(RSF/IFEX) – On 24 June 1999, RSF issued a report entitled “Burma, Sudan, Syria and Turkey: torture as a form of repression”. A synopsis and the full text of the report follows: Nine journalists were tortured by the Turkish police in 1998. Another suffered the same fate in March 1999. In Syria, 11 journalists languishing […]
(RSF/IFEX) – On 24 June 1999, RSF issued a report entitled “Burma, Sudan,
Syria and Turkey: torture as a form of repression”. A synopsis and the full
text of the report follows:
Nine journalists were tortured by the Turkish police in 1998. Another
suffered the same fate in March 1999. In Syria, 11 journalists languishing
in the country’s jails were victims of typical forms of ill-treatment. In
Zimbabwe, two journalists suffered burn marks and psychological damage after
being tortured for two days in January by soldiers. In May a foreign
correspondent based in Khartoum, Sudan, was unable to put any weight on his
right foot because of burns inflicted while he was being held in solitary
confinement. In Burma, an imprisoned journalist spent several weeks in a
cage meant for a dog. Under General Sani Abacha’s dictatorship in Nigeria,
at least four journalists were jailed in inhuman and degrading conditions.
Yet article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that
no-one may be subjected to “torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading penalties
or treatment.” The same clause appears in article 7 of the United Nations’
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. And article 2 of the
United Nations’ Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or
Degrading Treatment or Punishment stipulates that countries that have
ratified the convention it should “take effective legislative,
administrative, judicial and other measures to prevent acts of torture from
being committed in any territories under their jurisdiction.”
Many countries do not respect the provisions of those agreements. Some of
them – Turkey, Sudan, Syria and Burma – practise torture on a massive scale,
particularly against journalists. Not only are the governments of the
countries concerned violating the inalienable right of all human beings not
to be subjected to cruel acts; they are also contravening their obligation
to respect the right to inform and to be informed.
RSF is calling on Turkey and Burma to ratify the International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights and asking Nigeria, Sudan, Syria and Zimbabwe,
which have already ratified the covenant, to respect their international
undertakings in this respect. RSF is also calling on Burma, Syria and
Zimbabwe to ratify the United Nations’ Convention Against Torture, asking
Nigeria and Sudan, which have already signed the convention, to ratify it,
and asking Turkey, which has ratified the convention, to respect the
commitment it made by doing so.
Report
Burma, Sudan, Syria and Turkey: torture as a means of repression
In Turkey and Syria, journalists are frequently victims of torture
Torture is still being practised in Turkey on a massive scale. While in many
cases it is used by the police against common-law prisoners, it is also used
against journalists. Reporters Sans Frontières has received accounts from 38
journalists claiming to have been tortured in 1996, 16 in 1997 and nine in
1998. In 1999, the organisation was informed of another typical case of
torture that occurred during the night of 19 to 20 March. Aydogan Inal, a
reporter with the pro-Kurdish weekly Hêvi in Diyarbakir (a city in
south-eastern Turkey, where a state of emergency is in force), was arrested
at his home by eight police officers who punched and blindfolded him before
taking him to the city security headquarters (Cevvik Kuvvetler). He was
forced to wait for an hour kneeling against a wall before being questioned.
The police officers ordered him to sign some documents and he was obliged to
comply: “When I had the papers in front of me, they insulted me and hit me
continuously.” Stunned by the blows, he fell to the ground. The policemen
picked him up, told him to sing the national anthem and began hitting him
again when he claimed he did not know it. They then undressed him and threw
him into a cell, eventually giving him back his clothes.
During the night of 20 to 21 March, Aydogan Inal was taken blindfold to a
room where police officers asked him which “organisation” published Hêvi. He
denied having any connection with a political movement (in other words, the
PKK – Kudistan Workers’ Party). The journalist was struck several times,
undressed and taken to another room where he was forced to lie on the
ground. The police tied his feet up with a carpet and ordered him to put his
hands behind his head. They then put pressure on his hands and feet. One of
the men squeezed his testicles until he passed out, starting again as soon
as the journalist came round. When the torturer noticed pus coming out of a
wound he stopped and put a plastic bag over the journalist’s head until he
started to suffocate. Aydogan Inal also suffered a form of torture that
involves being sprayed with water. On 24 March, after enduring three days of
ill-treatment, he was examined by a doctor at the Baglar clinic. Police
officers were present at the examination – in contravention of Turkish law.
The doctor asked the journalist no questions and issued a medical
certificate stating that he was “in good health”. Aydogan Inal was released
the same day on the orders of the state security court. In November 1998,
Mehmet Eren, his predecessor with the weekly in Diyarbakir, had also been
tortured by police officers and subsequently left the job.
The case of Asiye Zeybek Güzel is also typical of the violence used by the
police against journalists. A reporter with the extreme-left weekly Atilim
and former editor of the weekly Isçinin Yolu, which also leans to the left,
she was arrested at her home on 22 February 1997 as she was returning from
shopping with her husband. The police were waiting inside the house and did
not have an arrest warrant. They took the journalist to the anti-terrorist
unit of Istanbul security headquarters. She was accused of having ties with
the MLKP, a banned Marxist-Leninist party, and was detained in custody for
13 days. Asiye Zeybek Güzel was tortured while in custody: “The head of the
unit where I was tortured was called Bayram Kartal. I would recognise his
voice. I was hung up by the arms, at first straight, then with my arms
crossed. The police left me wearing only underwear. While I was hanging up,
Bayram Kartal ordered his colleagues to lay me on the ground. He was very
conscientious, and watched all my reactions carefully as they carried out
the ill-treatment. Afterwards, when they stopped torturing me, they talked
about their wives and children, ate snacks or played lottery. They carried
on as if nothing had happened. How can they accept all that? I simply can’t
understand.” (Interview published in the women’s magazine Pazartesi.) After
being tortured, she was put into a solitary cell where she was raped by one
of the officers. In the interview, still suffering from shock, she refers to
the sexual cruelty she suffered as “the occurrence”.
In Syria, a neighbour of Turkey, torture of imprisoned journalists is a
common practice and various accounts support this. RSF has received reports
from three journalists who say they have been victims of “cruel and inhuman
treatment”. Two are currently in jail, along with nine other journalists:
RSF is calling for the immediate and unconditional release of all of them.
Nizar Nayyouf, aged 43, a journalist and human rights campaigner, won the
Reporters Sans Frontières-Fondation de France prize in 1998. Editor of the
monthly The Voice of Democracy and an officer of the Committee for the
Defence of Democratic Freedoms in Syria (CDF), a human rights group, he was
arrested on 2 January 1992. He gave himself up after 22 days on the run when
his wife and daughter were detained instead of him. On 17 March 1992 a
military court sentenced him to ten years’ hard labour.
Nizar Nayyouf spent ten months in Seydnaya prison, in the suburbs of
Damascus. On 6 February 1993, after he tried to organise a revolt among the
inmates, he was moved to Tadmoor military prison where for six months he was
tortured for two hours every day. In July 1993 he began a 13-day hunger
strike that left him very weak. He managed to smuggle out a report on the
torture and killings at Tadmoor (many prisoners have died under torture
there), and was then moved to Mezze military prison, Damascus. Nizar Nayyouf
is still suffering from the after-effects of his prison conditions and the
torture he endured: his legs have remained paralysed due to fractured
vertebrae caused by the “German chair” (a metal device for stretching the
spine), being crucified upside down and struck with iron bars. He is slowly
going blind because of an injury to his skull. He is also suffering from
skin disease due to cigarette burns that have not healed properly, and to
stomach bleeding resulting from his many hunger strikes and eating prison
food (in which the guards urinate). He is being held in particularly inhuman
conditions in a cell measuring seven by nine feet and has not seen the sun
for seven years. Because of his paralysis, he is forced to crawl along the
ground to go to the toilet and he has to wash in cold water. For several
months, Nizar Nayyuf has been suffering from Hodgkin’s disease, a form of
leukaemia that can be cured if treated early by chemotherapy. The military
authorities responsible for him have made it clear that he will only be
allowed to receive treatment if he agrees to sign a declaration recognising
that he “made false statements about human rights in Syria” and undertakes
to give up all political activities. In the view of internationally approved
conventions, refusal of medical treatment is also a form of torture.
Reporters Sans Frontières has also received reports of cruel practices being
used against Faraj Birqdar, a journalist and poet arrested in March 1987 and
sentenced on 17 October 1993 to 15 years in jail for belonging to the
Communist Action Party, and against Rida Haddad, a journalist and political
opposition figure, who was imprisoned from 1980 to 1995 and who died of
leukaemia just over six months after his release. He had been denied
treatment for the disease while in prison.
Sudan and Burma: damning accounts of torture
In Sudan, torture and ill-treatment are common currency, according to
Amnesty International. At least two journalists have been among the victims.
Mohammed Abdel Sid, Khartoum correspondent of the Arabic-lanugage daily
Asharq Al-Awsat, was arrested on 14 April 1999 by the police and kept in
solitary confinement until he was freed on 26 May. Legal provisions
concerning the detention of suspects were ignored. After his release the
journalist, who was accused of “collaborating with Egypt”, described his
ordeal: his right foot had been so badly burned that he could only walk with
a limp: “[The policemen] told me to leave the office barefoot – the tiles
were burning hot – and I had to stand up for a long time holding a table.”
His right foot is red and the burned skin is peeling. Mohammed Abdel Sid
explained that during this torture, the police officers had beaten him on
the heels with a rubber pipe. The blows left black scars around his ankles,
but he said he had suffered even more when he was moved to hospital a week
before his release, and the dressings were changed carelessly: “The bandage
had stuck to the wounds and the skin came away as they ripped them off.” In
1996, another journalist had talked about the ill-treatment he had suffered
in prison. Osama Ghandi, a cameraman with state television who was arrested
in April, was accused, along with four colleagues, of “plotting a coup
d’état”. Five months later, at his trial before a military court, he lifted
up his t-shirt to show where he had been whipped. He denied the confession
which he said he had made under torture. Osama Ghandi is believed to have
been released sometime during 1998.
Many Asian countries are suspected of using torture to silence journalists
but we have very few accounts to confirm that such practices exist.
Nevertheless, it has been established that torture and ill-treatment are
used in Burmese prisons against political prisoners, including journalists.
In mid-November 1995, Win Tin, editor of the daily Hanthawathi, who has been
serving a ten-year jail sentence since July 1989, and four others being held
at Insein prison, all members of the National League for Democracy (NLD, the
party of Nobel peace prize laureat Aung San Suu Kyi), have suffered
ill-treatment. Prison officers started by questioning the five men about
letters they smuggled out of the prison to Professor Yozo Yokota, the United
Nations’ special rapporteur on human rights in Burma, which gave details of
their appalling prison conditions and the cruelty they had suffered. They
are forced to sleep on the concrete floor, with no mattresses or blankets,
in “military recesses”, tiny cells that usually serve as dog kennels. The
five men have also been banned from receiving visits from their families,
which are normally allowed once a fortnight. They have therefore been
deprived of the food and medicines the visitors used to bring for them.
Zimbabwe and Nigeria: Six recent cases of torture
In Zimbabwe, journalists investigating military security issues were
ill-treated in 1999. On 12 January Mark Chavunduka, editor of the Sunday
Standard, was arrested by military police in Harare and taken to Cranborne
barracks. He was accused of publishing a report two days earlier on the
arrest of 23 officiers allegedly involved in an attempted coup d?état. On 14
January, high court judge George Smith ordered defence minister Job Whabira
to free the journalist. The ministry refused, saying: “Any civilian who
meddles in military matters is subject to military law.” In reply, the
journalist’s lawyers condemned the “illegal arrest” and asked the high court
to arrest the defence minister and two military officers. On 18 January,
under pressure from local journalists and international organisations, the
defence minister backtracked and handed Mark Chavunduka over to the police.
The next day, Ray Choto, who had written the offending report, decided to
give himself up. Both journalists were tortured for two days by soldiers at
Cranborne barracks, who tried to force them to reveal their sources in the
army. For several hours they were beaten and dragged along the ground, and
Ray Choto was given electric shocks, particularly to the testicles. In
March, the two journalists went to England to be examined by a doctor who
specialises in physical and psychological torture. In his report, the doctor
confirmed that they had been tortured, noting that they had scars from being
burned and were suffering from psychological disturbances. In late May they
filed a complaint against the soldiers who had carried out the torture. Mark
Chavunduka and Ray Choto are still charged with “damaging state security”.
In Nigeria, journalists imprisoned during the dictatorship of Sani Abacha
were all held in appalling conditions. This was a deliberate policy on the
part of the prison authorities, who applied a “special regime” to
journalists and political opposition figures. Christina Anyanwu, who was
arrested on 31 May 1995, spent over two years in Nigerian jails. During the
first few months, she was systematically refused visits from her family as
well as any form of medical assistance. When she contracted malaria in 1996,
she did not receive treatment. Similarly, when she was suffering from high
blood pressure, an ulcer, typhoid and sight problems, the prison authorities
stood by and did nothing. Babafemi Ojudu, editor of the independent magazine
The News, was kept in solitary confinement in a tiny cell for over ten
months. When he caught typhoid and yellow fever he too was refused medical
care. Kunle Ajibade, a journalist with The News, was kept in a bare cell
with no window for three years, and was frequently beaten by prison guards.
Niran Malaolu, editor of the newspaper The Diet, was held for almost two
years in a dilapidated prison in the north of the country. He was tortured
on several occasions by Colonel Frank Omenka. With his hands and feet bound,
he was rolled on the ground, dipped in baths of water and injured with
electric shocks. Held in appalling conditions, his health worsened while he
was in jail.
Laws that make torture easy
The continued existence of emergency laws, under which the time people can
be kept in custody, the conditions governing temporary detention and the
length of jail sentences are different from those otherwise in force, is a
factor that encourages the police to resort to torture.
Many Turkish citizens who have been victims of torture or degrading
treatment were arrested under the antiterrorist law, which allows the police
to hold suspects for ten days in areas where a state of emergency is in
force, and for seven days in the rest of the country. Although the length of
time spent in custody has actually been reduced following an amendment to
the law, many cases of torture are still being recorded and the police are
still allowed to hold anyone in solitary confinement for four days. This
practice, which the Convention Against Torture describes as unacceptable,
makes torture more likely to take place. Furthermore, as in the case of
Aydogan Inal, the victims of torture are often arrested in Kurdistan, where
emergency law has been declared and administrative regulations are different
from those in force in the rest of the country.
Similar observations may be made about Syria, where a state of emergency has
been in force since 1963. The police have exceptional powers – arrests may
be made without a warrant, and prisoners kept in solitary confinement – and
impose continuous restrictions on citizens’ basic freedoms. The trials of
the 11 journalists currently in jail were held behind closed doors before
the supreme state security court, which was set up in 1968 under the
emergency law. The court, which ignores the principles set out in the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (which Syria has
signed), accepted the prisoners’ confessions as evidence, even though they
were obtained under torture. Yet article 391 of the Syrian penal code,
promulgated by decree 148 of 22 June 1949, states that anyone who subjects
another person to any form of violence forbidden by the law (torture was
declared illegal by article 28 of the 1973 constitution) in order to obtain
a confession or information about an offence is liable to a prison term of
between three months and three years. As far as Reporters Sans Frontières is
aware, no inquiry has been conducted against the state employees responsible
for torturing journalists.
Imprisonment outside the usual legal framework is a factor that makes
torture more liable to occur. Imprisonment that is illegal in the eyes of
international law also exists in Burma. Under the law to protect the state,
any citizen may be kept in custody or under house arrest without being
charged or tried for anything up to three years. The same is true of Sudan,
where a law on national security grants exceptional powers to the police and
army. Another factor that encourages the practice of torture is the
existence in Sudan of many “ghost houses”, secret and illegal detention
centres over which the legal authorities have no control. People held there
do not have access to the services of either doctors or lawyers.
Legal safeguards in Zimbabwe and an improvement in Nigeria
In Zimbabwe the right of habeas corpus, a legacy of British law, which
obliges the police or any similar authority to bring prisoners before a
court, should theoretically protect people remanded in custody and prevent
torture. Even if it was not sufficient to avoid violence against the two
journalists who were victims of ill-treatment in 1999, Zimbabwean
legislation and the attitude of the police in general have prevented the
practice from becoming widely and systematically used against journalists
and political opposition figures. However, that cannot always be said of
petty criminals and prisoners accused of common-law offences.
In Nigeria, successive military governments have introduced decrees and
emergency laws that have allowed arbitrary arrests and prolonged periods of
detention – and therefore acts of torture such as those described above.
Even before the newly elected civilian president, Olusegun Obasanjo, took
office, the military government had repealed most of those laws following
the death of General Sani Abacha in June 1998. In particular, the media
welcomed as a major victory the repeal of decree number 2 of 1984, which
allowed anyone suspected of “threatening the country or the economy” to be
imprisoned for an indefinite period, held in solitary confinement, and
without being charged or tried. All the Nigerian journalists who were jailed
and ill-treated in appalling conditions were arrested under the terms of the
decree. It remains to be seen, however, whether the Nigerian police are
willing to change their old ways.
Recommendations
Recalling that the widespread and systematic practice of torture is regarded
as a crime against humanity by international law, and in particular by
article 7 of the statutes of the International Court of Justice, Reporters
Sans Frontières calls on:
– the authorities in those countries where journalists have been victims of
torture because of their work or opinions to start legal proceedings against
the torturers,
– Burma, Sudan, Syria and Turkey to repeal the emergency laws currently in
force,
– Turkey and Burma to ratify the United Nations’ International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights,
– Nigeria, Sudan, Syria and Zimbabwe, which have ratified the covenant, to
respect their commitments,
– Burma, Syria and Zimbabwe to ratify the United Nations’ Convention Against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment,
– Nigeria and Sudan, which have already signed the convention, to ratify
it,
– Turkey, which has ratified the convention, to respect its commitments.
