State torture routine in Africa, says Amnesty
LONDON, May 30 (AFP) -
Torture is a routine fact of life in Africa, with governments appearing to condone the practice by their failure to remedy the situation, the human rights group Amnesty International warned Wednesday.
In its annual report, which covers the whole of last year, the organisation said the challenge facing the world today was "to hold states accountable for their conduct."
One of the latest examples, given in an update to the report, was the arrest in February 2001 of nine adolescents in Douala, Cameroon. They were taken to a detention facility belonging to an elite security corps, and there has been no word of them since, Amnesty said.
Local non-governmental organisations have, however, reported "large-scale extra-judicial executions" in Douala by the corps.
Amnesty said torture was reported in 32 countries in Africa last year, whether carried out by police, security forces or other state authorities.
Confirmed or suspected extra-judical executions were carried out in 24 countries, while people were arbitrarily arrested and detained in 25.
"The pattern that emerged was of torture being used almost on a routine basis by security operatives and where governments, by failing to remedy the situation, appeared to condone the practice," Amnesty said.
"In countries such as Cameroon, Liberia and Sudan, criminal suspects were routinely assaulted and subjected to vicious and prolonged periods of torture.
"The practice was endemic among security forces and resulted in many deaths in custody."
The organisation concluded: "The failure to call human rights violators to account led directly to continued abuses, thus illustrating a frightening degree of casualness and sense of impunity amongst security forces."
Amnesty's report listed a catalogue of armed and inter-ethnic conflicts.
In Burundi, Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan, war resulted in large-scale killing of civilians as well as rape, torture, disappearances and massive population displacements.
Both government and rebel forces were responsible. Refugees had nowhere to go. In Guinea, hundreds of thousands who had fled the conflict in Sierra Leone suffered "appalling atrocities" such as rape, abduction and amputation.
Sudanese government forces pursued a "scorched-earth strategy" by forcibly displacing civilians in areas of the south with oilfields. All parties to the conflict in Sudan were guilty of gross human rights abuses, including abduction, enslavement and indiscriminate bombing, Amnesty said.
In Nigeria, the introduction of Sharia law in some northern states led to harsh corporal punishment for offences including drinking alcohol.
Politically motivated harassment of opponents remained "public policy" in Kenya, Tanzania, Cameroon, Togo, Liberia, Burkina Faso and particularly in Zimbabwe.
But there were signs of hope too across the continent, Amnesty stressed.
It pointed to international pressure which forced the Burundian government to dismantle so-called "regroupment" camps into which as many as 350,000 civilians had been forced.
Action was also taken to halt the trade in diamonds used to buy arms in Angola and Sierra Leone. A UN resolution was passed in March this year to ban diamond exports from Liberia unless it ceased supporting Sierra Leone rebels.
Finally, the UN Security Council resolved to establish a special court for Sierra Leone. A joint UN-Organisation of African Unity team was appointed to investigate hundreds of alleged extra-judicial executions.
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