Human Rights Watch Daily Brief, 15 June 2015

A judge in South Africa has barred Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir from leaving the country, after the International Criminal Court (ICC) called for Bashir's arrest. Wanted by the ICC in connection with war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in Darfur, Bashir went to South Africa for an African Union summit. The Pretoria High Court will rule today whether he should be handed over to the ICC, though there are some reports he has already fled the country. The heinous attacks on civilians in Lamu and Tana River area of Kenya’s coast in mid-2014 were followed by abusive security force operations, Human Rights Watch and the Kenya Human Rights Commission said today. One year later, no one has been held responsible for the attacks. Hundreds of people have been beaten and detained without charge while communities remain vulnerable to further attacks. There's increasing concern at alleged secret deals between Eritrea and EU member states, which may involve the abusive regime being offered money or having sanctions lifted in exchange for preventing people leaving the country. Migrants and asylum seekers from Eritrea, many fleeing life-long military conscription, are a significant proportion of those now crossing the Mediterranean. And speaking of alleged dodgy deals involving migrants, Australia's government has been accused of paying people smugglers to keep boats away. An activist in Azerbaijan, who had been taking refuge in the Swiss embassy in Baku for months, has managed to flee the country. A coalition of 14 international and 220 Congolese rights organizations have called on the Congolese authorities to immediately and unconditionally release two activists. Fred Bauma and Yves Makwambala were arrested on March 15, 2015, during a pro-democracy youth workshop organized to launch “Filimbi,” a platform to encourage Congolese youth to peacefully and responsibly perform their civic duties. A United States federal court dealt another blow to the Obama administration’s attempts to resuscitate the inferior military commissions at Guantanamo Bay by overturning the 2008 conviction of Ali Hamza Ahmad Suliman al-Bahlul.