This year we invite you to pray for 10 particular situations:

• groups of people victims of torture, of ill treatment, or subject to the death penalty because of their religion, their ethnos or their political activities

• people victims of torture

Last minute information : they are FREE

The wave of demonstrations spreading from North Africa since the end of January has reached Khartoum, the Sudanese capital. A peaceful protest gathering over 2000 people was suppressed by national security forces and riot police who have arrested and injured more than 70 people, of whom 20 are still being detained, and one person has died as a result of the clashes. Those imprisoned have been badly treated and tortured in events occurring within a general context of power struggles between communities but also between clans from the same ethnic group. Southern Sudanese leaders face a difficult task in bringing peace to South Sudan, which chose in January to separate from the North in a massive vote for independence. Following the first wave of protests, arrests were made as protest gatherings spread beyond Khartoum, focusing specifically on student movements and universities.

Last minute information : they are FREE

Sanogo Aboubakar (aka Abou Sanogo) and Kangbé Yayoro Charles Lopez (aka Gnahoré Charly) accused of being pro-Ouattara rebels were arrested on 28th January in Abidjan by pro-Gbagbo law enforcement agencies. According to the latest reports they are being detained at the Abidjan prison (MACA). Meanwhile, numerous detainees fled from MACA at the end of March at the time of the attack on Abidjan by the Côte d’Ivoire Republican Forces. The two men had just arrived in Abidjan to do a series of reports when they were arrested. Certain sections of the media supporting Laurent Gbagbo sullied the image of the two journalists portraying them as rebels who had come to Abidjan to participate in an attack against the institutions of the Republic. This arbitrary arrest occurred approximately two months after Côte d’Ivoire was plunged into a serious political crisis following the second round of presidential elections on 28 November 2010. Despite support from various organisations and particularly assistance for the families of the two prisoners, there is currently no news regarding d’Abou Sanogo and Gnahoré Charly.

The social demands of the Mapuche people have been suppressed and criminalised by the Chilean state. The anti-terrorism law, a remnant from the Pinochet dictatorship, allows for extended periods of preventative detention and heavy penalties. José Ñirripil Pérez, Cristián Cayupán Morales and Luis Humberto Marileo Cariqueo were minors when they were arrested, tortured, illegally interrogated and then held at the Chol Chol Preventative Detention Centre in the region of Araucanía. They were released at the beginning of 2011 but put under house arrest.

Sexual violence against women and girls has been widespread and used systematically during the Colombian armed conflict. For 50 years soldiers, as well as paramilitary and guerrillas have committed sexual assaults. Rape, sterilisation and forced abortion, genital mutilation, sexual slavery and forced prostitution are inflicted as torture, punishment and a form of social and political persecution. The aim: to spread terror among communities in order to terrorise the enemy and control territories. Despite the scale of the phenomenon, victims go unnoticed. Only 9% of them will lodge a formal complaint. They are ashamed and fear the consequences, are not aware of their rights and do not trust the authorities charged with their protection. These are considered minor crimes and virtually none of the complaints leads to convictions with impunity resulting in the phenomenon becoming accepted as the norm. It is one of the causes of internal displacement: 2 out of 10 women flee following sexual assaults. But the displaced are also the most at risk. The simple fact of having once fled means they are suspected of belonging to certain armed groups and this increases the risk of further attacks. It is estimated that women and girls represent slightly more than half the number of displaced persons and internal refugees (between 3.3 and 5.1 million).

According to a report published in 2010 by Colombian NGOs and Oxfam, from 2001 to 2009 in the 407 communes where public law enforcement agencies, paramilitaries and guerrillas are present, 17.58% of women have been the victims of sexual violence, an average of 54,410 women per year, or 6 every hour.
 

Released in November 2008 after two-and-a-half years in prison for her fight for human rights and notably her rejection of the one child policy, Mao Hengfeng was arrested once again in February 2010 for protesting in December 2009 before the trial of Liu Xiaobo, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010. She was sentenced to one-and-a-half years of re-education through labour. In February 2011, she was released on medical parole. Two days later, the authorities repealed her parole. According to Mao Hengfeng’s husband, she went out to dinner with friends on the evening of her release. The next morning, more than ten police officers blocked the entrance to her home preventing her from leaving. The next day Mao was taken away. Her husband was presented with a document entitled “Order for the repeal of conditional medical parole”.

Mao recounts abuse suffered at rehabilitation centre
The guards encouraged the other inmates to hit me repeatedly. Sometimes, they joined in too. They said I had shouted “down with the communist party” in front of the Beijing tribunal where Liu Xiaobo was being tried and they wanted me to give in and admit my guilt. I refused. I said that if the communist party tolerated the torture of prisoners in centres for re-education through labour, they should be overthrown. […] The 14 July was the worst day. I was tied to a metal bar and the guards told 10 detainees to hit me, to stick their fingers in my eyes until they bled and to bang my head until I was concussed.

Before being arrested in 1995, Hada was manager of the Hohhot university bookshop and a member of the Democratic Alliance of Southern Mongolia, which supported human rights and Mongolian culture. He also defended the idea that “the national minorities in China should benefit from a high degree of autonomy, as guaranteed by the constitution.” Put behind bars for 15 years for “separatism” and “spying”, Hada served his sentence at Ulanhad prison(Chifeng in Chinese), in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. In 2004, a released prisoner reported that Hada was regularly a victim of physical abuse there, subjected to disciplinary sanctions ranging from isolation to being chained to a metal immobilising table. His wife Xinna and his son Uiles were arrested on 4 December 2010 and taken to an unknown location. Following his release on 10 December last year Hada disappeared and appears to have re-joined his family in captivity. Their whereabouts are currently unknown.

Suranjiv Chrishantha Fernando, 21, was arrested in a totally arbitrary manner and severely tortured by police officers from the Terrorism Investigation Division en August 2008.
He was then sent to Bogambara prison where he is still imprisoned more than 3 years after his arrest. Under torture he admitted to committing acts of terrorism and was forced to sign papers prepared by police without being informed of their contents. He denied terrorist activities but his case was put under review and he is still awaiting trial to prove his innocence. His case is renewed proof of the collapse of the Sri Lankan judicial system.

Roza is a fifty-year-old Algerian. Born into a Muslim family, she converted to Christianity in 1999. She practised her religion secretly for several years until her husband, a Muslim, discovered his wife’s religious practices. Things then began to deteriorate between the couple. Roza suffered violence at the hands of her husband who in the end repudiated her. She fled to France in December 2009 and began steps to seek asylum. She was refused asylum by the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons in September 2010. She has filed an appeal before the French National Court of the Right to Asylum to have her refugee status recognised and benefit from protection from France. Her case is currently pending a hearing.

Following the destruction of a camp in November 2010, Moroccan law enforcement agencies proceeded to arrest hundreds of Sahrawi. Among them were twenty activists, including Naama Asfari, who have been transferred to the Salé prison in Rabat and are currently being prosecuted at the military tribunal. They are most notably accused of violating internal and external state security, forming a criminal gang and attacks on civil servants in the course of their civic duties; crimes punishable by life imprisonment. According to testimonies taken by lawyers for the detainees, at least thirteen of them were tortured before being transferred to Salé prison. Sixteen of the twenty detainees are currently in solitary confinement. They can only receive family visits for fifteen minutes a week during which they are separated by two sets of prison bars between which prison guards are patrolling. Several are suffering the consequences of torture and are not receiving adequate care. Moroccan authorities have blocked access to information. Since November, many activists have reported being tortured and there are now more than 140 detainees at El-Ayoun prison.

Zeinab Jalalian, a young Kurdish activist, aged 27, has been sentenced to death in Iran, and was transferred in March 2010 to section 209 of the Evin prison in Tehran. This transfer could signal that her execution is imminent in a context of increasing suppression of the Kurdish minority including the execution of several Iranian Kurds including one woman since 2008 for membership of the Kurdish Independent Life Party (PJAK). Zeinab Jalalian was arrested on suspicion of participating in PJAK activities. Tortured for eight months, the authorities refused access to a doctor and the right to see her family. In January 2009, an Iranian Revolutionary Court sentenced Zeinab Jalalian to death by hanging for “enmity against God” (Mohareb ba Khoda), in accordance with article 183 of the Islamic Penal Code of Iran. The trial of Zeinab Jalalian lasted only a few minutes and took place without the presence of a lawyer. Imposition of the death penalty was confirmed by the Iranian Supreme Court on 26 November 2009. Zeinab is still being detained while she awaits execution.

ASIA

• NV 2006/ Sanjar Umarov – Uzbekistan

Update : freed in November 2009
Sanjar UMAROV was freed last November, after four years in prison.

This PhD in physics and entrepreneur had founded the “Sunlit Coalition” association, which brought together representatives of civil society and intellectuals. The purpose of his association was to create a dialog with the Uzbek government on reforms of the economy to better the people’s standard of living.

In 2005, he had openly criticized the Andijan events (May 2005). He had subsequently supported the demand for an independent international investigation of that massacre. Arrested in October 2005, he was condemned to 14 years in prison following an arbitrary trial. While in detention he was tortured and constantly humiliated.

Sanjar Umarov was able to join his family in the United States on November 21st, 2009. His imprisonment has left him greatly weakened. Surrounded by his family, he is finally receiving proper treatment and attention.

He sent a Christmas message to the groups which had supported him and to the national secretariat of ACAT, in which he thanked us for our support. He sent us this message, trying to write it in French. We have translated it into English.

“Dear friends,
I give thanks to you for your support that ACAT has made for me and my family. Really, in prison, I was encouraged by the spirit of God and the prayers of many people. Permit me to congratulate you on the occasion of the holidays.
Still, dear friends thanks
I kiss you
Sanjar Umarov and family
December 20, 2009

• NV 2007/ Mao Hengfeng - China

Update: liberation
She was released from incarceration on November 29 2008. In prison she was tortured.
Today she is suffering from hypertension, from constant pain due to the wounds caused by torture as well as from a skin infection due to the bad sanitary conditions and also from constant stomach pain. Since she was freed the authorities watch all her activities very closely and have arrested her again several times for short periods.

In December 2009 she was once again arrested for 10 days in Beijing for having organized a demonstration in support of the writer Liu Xiaobo, who was sentenced to 11 years in prison.

• 2008/Mutabar Todjibaeva - Uzbekistan

Update: liberation
Mutabar Todjibaeva, an Uzbek defender of human rights and president of the NGO, “Ardent Hearts”, was freed in 2008, thanks to the common efforts of several human rights organizations and of those who supported her by writing letters. ACAT participated actively in the campaign for her liberation.
She testified at the ACAT-France headquarters: “I learned that letters of support for me came from all over the world. I was told that a truck would be needed to bring them all to me. I am extremely grateful to all those who fought for my freedom, and to each one of them. Not only do I thank them, but I pay homage to those who did not leave me and my family alone during this ordeal.”

• NV 2009/Alimujiang Yimiti - China

Condemned after two secret hearings in May 2009, his lawyers denounced the violation of his right to a fair trial and the use of false documents to charge him. After almost two years in provisional detention, this Christian Uyghur from Xinjiang was condemned on December 8, 2009, by the Kashi tribunal, to 15 years in prison, for “divulging State secrets to foreign organizations”. His lawyer is appealing the decision. The severity of the verdict has surprised the observers of the Uyghur cause.

AFRICA Update on 2009 Night Vigil Cases

Albinos from Tanzania and Burundi

Aggressions against albinos continue in those two countries. Though fewer were murdered in 2009, 7 rather than 27 in 2008 in Tanzania, attacks did not diminish. More than 30 were reported during last year. Because of the death penalty undoubtedly, the tendency of the aggressors is to no longer kill systematically but to flee, leaving behind the body they have amputated. Attacks against albinos occur principally in the remote zones of Tanzania and Burundi, where sorcerers exploit the ignorance of parts of the rural population, who identify albinos with the devil.

In Tanzania, the government has undertaken a census of albinos and created a police service to escort children as they go to school. Certain have been given cell phones so they can call the police rapidly if they are attacked.
In his wishes for the nation at the start of 2010, the Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete called for an end of assassinations, “In spite of our national campaign, there are still too many attacks.
Not a single albino must die because of the color of his skin” he declared.

Moulumba Kapepula (DRC)

Report : liberation

Mulumba Kapepula was acquitted and freed on June 5, 2009. However no inquest has been opened about the tortures he endured.

Other individual situations

The four other persons are still detained in Equatorial Guinea, in Erythraea and in Ethiopia.
 

MIDDLE EAST NPV 2009

When we last heard Ridvan Kizgin was still in prison.

Freed in 2007, Abdellatif Bouhjiia has been denied medical care, work and a passport. While his suffering, caused by kidney and heart problems, increases, he is unable to get a medical appointment and he is denied the normal free care booklet. His condition does not allow him to work and he cannot get medical attention in another country as long as he is barred from getting a passport.

According to Amnesty International, on April 14, 2009 Ronak Safarzadeh was condemned to 6 years in prison, 5 years of which are for belonging to an opposition movement and 1 year for making anti-government propaganda.

LATIN AMERICA NPV 2009

Situation of indigenous communities in Columbia

The situation of these communities is always very delicate. They are victims of the conflict and certain of them have had to move.

Last January 31, a community was shelled by the army “by mistake”. But it seems that it is rather a means of making the population move. In fact a multinational corporation has received the government’s permission to use this territory for a mine.

In the south of the country their territories are militarized which makes them the target of attacks from the guerrillas and from the paramilitary.

Javier Giraldo ,S.J., a Colombian Jesuit priest

In 2009 Father Giraldo was victim of a campaign of calumnies by the media and by some high officials of the state. This was the result of false accusations by a former “guerrillo" who is collaborating with the army.

At the beginning of 2009 Father Giraldo was summoned to appear before a prosecutor for a judicial inquest. He had been accused of calumny by a general. He sent the prosecutor a 31 page letter in which he explains the moral and ethical reasons preventing him from going to the tribunal. That letter is a real indictment of the corruption of Colombian institutions.

For the last 25 years Father Giraldo has been denouncing, with calm and determination, the crimes committed against peasant communities. In spite of accusations and threats he continues to seek the truth.