• Algeria: Crackdown on Protest as Election Nears
    Press release
    May 9, 2012
    Algerian authorities have used arrests and other tactics to keep people from demonstrating in the capital in the period leading up to the May 10, 2012 elections. Security forces are detaining people who try to demonstrate peacefully in Algiers, including at least one candidate for election, and have prevented people from reaching the city if they suspect them of intending to demonstrate.
  • Letter to Ambassadors of UN Security Council Member States in Favor of Enlarging MINURSO's Mandate
    Letter
    Apr 12, 2012
    Human Rights Watch urges the Security Council, when it reviews the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) this month, to extend it to incorporate human rights monitoring in Western Sahara and in the Polisario Front-run refugee camps near Tindouf.
  • Letter to French Prime Minister Regarding the Extradition of Mourad Dhina
    Letter
    Mar 12, 2012
    We urge you not to sign such an order because by doing so, you would be sending Mr. Dhina to a country where he would be at risk of torture or of conviction on the basis of evidence obtained through torture.
  • Algeria: Restore Civil Liberties
    Press release
    Apr 6, 2011
    Algerian authorities have taken a step in the right direction by lifting a state of emergency, but the government still needs to restore basic civil liberties.
  • Algeria: End Public Assembly Ban in Algiers
    Press release
    Mar 20, 2011

    The Algerian authorities should rescind a 2001 decree denying people the right to assemble peacefully.

  • US: Stop Returns of Guantanamo Detainees Fearing Mistreatment
    Press release
    Jan 6, 2011
    The US government should not forcibly return detainees to places where they fear ill-treatment without providing them a fair legal process to contest their repatriation. The Obama administration on January 6, 2011, transferred detainee Saeed Farhi bin Mohammed to his native Algeria despite his expressed fears of abuse in his homeland – the second forcible US return to that country in six months.
  • US: Don’t Return Guantanamo Detainees Fearing Ill-Treatment
    Press release
    Jul 19, 2010
    The US government should not forcibly return Guantanamo detainees to places where they fear ill-treatment without providing them a fair legal process to contest their repatriation. The Obama administration today transferred Aziz Abdul Naji, an Algerian detainee, to Algeria despite his expressed fears of abuse back in the country.
  • Algeria: Stop Suppressing Protests
    Press release
    May 3, 2010
    Algeria should end its repressive policy banning all demonstrations in the capital, Human Rights Watch said today after police blocked a small rally planned in front of the offices of state television to demand press freedom.
  • Letter to Minister of Interior Zerhouni on the right to freedom of assembly
    Letter
    May 3, 2010
  • Letter to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
    Letter
    Apr 13, 2010
    Our organizations, Human Rights Watch and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights (RFK Center), have an established record of working on human rights issues in Western Sahara. Concerned about human rights violations against the Sahrawi people, we write to urge your support at the UN Security Council for the establishment of a UN mechanism that would monitor and report on human rights in Western Sahara and in the Sahrawi refugee camps in Tindouf, Algeria.