing military commission hearings in Guantánamo. Pre-trial hearings resumed this week in the cases of Mohammed Jawad and Omar Khadr.

These are the first commission hearings to take place since the US Supreme Court ruled last week that the Guantánamo detainees had the right to challenge their detention in the federal civilian courts. Amnesty International has an observer at the hearings.

As well as challenging the legality of the proceedings, their lawyers raised disturbing allegations of torture and ill-treatment and continuing concerns about the detainees’ physical and mental health.

Mohammed Jawad is an Afghan national who was aged 16 or 17 when detained in Kabul in December 2002. His lawyer, Air Force Major David Frakt, filed a motion to dismiss attempted murder charges against him on the ground that the US military had tortured him in Guantánamo through severe sleep deprivation and other ill-treatment.

Records revealed that Mohammed Jawad was subjected to what is known as the "frequent flyer program" in the course of a two-week period in May 2004. He was transferred to different Guantánamo cells 112 times every two hours. Mohammad Jawad had already tried to commit suicide some months before.

At the time he was subjected to the treatment, according to his lawyer, his custody records showed he had already been determined to have "no intelligence value". His record further showed only minor disciplinary infractions, such as calling out to fellow detainees in Pashto (his own language) while in isolation.

During his last appearance before a military commission in March, Amnesty International's observer noted that Mohammed Jawad was visibly agitated. At one point he removed the headphones he was wearing for interpretation, saying he had a severe headache. He put his head down on the table and did not raise it again for the rest of the proceedings.

Omar Khadr was only 15 years old when taken into US custody. The Canadian national also faces a military commission hearing today, at which the charges against him are expected to be challenged again. He is reported to have complained recently of feeling unwell and suffering dizziness, although a military health professional who visited him reported yesterday that he found him to be "in good health with no complaints or problems."

Amnesty International's observer made a request jointly with other NGO observers from Human Rights Watch, Human Rights First and the ACLU on Tuesday to be allowed to view the cells where Mohammed Jawad and Omar Khadr are currently held, because of concerns raised about the impact of their conditions on their mental and physical health. No response has yet been received from the authorities to this request.

Amnesty International has said that that no-one under 18 should ever have been transferred to Guantánamo or that anyone who was a child at the time of the alleged crime should be subjected to a military commission. Apart from fundamental flaws in the proceedings generally, the commission have no juvenile justice provisions as required under international law.

Amnesty International has called on the US authorities to abandon the fundamentally unfair military commissions in all cases; to close Guantánamo promptly and either release or charge and try the detainees held there in US federal civilian courts.

Ethiopia must release mosque attack children

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:11:14 +0100

Ethiopian forces and forces of the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia (TFG) have been accused of targeting civilians in an attack on a Mogadishu mosque on Saturday. Twenty-one people were killed in the attack, which Amnesty International has said may constitute a war crime.

Eleven of the twenty-one dead were killed inside the mosque, including the Iman Sheik Saiid Yahya, Sheik Abdullah Mohamud and a number of Tabliq Islamic scholars. At least ten other individuals were killed in the area around the mosque. Their bodies were later brought to the mosque by local residents.

Seven of the twenty-one were reported to have died after their throats were cut, a form of extra-judicial execution practised by Ethiopian forces in Somalia.

The mosque was raided during extensive conflict in the north eastern area of Mogadishu, in which a number of Ethiopian soldiers were reported to have been killed. According to eye-witnesses, the eleven killed inside the mosque were unarmed civilians taking no active part in hostilities. A spokesperson for the Ethiopian government has denied the involvement of Ethiopian troops in these killings.

Amnesty International is also concerned that approximately 41 children, estimated to range from 9 to 18 years of age, were taken by the Ethiopian military from the Al Hidya mosque where they were attending religious classes. The children are reported to be detained at the Ethiopian military base close to the pasta factory in Mogadishu. Other younger children present were not arrested.

Witnesses have told Amnesty International that Ethiopian forces said these children would be released "once they had been investigated" and "if they were not terrorists".

The Ethiopian military and TFG forces have been fighting against armed groups opposed to them for two days. The Elman Human Rights Organisation has documented 81 deaths and more than one hundred injured in the fighting. It is not known how many of these were civilians.

The attack on the mosque followed increasing attacks by armed groups opposed to the TFG on towns in southern and central Somalia. Local residents of Beledweyne City have reported that members of the Al-Shabab militia killed four teachers in an attack on 13 April. An Al-Shabab leader has claimed that the teachers were shot in crossfire.

The targeting of civilians constitutes a war crime. Amnesty International has called for international action to end impunity for crimes such as these, which are being committed in many areas of Somalia. The organization has said that the Ethiopian Government and TFG must ensure an independent investigation into these killings.

"Any Ethiopian soldiers found to be responsible must be prosecuted in accordance with international fair trial standards without use of the death penalty," said Amnesty International.

The organization is also calling on the United Nations Security Council to take action to end impunity throughout Somalia, through the establishment of an international Commission of Inquiry or similar mechanism to investigate serious human rights abuses and violations being committed in armed conflict in the country.

Darfur's children of conflict

Wed, 09 Apr 2008 17:38:48 +0100

The United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force to Darfur (UNAMID) was deployed on 31 December 2007, but little has changed for the children of the region. Since December there have been a number of attacks by government forces and armed militia.

Each attack has left men, women and children dead and displaced. Obstructions to the effective deployment of UNAMID by the Government of Sudan and armed groups have continued.

The Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), which provides the legal framework within which UNAMID operates, was signed on 9 February 2008 by the Government of Sudan and UNAMID. The force, however, still suffers from inadequate military hardware and human resources and it is not yet effectively protecting civilians.

A generation of Darfuris is growing up in extreme fear and insecurity. Of the four million people affected by the conflict in Darfur, 1.8 million are children under 18.

Of the 2.3 million people who have been displaced, one million are children. Since April 2006, the conflict has created 120,000 newly displaced children.

In February 2008, Sudanese forces and government-backed militias attacked villages in West Darfur. 800 children between the ages of 12 and 18 were left unaccounted for by the attacks.

This April, children in Darfur reaching their fifth birthdays will have never known peace. This marks five years in which the international community has failed to respond adequately to the scale of the crisis.
Many of the children living in the camps are traumatized by what they have seen. Children outside the camps live in fear of attacks on their villages. Schools have been burnt down.

The children in the camps and outside the camps are facing an uncertain future and some are recruited, forcibly or willingly, to serve as child soldiers. The climate of fear, rising domestic and sexual violence and uncertainty is compromising their security today. The lack of access to education is jeopardizing their future.

Safe Schools: every girl's right!

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 15:26:53 +0000

The key to a bright future is for girls and women is choice. Women must be free to choose the path that is right for them, a path that is out of harm’s way and allows them to move forward and realize their potential.

Education is a crucial step in this journey. It is crucial to breaking cycles of poverty, violence and disease. Education is a human right, and therefore every girl’s right.

Girls across the world find a range of barriers to education:

Girls are assaulted on the way to school, attacked in schools grounds and teased by their classmates. Some are threatened with sexual assault by other students, coerced into sex by teachers, even raped in the staff room.
In countries wracked by war, girls are at risk from armed groups and from attacks on their schools. Sexual abuse and exploitation are problems for girls living in refugee camps or displaced people’s camps.
Certain girls face an increased risk of violence at school. Certain aspects of girls’ identities, including their sexuality, status as migrants, orphans or refugees, caste, ethnicity and race, can increase their risk of abuse.
Although free primary education should be available to all children, schools around the world commonly charge user fees. Girls are more likely to be excluded than boys when there isn’t enough money to go round.

Violence leads to countless girls being kept out of school, dropping out, or not fully participating in school life. Effects range from pain and fear, to lowered self-esteem, sexually transmitted infections, unwanted pregnancies and depression. In many cases, abuses go unreported.

The problem is exacerbated by the fact that girls often choose not to report what continues to be a taboo issue in some societies, or for fear of retaliation. That leaves such acts under-reported and allows their perpetrators to go unpunished.

There is no justification for the lack of action. The issue is not about resources but political will. Governments, teachers and school authorities must work to prevent violence against girls in schools, must promptly investigate reports of abuse, impose appropriate punishments on offenders, support those who have suffered from violence to recover and ensure that such abuses do not recur.

Join Amnesty International’s campaign to protect girls’ rights to safety, equality and education. Make schools safe for girls.

READ MORE:
Safe Schools
Stop Violence Against Women

Children and civilian bystanders in Gaza death toll

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 16:06:57 +0000

Israeli military air strikes and artillery attacks on the Gaza Strip during the last few days have killed over 100 Palestinians, including dozens of children and other civilian bystanders. Three Israelis – a civilian killed by a rocket fired by a Palestinian armed group on 27 February and two soldiers – were also killed.

Many of the Palestinians killed were militants involved in attacks on Israel, but others were unarmed civilians taking no part in the hostilities, including some 25 children. The precise number of civilians killed is unclear and difficult to establish.

The Israeli chief of staff is reported to have claimed that 90 percent of those killed were militants, but the UN and other sources, including those in Gaza, suggest that as many as half of the dead were civilians. More than 250 other people, including scores of unarmed civilians, have been injured.

Israeli forces also destroyed houses and property across the Gaza Strip, including at least two medical facilities, before withdrawing on 3 March.

Amnesty International said on Sunday that the Israeli military air strikes and artillery attacks on the Gaza Strip were being carried out with reckless disregard for civilian life, and called on Israel to put an immediate end to such disproportionate and reckless attacks.

"Israel has a legal obligation to protect the civilian population of Gaza,” said Malcolm Smart, director of Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa Programme. “These attacks are disproportionate and go beyond lawful measures which Israeli forces may take in response to rocket attacks by Palestinian armed groups."

This latest cycle of killings and destruction comes at a time when the 1.5 million inhabitants of Gaza are confronting a humanitarian crisis as a result of the increasingly stringent blockade imposed by Israel on Gaza.

Hospitals and medical facilities, already facing severe difficulties in coping with shortages of electricity, fuel, equipment and spare parts due to the Israeli blockade, are struggling to cope with the new influx of casualties caused by Israeli attacks in the last few days.

With Gaza's borders sealed, many patients in dire need of medical care that is not available in Gaza cannot be transferred to hospitals abroad and risk losing their lives.

In the past two months, Israeli forces have killed more than 230 Palestinians in Gaza, including scores of unarmed civilians, and wounded and maimed many others. During the same period, Palestinian armed groups have continued to fire qassam and other rockets indiscriminately at Israel from the Gaza Strip, mostly towards the town of Sderot but also, last week, the more distant town of Ashkelon.

One Israeli civilian has been killed and several injured by such rockets fired from Gaza into Sderot and other areas by Palestinian armed groups.

Amnesty International has again called on Hamas and the Palestinian Authority to ensure that Palestinian armed groups cease immediately from carrying out indiscriminate attacks against Israel, and for those responsible to be held to account.

"It is high time that the leaders of Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA) took effective steps to prevent and punish attacks on civilians in Israel," said Malcolm Smart, "but their failure to do so does not make it legitimate for the Israeli authorities to launch reckless air and artillery strikes which wreak such death and destruction among Palestinian civilians.

"At the same time, the Palestinian armed groups who launch frequent rocket attacks from Gaza into nearby Israeli towns not only show a callous disregard for the lives of Israeli civilians but also expose the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip to the danger of Israeli attacks."

Malcolm Smart said that Amnesty International condemned all attacks on civilians, but that "unlawful attacks by one side cannot justify violations by the other."

Rape: ever present danger for Darfur's women

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 17:14:09 +0000

"All around the camps there is not enough wood. But the Arab Jammala dominate the area and we daren’t go far out. If you are a man you will be beaten, if you are a woman you will be raped." – Internally displaced man living in a camp, 2007.

At least 2.3 million people have been displaced by the conflict in Darfur. Most of those driven from their homes and communities are now living in more than 65 camps dotted around Darfur.

Hundreds of thousands of people were driven from their home in 2003-4 in attacks that were accompanied not only by killing, but also by rape of women on an unprecedented scale.

Janjawid militias used rape as a weapon to humiliate and punish the communities they attacked. They often carried out assaults in public and abducting some women, taking them to militia camps to live for months in sexual slavery.

There are more women living in camps than men and the threat of rape remains rife for those who venture outside the camps. Many of the camps are surrounded by belts of deserted land with hardly a tree standing. Rapes are carried out on women who leave the camps to go to market or collect firewood. They are carried out by Janjawid militia, government soldiers, armed opposition groups and even by other displaced people.

One girl displaced during the conflict told of being raped by a group of men from the Sudanese army while collecting fire wood. When her brother took her to report this to the local police, the policeman refused to report the case and detained her brother when he questioned the procedure.

"The images of that day occupied my mind. I can’t say I have completely recovered. The shock is still terrible. I don’t trust the police and I never will trust them," said the girl to Amnesty International.

Most women raped in Darfur never report what has happened because it’s so unlikely that the perpetrator will be brought to justice that there’s little point in a woman harming her reputation and prospects of marriage.

Police rarely investigate cases of rape reported to them, while if the alleged rapists are members of the Sudanese Armed Forces, justice appears to be impossible. In some instances, it is the person who makes the complaint who is detained.

Sudan: Anger rises as insecurity worsens for Darfur’s displaced children

Mon, 21 Jan 2008 17:35:28 +0000

As UN forces end their third week of operations in Darfur, Amnesty International today warned that the security situation for internally displaced people in Darfur is on a knife-edge and warned that a generation of Darfuris is growing up in extreme fear and insecurity in camps awash with weapons – a potentially explosive combination.

The stark warning came as the organization released a report, Displaced in Darfur – A generation of anger, outlining the current state of insecurity in camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Darfur and the potential consequences and possible remedies.

“Almost all of the camps in Darfur are flooded with weapons. The security situation in and outside of the camps continues to deteriorate, as hopes of a political resolution to the Darfur conflict recede and hostilities between the government and armed groups continues to escalate,” said Tawanda Hondora, Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Africa Programme.

“The welfare of displaced people continues to be ignored while armed groups and the government bicker and impede the complete deployment of UNAMID [hybrid AU-UN mission in Darfur] forces,” said Hondora. “There can be no durable peace without ensuring that the security and human rights of these people are respected and upheld.”

Armed groups continue to use the camps to recruit fighters – including children.

“Darfuri youth live in a situation where there appears to be no hope for the present or future. Angry and frustrated, some of them join armed groups,” said Hondora.

“Ali,” an internally displaced person in Abu Shouk camp, told Amnesty International: “The boys of 18 – they are lost. They have no work, especially the graduates, they live on relief.”

The internally displaced in Darfur have been left largely unprotected. The African Union force that was supposed to protect them was outmanned and outgunned by Janjawid and armed opposition groups who attacked them.

“The same fate will befall UNAMID forces unless clear signals are sent to the warring parties that any attacks on UNAMID and civilians are not acceptable” said Hondora. “In addition, urgent steps must be taken to ensure that the government of Sudan removes all impediments to the complete deployment of UNAMID forces. The international community must also adequately strengthen UNAMID’s resource capacity, including through the provision of ground and air transport equipment.”

The Sudanese army and police, on the other hand – who are also meant to protect civilians – are seen as antagonistic rather than protective by the IDPs, who they often arbitrarily arrest outside IDP camps on suspicion of being members of armed opposition groups.

Some camps, such as Kalma, have members of as many as 29 different ethnic groups. Most Kalma camp residents have arms. Amnesty International has learned that many of the youth in the camp have formed vigilante groups based on their ethnic origin – Fur, Masalit, Zaghawa and Dajo. The UN recorded more than 10 armed incidents in Kalma camp between 16 and 22 October 2007, saying that “Much of the violence has been attributed to armed Fur, including children, against other ethnic groups in the camp.”

“The presence of weapons in the camps has worsened an already volatile security situation for everyone,” said Hondora. “In some IDP camps, a revolver can be bought for only US $25 – leading to widespread incidents of robbery and assault. In this charged atmosphere of anger, fear, insecurity and political disagreements, quarrels often turn tragic.”

Displaced women are at constant risk of rape when they venture outside their camps to find firewood or food. Although most victims of rape accuse Janjawid militia, there are also reports of rape being committed by members of the Sudanese army, the police and other armed opposition groups – including SLA/MM soldiers. Women also say that they are sometimes raped by displaced men inside the IDP camps.

“Mahmud,” an internally displaced person in al-Jeneina, told Amnesty International: “Women are still going out to collect firewood, which is a danger to them as they may be raped. But we men are still letting them go because the men who collect firewood may be killed.”

Amnesty International called on UNAMID to ensure the protection of the internally displaced, including by stationing units near each camp and by constant patrolling – including accompanying people collecting firewood.

“UNAMID must be given the resources to fully ensure the protection of all civilians in Darfur,” said Hondora. “In addition, all parties to the conflict must immediately stop attacking civilians and facilitate the deployment of UNAMID forces to all affected areas.”

Please click here to see the full report Sudan: Displaced in Darfur – a generation of anger.