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Published in 2000 Election Violence in Abidjan: October 24-26, 2000 On October 22, 2000, presidential elections were held in the Ivory Coast. In a bid to eliminate political rivals from the presidential race, military dictator General Robert Guei fomented ethnic and religious mistrust, and questioned opposition leader Alassane Ouattara's nationality, barring him from running in elections. Ouattara, who heads the Rally of Republicans party (RDR), draws heavily on support from the largely Muslim north. December 20, 2000 Background Briefing Urgent Concerns: Conditions Of Detention For Foreigners In Greece The Greek Government should as a matter of urgency take measures to alleviate the extreme overcrowding and other appalling conditions of detention for foreigners held in police facilities in Greece. December 20, 2000 Background Briefing Fueling Aghanistan's War: Press Backgrounder Afghanistan has been at war for more than twenty years. During that time it has lost a third of its population. Some 1.5 million people are estimated to have died as a direct result of the conflict. Throughout the war, all of the major factions have been guilty of grave breaches of international humanitarian law. Their warmaking is supported and perpetuated by the involvement of Afghanistan's neighbors and other states in providing weapons, ammunition, fuel, and other logistical support. State and non-state actors across the region and beyond continue to provide new arms and other materiel, as well as training and advisory assistance. December 15, 2000 Background Briefing Serbia: Time Ripe For Free And Fair Elections The Yugoslav republic of Serbia has an opportunity to hold free and fair parliamentary elections on December 23, for the first time since a multiparty system was introduced in 1990. December 15, 2000 Background Briefing Update on Human Rights Violations in the Niger Delta The restoration of civilian rule in Nigeria has not produced a reduction of human rights violations in the oil producing regions of the Niger Delta, even though the location and types of abuse have changed to some extent. Since the inauguration of President Olusegun Obasanjo in May 1999, the government has continued to show a disturbing willingness to deploy indiscriminate lethal force in response to criminal activity, ethnic conflict, or protests related to oil production. December 14, 2000 Background Briefing 50 Years On: What Future for Refugee Protection? How countries treat those who have been forced to flee persecution and human rights abuse elsewhere is a litmus test of their commitment to defending human rights and upholding humanitarian values. Yet, fifty years after its inception, the states that first established a formal refugee protection system are abandoning this principle, and the future of the international refugee regime is under serious threat. December 12, 2000 Background Briefing Download PDF Printer friendly version Uzbekistan -- "And it Was Hell All over Again...": Torture in Uzbekistan Widespread torture of detainees is common in criminal investigations in Uzbekistan, and has become an unmistakable feature of the government's crackdown against independent Islam. Uzbekistan's government refuses to hold police and security forces accountable for acts of torture, and even tacitly encourages torture though its broadcasting of political prisoners' public "confessions" as tools of political propaganda. Instituting legal and judicial reform to halt torture, and ending impunity for it, should be a matter of priority for the government of Uzbekistan and for all parties interested in human rights and the security and stability of the region. HRW Index No.: 253X December 1, 2000 Report Purchase online Memorandum on Human Rights and Rule of Law Priorities in Yugoslavia The November 24-25 summit in Zagreb, with the participation of fifteen European Union (E.U.) states and Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia, provides a unique opportunity for the E.U. to assess the transition in Yugoslavia and to improve the dialogue with the new authorities in Belgrade on a variety of issues, including human rights. November 17, 2000 Background Briefing Human Rights Defenders in the Barcelona Era The five years since the inauguration of the Barcelona process has witnessed a considerable dynamism in the area of human rights activism. November 1, 2000 Background Briefing Human Rights Issues in Vietnam Press Backgrounder While dissent is seriously punished by isolation of critics and through a legal system that is highly politicized, Human Rights Watch notes that there have been areas of gradual improvement in Vietnam in recent years. Restrictions on everyday life for most citizens have eased noticeably as the market economy has taken hold. November 1, 2000 Background Briefing Download PDF Printer friendly version Azerbaijani Parliamentary Elections Manipulated Parliamentary elections scheduled for November 5 were to have been a test of Azerbaijan's commitment to the rule of law and to its obligations as a country seeking accession to join the Council of Europe. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) voted on June 28 to recommend to the Committee of Ministers that Azerbaijan be admitted to the Council of Europe and asked Azerbaijan "to ensure that its planned elections be free and impartial." The Council of Ministers is unlikely to vote on Azerbaijan's accession until after the parliamentary vote. October 30, 2000 Background Briefing Turkey: Draft Prison Laws Need Wider Debate Human Rights Watch welcomes the Justice Ministry's apparent abandonment of plans to impose a regime of isolation in its new F-type high security prisons. However, the organization believes that further work on the draft laws issued last week will be necessary in order to allay fears among prisoners and their families. In recent months the Turkish authorities have used violence and the law to suppress the debate on the future of its prison system. October 28, 2000 Background Briefing Elections in Egypt Elections for Egypt“s 454-member People“s Assembly began on October 18, 2000. Fifteen political parties are contesting 444 parliamentary seats, the remaining ten seats to be filled by presidential appointment. These are the first parliamentary elections in the country“s history to be held under full judicial supervision. October 15, 2000 Background Briefing Reform or Repression?: Post-Coup Abuses in Pakistan Human Rights Watch today accused Pakistan's military rulers of committing widespread abuses in the name of political "reform," and called on General Pervez Musharraf to immediately return the country to constitutional rule. In the twenty-page report, "Reform or Repression? Post-Coup Abuses in Pakistan," Human Rights Watch said the Musharraf government had detained opponents and former officials without charge, removed indepedent judges from the higher courts, banned public rallies and demonstrations, and rendered political parties all but powerless. October 10, 2000 Report Promises Betrayed: Denial of Rights of Bidun, Women, and Freedom of Expression Human Rights Watch today called on Kuwait to revoke laws that discriminate against women and long-term non-citizens of Kuwait. In a report issued before the opening of the Kuwaiti National Assembly on October 28, Human Rights Watch also called on Kuwait to amend its Penal Code and Printing and Publications Law to protect freedom of expression. The 38-page report, "Promises Betrayed: Denial of Rights of Bidun, Women, and Freedom of Expression," details Kuwaiti laws and practices which systematically discriminate against women and stateless Bidun, and laws which criminalize free expression by journalists, academics, and writers. These laws contravene Kuwait's international treaty obligations, including the six human rights treaties that Kuwait has signed since 1968. Human Rights Watch said that Kuwaiti women face severe discrimination in both public and private life. Under Kuwaiti penal law, men who kill female relatives in so-called "honor crimes" serve a maximum three-year sentence and are not prosecuted for murder. Women are banned from voting and standing for election, cannot contract their own marriage or divorce without the agreement of a male guardian or judge, and are barred in practice from many public positions, including serving as judges. October 1, 2000 Report Also available in 
Purchase online Investigation into Unlawful use of Force in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and Northern Israel, October 4 through October 11 Human Rights Watch today released results of a week-long investigation that condemns Israeli police and security forces for a pattern of using excessive, lethal force in clashes with demonstrators over the past two weeks. In the report, Human Rights Watch also strongly criticized the failure of the Palestinian police to act consistently to prevent armed Palestinians from shooting at Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) from positions where civilians were present and thus endangered by the Israeli response. Human Rights Watch said its week-long investigation of clashes in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and northern Israel showed repeated use by Israeli security forces of lethal force in situations where demonstrators posed no threat of death or serious injury to security forces or others. In situations where Palestinians did fire upon Israeli security forces, the IDF showed a troubling proclivity to resort to indiscriminate lethal force in response. At least 100 Palestinians have been killed and 3,500 injured in clashes with Israeli security forces. Human Rights Watch also expressed concern at the IDF's use of medium caliber munitions, which are meant for penetrating concrete and other hard surface barriers, against unarmed demonstrators in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The military munitions were particularly devastating when they hit civilians. October 1, 2000 Report Also available in
Purchase online Backtracking on Reform: Amendments Undermine Access to Justice In a report released today, Human Rights Watch documents Georgia's repeal of reforms that would have widened access to the courts to hear torture and other complaints of abuses by the police, procuracy, and security forces.The Georgian parliament repealed these important reforms just weeks after Georgia was voted into the Council of Europe in April 1999. Since then, Georgia's abysmal record on torture has shown no improvement, and the report shows how the backtracking on legal reforms last year has contributed to continuing widespread, unchecked abuses. The reforms affected the criminal procedure code, which governs criminal investigations and trials. Council of Europe experts had reviewed and the Georgian parliament had adopted the reformed criminal procedure code prior to Georgia's April 1999 admission to the organization. October 1, 2000 Report Purchase online Seeking Protection Addressing Sexual and Domestic Violence inTanzania's Refugee Camps Burundian refugee women confront daily violence in Tanzanian refugee camps, Human Rights Watch charges in a new report released today. Wide-spread sexual and domestic abuse have left many of these women physically battered, psychologically traumatized, and fearful for their lives HRW Index No.: 2483 October 1, 2000 Report Purchase online "Welcome to Hell": Arbitrary Detention, Torture, and Extortion in Chechnya This report details the cycle of torture and extortion faced by thousands of Chechens whom Russian forces have detained in Chechnya. The rights group called on European states to file a case against Russia in the European Court of Human Rights, for these and other abuses during the war in Chechnya. HRW Index No.: 253X October 1, 2000 Report Purchase online Queston of Principle: Arms Trade and Human Rights South Africa is not living up to its own high standards with respect to arms exports, Human Rights Watch charged today. In this report, "A Question of Principle: Arms Trade and Human Rights," Human Rights Watch charged the South African government with selling weapons to countries with serious human rights problems, where an influx of weaponry could significantly worsen ongoing abuses. Human Rights Watch noted that after 1994, South Africa announced more restrictive policies on arms transfers. But the report charges that those policies are not always being followed. In 1994, a scandal erupted involving the sale by Armscor, the apartheid-era governmental arms export agency, of weapons to Yemen for probable on-shipment to the former Yugoslavia, then under U.N. embargo. The Human Rights Watch report cited examples of weapons sales since 1994 to governments engaging in repression against their own people or to countries involved in their own or others' civil wars. These sales clearly violated South Africa's own stated policies. Purchasers of South African arms include Algeria, Angola, Colombia, the Republic of Congo (Brazzaville), India, Namibia, Pakistan, Rwanda, Uganda, and Zimbabwe. HRW Index No.: A1205 October 1, 2000 Report Purchase online |
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