The Wire- September 2001

Contents

China's execution frenzy

Notorious detention centre burns down

Police brutality in Genoa

UN fails to guarantee justice and human rights in East Timor

Freedom of expression under attack in Togo

Worldwide appeals

News in brief

AI at a crossroads, says new Secretary General

A victory for Brazilian justice

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September 2001 issue of The Wire.

AI Index: NWS 21/007/2001

China's execution frenzy

Even as the international spotlight was focussed on China's bid for the 2008 Olympic Games, the Chinese authorities embarked upon a frenzy of executions as part of their latest ''Strike Hard'' campaign against crime. Between April and July this year at least 1,781 people were executed — more in three months than in the rest of the world for the last three years. A total of 2,960 people have been sentenced to death across the country during this period for crimes as diverse as bribery, pimping, embezzlement, tax fraud, robbing petrol and selling harmful foodstuffs, as well as violent crimes. Hundreds have been executed for drug offences under the slogan ''treasure life, reject drugs''.

For those sentenced during the ''Strike Hard'' campaign ''justice'' is swift and ruthless. Under pressure to produce results, police have been reporting extraordinary ''successes''. In Hunan province during a ''Spring Thunder'' operation from 23-25 April, police boasted of ''solving 3,000 cases'' in two days. In Sichuan province, police reported that they had ''cracked'' 6,704 cases including 691 murders, robberies or bombings in six days from 19-24 April, apprehending 19,446 people.

Under such circumstances, the possibilities of miscarriages of justice and the execution of innocent people are immense. Police and prosecutors have been urged to cut corners, and not to ''get entangled in the detail'', so as to achieve ''quick approval, quick arrest, quick trial and quick results''. At meetings to prepare for ''Strike Hard'', lawyers were reportedly called on to cooperate with the police and prosecution, and not to hold up the judicial process. Courts have boasted of their speed and ''special procedures'' during the campaign.

Many of those sentenced are likely to have been tortured in order to extract ''confessions''. There are also persistent allegations of organs being harvested for transplantation from the bodies of the executed without consent.

Ironically, sports stadiums were the last places where many of those condemned to death were taken, to be subjected to ritual humiliation in front of large crowds, just before being executed. In the past stadiums like the Beijing's Workers' Stadium, which may be used as the Olympic football venue in 2008, have hosted such macabre events. Other condemned prisoners are paraded through the streets past thousands of people on the way to execution by firing squad in nearby fields or courtyards.

Tens of thousands of arrested suspects and thousands assigned to ''re-education through labour'' without charge or trial have also been subject to public humiliation at ''sentencing rallies''. In most Chinese cities, invited audiences, often numbering several thousand, are required to attend such rallies to learn to obey the law and the government. One rally in Yunnan province was reportedly broadcast live on state television and 1,800,000 spectators are said to have attended rallies in Shaanxi in April and May 2001 alone.

Not for many years have mass rallies and sentencing been seen on this scale. Like other ''Strike Hard'' campaigns before it, this crackdown is unlikely to have a lasting impact on China's growing crime problem.

AI believes that rising crime rates in China show the failure of the death penalty as an effective crime deterrent and calls for this callous and counterproductive policy to be replaced with more effective and humane criminal punishments, in line with global trends. It appeals to the Chinese government to demonstrate that it upholds the spirit of ''fair play'' and respects the human rights of the people of China.

Notorious detention centre burns down

Paraguayan government's inaction made tragedy inevitable

Panchito López juvenile detention centre in Asunción, Paraguay, has been destroyed by fire. Several youths at the centre suffered from smoke inhalation.

The fire was said to have broken out during a protest by inmates following an incident in which a guard shot a detainee. It was not the first time that youths at the centre had started fires to draw attention to their horrendous treatment. On 11 February 2000, nine inmates died as the result of a fire started in a similar protest following a particularly severe beating by two of the guards of several of the cell's occupants.

One of the world's most notorious juvenile detention centres, Panchito López was universally condemned for the appalling conditions in which its prisoners were held. At the time of the latest fire, on 25 July 2001, more than 240 juveniles were crammed into the facility, which was built to accommodate 80 inmates. Some 90 per cent of them had not even been convicted of a crime but were in pre-trial detention. Many had spent months or even years awaiting trial in filthy and severely overcrowded cells with few toilets or washing facilities. In some cells the inmates had to sleep three to a bed and temperatures could hover at around 40ºC (100ºF) for weeks on end. A journalist who visited the facility noted that each child got about the same amount of personal space ''as that covered by a newspaper''.

There were consistent reports of physical abuse by guards. These included boys being kicked, beaten, suspended upside down, having plastic bags put over their heads, being beaten on the back with a hammer or having their feet scalded. Some children reported being denied food, drink or access to toilets — sometimes for several days.

Yet despite international pressure, and the protests of the inmates, the government of Paraguay failed to act on repeated promises to close the centre. The latest fire was the perhaps inevitable result of their inaction.

The 240 children detained in Panchito López at the time of the fire have been sent to a number of adult prisons, including the high security prison at Emboscada, where conditions are known to be equally unfit for juveniles. AI urges the government to provide immediately adequate facilities which conform to international standards for all the children previously held at Panchito López and to carry out an exhaustive and impartial investigation into the fire and the incident that provoked it.

Police brutality on the streets of Genoa

AI calls for a comprehensive and effective investigation after G8 policing operation leaves one dead and hundreds injured

On 20 July 2001 representatives from the G8 nations met in Genoa, Italy, for a three-day summit. Outside the meeting, over 200,000 people, many of whom had travelled from around the world, took to the streets to demonstrate on issues such as world debt and globalization. The vast majority protested peacefully, but certain factions clashed with law enforcement officers, causing injuries and millions of dollars' worth of damage. There were also reports and film footage of officers assaulting people on the streets — including non-violent protesters and journalists reporting on the demonstration — kicking, punching and beating them with batons. After two days of violence, one protester had been shot dead by a young officer carrying out his military service in the carabinieri military force, hundreds had been injured and over 280 protesters, many foreigners, had been arrested.

In the early hours of 22 July the police raided buildings legally occupied by the Genoa Social Forum (GSF), the coordinating body for most of the organizations demonstrating against globalization. During the raid, law enforcement officers are said to have subjected individuals to deliberate and gratuitous beatings, resulting in numerous injuries, dozens of them requiring urgent hospitalization and in some cases surgery. Up to 20 people were reportedly carried out of the building on stretchers, two of them apparently unconscious.

Many of the dozens of people arbitrarily and illegally arrested during the policing operation, including the majority of those detained during the raid on the GSF, reported being ill-treated inside detention facilities. It has been claimed, amongst other things, that detainees were slapped, kicked, punched and spat on and subjected to verbal abuse, sometimes of an obscene sexual nature. Detainees have said that they were deprived of food, water and sleep for lengthy periods, made to line up with their faces against the wall and remain for hours spread-eagled, and beaten if they failed to maintain this position. Some were apparently threatened with death and, in the case of female detainees, rape.

The Italian policing operation appears to have shown scant concern for the internationally recognized human rights of those they arrested. There are concerns that detainees were denied their rights to prompt access to lawyers and, in the case of foreigners, consular officials, and prompt and adequate medical care. In addition, many were not allowed to have their relatives promptly notified of their whereabouts and were not informed of their rights. In the lead up to G8, AI had urged the Italian authorities to ensure that state officers who would be engaged in the G8 policing operation were aware of, and at all times acted in accordance with, relevant international human rights standards, including those relating to the use of force and firearms.

In the days immediately preceding the G8 summit some protesters with apparently peaceful intent were denied entrance to Italy or were expelled and not allowed to proceed to Genoa, thus arbitrarily violating their rights to freedom of expression and assembly. In incidents at the Port of Ancona some such protesters, including the Chair of the Greek Section of AI, were allegedly beaten by law enforcement officers.

AI welcomes the prompt initiation of criminal investigations into the G8 policing operation by the Genoa prosecutor's office. However, it notes that the prosecutor's office is itself under investigation for violating detainees' rights of prompt access to lawyers. The organization is also concerned about the limited powers of a ''fact-finding'' investigation established by parliament on 1 August. AI calls for and has set out the criteria that should inform the establishment of an independent, comprehensive and effective investigation.

UN fails to guarantee justice and human rights in East Timor

Two years after the UN took over the running of East Timor, there are serious failings in the upkeep of law and order and human rights cannot be guaranteed. The high ambitions of the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) have been compromised by delays in establishing key institutions and a legal framework to protect and promote human rights.

The UN sent in an Australian-led force in September 1999, in response to a wave of violence unleashed by Indonesian security forces and allied militias when the people of East Timor voted overwhelmingly for independence. UNTAET was established in October 1999 to administer East Timor until it achieves full independence next year.

Among UNTAET's tasks are the establishment of a judicial system and a civilian police force. In August 2000, AI warned that progress was too slow, contributing to a law and order vacuum in which new patterns of human rights violations were emerging. A visit to East Timor by AI researchers in March 2001 revealed that UNTAET has failed to deliver on key parts of its mandate.

The judicial system is only partially established. Members of the fledgling judiciary lack training and support, and are vulnerable to political pressure and intimidation. Courts lack basic facilities. The right to a fair trial — both through lengthy delays and political interference — is far from guaranteed.

The UN civilian police responsible for law enforcement have often been unable to prevent civil disturbances, and in some cases its members have committed violations themselves. A climate has been created in which unofficial vigilante groups are taking the law into their own hands.

UNTAET's investigations into crimes against humanity and other serious crimes by the Indonesian security forces and allied militias in 1999 have also been under-resourced, poorly managed and unacceptably slow. Confidence that UNTAET can or will see perpetrators brought to justice is low and risks undermining reconciliation efforts.

In East Timor: Justice past, present and future(AI Index: ASA 57/001/2001, July 2001) AI calls for a long-term UN human rights field presence in East Timor, sets out the steps UNTAET should take at once to improve the administration of justice and calls on UN member states to provide all the necessary support, including funding, to ensure the new state of East Timor has human rights at its core.

Freedom of expression under attack in Togo

Human rights violations increase in the run-up to elections

On 5 June 2001, Lucien Messan (pictured), an outspoken journalist critical of the government in Togo, was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment with six months suspended for forgery in relation to a communiqué released by the Togolese Association of Private Press Editors. AI considers him to be a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned in an attempt to silence him because of his activities as an independent journalist.

The communiqué challenged the government to provide evidence for its statement to the UN Commission of Human Rights in March 2001 that the Togolese press had unanimously denied that hundreds of people were extrajudicially executed in 1998 by government forces. Allegations about these extrajudicial executions had been reported by both AI and a joint commission of inquiry conducted by the UN and the Organization of African Unity.

Lucien Messan, the editor of the weekly newspaper Le Combat du Peuple, has been arrested in the past and editions of Le Combat du Peuple have been regularly seized, most recently in July 2001. He is currently held in Lomé civil prison where conditions are so harsh they amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

The authorities' treatment of Lucien Messan is typical of the systematic silencing of those who seek to question or oppose the Togolese government. Human rights defenders who monitor and expose human rights violations in Togo are regularly subjected to harassment, intimidation and threats. As the parliamentary elections of October draw near, violations of the rights of freedom of expression and assembly are becoming more frequent.

On 2 June seven students were briefly detained during a demonstration calling for the reinstatement of the leaders of the Council of the University of Lomé student association who were expelled from the university in May 2001. On 16 June a march organized by opposition political parties calling for free and fair elections was broken up by security forces using tear gas.

Two opposition leaders, Harry Olympio, ex-minister and leader of the Rally in Support of Democracy and Development, and Yaowi Agboyibo, Chair of the Action Committee for the Renewal, are currently imprisoned following trials which appeared to be politically motivated, unfair and aimed at stopping them running in the elections.

This pattern of increasing repression and human rights violations in the build-up to elections is a familiar one in Togo. Several opposition members were killed during the elections of 1994 and many of those who instigated democratic change in the country are now living in exile or in hiding in Togo as a result of threats and harassment. The elections of 1998 and 1999 were undermined by the violence used by the security forces against suspected dissidents in the civilian population.

AI is calling on the government of Togo to ensure that the October elections are free and fair, and that all its civilians are free to express their opinions without fear. The organization has also appealed for the release of all prisoners of conscience, including Lucien Messan.

Please write calling for the immediate and unconditional release of Lucien Messan. Send appeals to: Son Excellence, Monsieur le Général Gnassingbé Eyadéma, Président de la République, Palais présidentiel, Avenue de la Marina, Lomé, Togo. Fax: + 228 21 27 01.

Worldwide appeals

Egypt

Fifteen prisoners of conscience sentenced after unfair trial

Fifteen alleged members of the Muslim Brothers, an unauthorized organization in Egypt, were sentenced to prison terms of between three and five years on 19 November 2000, by the Supreme Military Court, for their non-violent political activities. Charges against

the 15 men, all professionals, included affiliation to an illegal

organization, ''disrupting social peace'', reviving an illegal organization and recruiting supporters, and aiming to control the activities of professional associations. AI considers the 15 men to be prisoners of conscience.

Three of the 15 men, Muhammad Badi'a 'Abd al-Magid, a university professor, Ahmad Ibrahim Ahmad al-Halawani, a teacher, and Sa'd Zaghlul al-'Ashmawi Muhammad Sabir al-'Ashmawi, a physician, received prison sentences of five years while the other 12 received sentences of three years.

The trial before the Supreme Military Court fell short of international standards for fair trial and violated some of the most fundamental requirements of international law, such as the right to be tried before an independent and impartial court, and the right to appeal before a higher court. The 15 men are being held in Mazra'at Tora Prison in Cairo.

Please write, calling on the Egyptian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release the 15 men and ensure their right of freedom of opinion and expression as guaranteed by Article 19 of the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights, to which Egypt is a state party.

In your appeals, please refer to case number 18/1999, Supreme State Security Court.

Send appeals to: His Excellency Muhammad Hosni Mubarak, 'Abedine Palace, Cairo, Arab Republic of Egypt. Fax: + 20 2 390 1998.

Saudi Arabia

The forgotten refugees in Rafha

Over 5,000 Iraqis are being held at Rafha Camp in northern Saudi Arabia. The authorities refuse to consider them refugees, referring to them as 'guests', and thereby denying them all legal protection guaranteed by international law. The holding of these refugees as virtual prisoners is causing them serious suffering, which in some instances has had fatal consequences.

Their ordeal started a decade ago, at the end of the Gulf War of 1991, when they were among 33,000 men, women and children settled there after fleeing persecution by the Iraqi forces.

Dozens of them have been on hunger strike since 23 June 2001 in protest at the halt, in 1997, of a program of resettlement in third countries. After the halt of this program, which saw over 24,000 Iraqi refugees resettled in third countries by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, those remaining are now faced with the single option of returning to Iraq.

Please write, calling on the Saudi Arabian government to take urgent steps to redress the discriminatory practices imposed on these refugees and to allow them access to adequate asylum procedures.

Send appeals to: His Royal Highness Prince Naif bin 'Abdul 'Aziz, Minister of the Interior, Ministry of the Interior, P.O. Box 2933, Airport Road, Riyadh 11134, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Fax: + 966 1 403 1185.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Businesswoman held without charge

Rose Samba (pictured), a Congolese businesswoman, has spent most of the last two years in prison, although she has not been charged with any offence. She has frequently been in poor health, but has not always received the medical treatment she requires.

She was arrested in the south-eastern town of Lubumbashi on 11 March 1999 because of her supposed links to three American missionaries who had been accused of espionage. These links appear to have been solely of a business nature: the missionaries had sold two of their cars to her.

On the day of her arrest Rose Samba was transferred to the capital, Kinshasa, where for the next month she was detained and repeatedly interrogated by the security services. On 12 April she and eight others were reportedly paraded on national television and accused of involvement in a plot to kill the then head of state. Before and after this broadcast Rose Samba had to be hospitalized for heart palpitations.

She was released from Kinshasa's central prison on 6 June 2000 following a general presidential amnesty for political prisoners. She immediately sought to recover the two cars she had bought from the missionaries, which had been seized by the Congolese authorities in Kinshasa. She was finally told on 6 November 2000 that the cars were available for collection, but as she was on her way to collect them, she was again arrested by the security services and returned to the central prison. No reason was given for her arrest and she continues to be held without charge.

It would appear that the true motive for detaining Rose Samba was political or to confiscate her property.

Please write, expressing concern at the arbitrary detention of Rose Samba and urging that, in the absence of any charges or evidence of any criminal offence, she is immediately released and that any confiscated property is returned to her.

Send appeals, in French or English, to: Professeur Ntumba Luaba, Ministre des droits humains, Ministère des droits humains, 33/C Boulevard du 30 juin, Kinshasa-Gombe, DRC. Fax: +243 12 20 664.

Viet Nam

Catholic priest arrested

Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly (pictured), a 55-year-old Catholic priest from the diocese of Hue in central Viet Nam, was arrested on 17 May 2001. Hundreds of police were reportedly involved in arresting him from An Truyen church as he prepared to celebrate mass, apparently in order to outnumber the priest's local supporters. Official media stated that Father Ly had caused public disorder, incited believers to cause unrest, and spread propaganda against the government. However, there has been no confirmation of charges brought against him and his place of detention is not known.

Father Ly has spent much of the last 26 years peacefully attempting to exercise his right to freedom of expression and worship. He was previously held without trial in 1977-78, and then sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment in 1983, on account of his peaceful dissenting views. This third arrest is believed

to be because of his public appeals for religious freedom and support for villagers cultivating church land which the authorities reportedly wanted to confiscate.

In December 2000 he made a joint statement with three other religious leaders calling for more religious freedom, the return of church properties confiscated by the state, an end to state interference in religious affairs, and the release of all prisoners detained for their religious beliefs.

Father Ly is believed to be a prisoner of conscience held solely for the peaceful expression of his dissenting political and religious beliefs.

Please write calling for the immediate and unconditional release of prisoner of conscience Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly. Send appeals to: Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, Office of the Prime Minister, Hoang Hoa Tham, Ha Noi, Socialist Republic of Viet Nam. Fax: +84 4 8123 4137 (c/o Ministry of Foreign Affairs).

News in brief

Slovenia

AI Youth Camp in Kranjska Gora

70 participants from 27 East and West European countries took part in a youth camp from the 2nd to 8th of July. The program included workshops, presentations, and a public action in Ljubljana on torture in Tunisia.Visit the camp website www.amnestysummercamp.nl to find out more.

Austria

Continued vigilance needed

In June 2001 the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment published the report of its latest visit to Austria. It recorded a number of complaints of police ill-treatment during inspections of police jails, police stations and gendarmerie posts. While the allegations were less numerous and the ill-treatment less serious than on previous visits they stressed: ''The continuation of a certain number of allegations of ill-treatment clearly indicates that the Austrian authorities must continue to be vigilant in this area''.

Myanmar

Releases welcomed

More than 160 political prisoners were released between January and July 2001. The vast majority are opposition party members, including 41 members of parliament-elect detained without charge since mid-1998. Well-known prisoners of conscience writer Daw San San Nwe and comedians U Pa Pa Lay and U Lu Zaw (known as ''the Moustache Brothers'') are among those released after completing their sentences. While these releases are welcome, an estimated 1800 political prisoners are serving long prison terms for exercising their rights to freedom of expression and association.

Publications and reports

ACT 40/020/2001 Racism and the administration of justice

AMR 51/105/2001 USA: Too young to vote, old enough to be executed. Texas set to kill another juvenile offender

AFR 57/009/2001 Liberia: Killings, rape and torture continue in Lofa County.

ASA 57/001/2001 East Timor: Justice past, present and future.

EUR 30/08/2001 Italy: Letters to the Italian government concerning the G8 policing

operation

AI at a crossroads, says new Secretary General

Irene Khan explains to the Wire why she is so pleased to be heading AI at such an exciting moment in the history of the movement

This August Irene Zubaida Khan became AI's seventh Secretary General.

Irene Khan comes to AI after more than 22 years working for human rights, particularly those of refugees. Growing up in Bangladesh and Northern Ireland, she experienced at an early age the effects that political conflicts have on ordinary people. After studying law she arrived at UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, in 1980 and soon realized that she wanted to work not as a bureaucrat behind the scenes, but directly in finding solutions to the plight of the vulnerable and abused. This work has taken her to many places of strife and historic change, including Vietnam and Cambodia in the 1980s, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosova and Macedonia in the 1990s.

It is perhaps significant that one of the first duties that Irene will undertake as Secretary General of AI is to attend the World Conference Against Racism. Combating racism is a new and growing area in AI's widening mandate on human rights. As she sees it, AI has developed over the last 40 years ''from a prisoner organization to a human rights organization''. Where once it worked mainly for prisoners of conscience, who were often political leaders, today it increasingly works for ordinary people ''whose rights have been violated because of who they are, where they are and what they do. AI should be a movement of the masses, for the masses.''

Irene's experiences working for the rights of refugees, particularly women and children, have given her a special interest in this area. She believes that as AI's first woman Secretary General she has a responsibility to develop AI's work on women's rights. ''When AI was first formed the women's movement was in its infancy, now it is an internationally recognized force that AI can work with to further the understanding that women's rights are human rights'', she says.

As a national of Bangladesh, Irene Khan is also the first Asian and Muslim to lead the movement. She believes that this is significant. ''We all bring to our work what we are,'' she says. ''All those things colour the decisions that I make in my work. It is important for AI as a global movement to have a diversity of perspectives. International solidarity brings views from different cultures.''

So will Irene Khan bring change to AI? She believes that change is inevitable in this fast-moving world. Today there are many organizations working for human rights worldwide. AI acted as an inspiration for these groups in the past, now it must act as a leader in a new phase of globalization of human values.

As such she is looking forward to a lively debate at the International Council Meeting about the direction that AI is to take over the next few years. AI's strength comes from the fact that it is a democratic organization she says, and ''the membership has to decide what it wants to make AI''. She believes that she can contribute to that debate, bringing her own perspectives and the ability to view AI with a fresh pair of eyes.

AI is at a crossroads, she says, and she feels it is a great privilege to lead the movement at such challenging and exciting times. It is an excitement that our new Secretary General thinks that all AI members should share. ''There is so much tragedy in the human rights business,'' she says. ''You see the worst things. But the wonderful thing about AI is that it gives us the chance to make a difference, to change things.''

A victory for Brazilian justice

Carandiru prison massacre police colonel convicted

On 2 October 1992 members of the São Paulo Military Police stormed the Casa da Detenção prison (popularly known as Carandiru) following the outbreak of a riot. When the police left the prison complex 11 hours later, 111 inmates were dead. The massacre was followed by cover-ups and attempts to investigate the crime were delayed or obstructed, while those responsible for the killings evaded justice.

After nine long years, one of the perpetrators has finally been called to account in a São Paulo court. On 29 June 2001 Colonel Ubiratan Guimarães, who led the military police shock troops into the prison on the day of the massacre, was convicted of co-authorship of simple homicide of 102 detainees, and five counts of attempted homicide, and sentenced to 632 years in prison.

Policing methods in Brazil have changed as a result of the massacre. During a crisis across 29 prisons in the state of São Paulo earlier this year, pastoral workers and human rights defenders worked alongside the authorities during negotiations, and their mediation undoubtedly saved lives.

Tragically, on the day of the Carandiru massacre there was no will to negotiate or to call upon mediators to find a peaceful way out of the situation that saw inmates staging a riot. Not even the prison director was allowed to approach the prisoners under his care with a megaphone. He was pushed aside by police armed with machine guns, who had already taken the precaution of removing their identity tags. Several hours and 515 bullets later, 111 sons, brothers, husbands and fathers were dead.

An AI delegation, which included an eminent forensic anthropologist, sent immediately after the massacre to accompany investigations, concluded in its report that: ''There is obvious evidence that the military police, in action in the Casa de Detenção (Carandiru prison) on 2 October 1992, killed inmates in cold blood, in the vast majority of cases after the victims had already surrendered. The killings were not the result of accidental excesses but were part of a deliberate and coordinated action.'' This AI report, Death has arrived – massacre at the Casa de Detenção, São Paulo(AI Index AMR: 19/08/93), was presented as evidence during the trial of Colonel Ubiratan Guimarães.

Despite formidable obstacles including deliberate tampering with the crime scene, delays in the collection of forensic evidence, incompetence in the handling of ballistic evidence, intimidation of witnesses, political immunity, and a long and complicated passage through the Brazilian legal system, the public prosecutor's office finally managed to put together a case against the Colonel which resulted in his conviction.

This is a significant advance for Brazilian justice; such a trial would have been unthinkable nine years ago. However, Colonel Guimarães has not been imprisoned pending an appeal against his conviction, and AI will continue to follow this case closely until all those responsible for the massacre have been brought to justice.

Worldwide appeal updates

Armenia appeal June 2001

AI has learnt that Rafik Tonoian was released on 21 May 2001 after having served one third of his sentence, probably on grounds of good behaviour. It is not yet known whether the Armenian authorities have opened an investigation into allegations that Rafik Tonoian was ill-treated while in pre-trial detention.

Karen Yegoian, the other conscientious objector, is still in prison. Please continue appeals on his behalf.

Uzbekistan appeal March 2001

Ismail Adylov was released from prison on 3 July 2001 apparently following a presidential amnesty. AI heard the news from Mikhail Ardzinov, chair of the Independent Human Rights Organisation of Uzbekistan (NOPCHU). He said that all members of NOPCHU, Ismail Adylov himself and his family, express their deeply felt gratitude to all those who campaigned tirelessly for his release.

Burundi appeal April 2001

Valérie Bukuru was unconditionally released on 25 May 2001. In July 2000 the State Prosecutor's department of the Court of Appeal said there was insufficient evidence to proceed and the case should be closed however she remained in detention. She was transferred to Bujumbura and eventually released in May 2001.

The other women remain in detention and appeals should continue.

USA appeal July 2001

Napoleon Beazley was granted a stay of execution less than four hours before he was due to die on 15 August 2001. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted the emergency reprieve following an appeal raising various issues, including his age (17) at the time of the murder. Beazley is one of 31 juvenile offenders awaiting execution in Texas. Please continue appeals.