Reports

“Die Here or Go to Poland”

Belarus’ and Poland’s Shared Responsibility for Border Abuses

The 26-page report, “‘Die Here or Go to Poland’: Belarus’ and Poland’s Shared Responsibility for Border Abuses,” documents serious abuses on both sides of the border. People trapped on the Belarus border with Poland said that they had been pushed back, sometimes violently, by Polish border guards to Belarus despite pleading for asylum. On the Belarusian side, accounts of violence, inhuman and degrading treatment and coercion by Belarusian border guards were commonplace.

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  • Reforming Bulgaria's Arms Trade

    A Human Rights Watch Backgrounder

    For the last two years, the government of Bulgaria has pledged to control the country's notorious arms trade as part of its strategy to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union (E.U.).

  • A Village Destroyed

    War Crimes in Kosovo

    In the early morning of May 14, 1999, in the midst of NATO's air campaign against Yugoslavia, Serbian security forces descended on the small village of Cuška--Qyshk in Albanian--near the western Kosovo city of Pec (Pejë).
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  • Class Dismissed

    Discriminatory Expulsions of Muslim Students

    Schools and universities throughout Uzbekistan are closing their doors to Muslim men with beards and women in headscarves. n a new report about Uzbekistan, Human Rights Watch documents a pernicious form of religious discrimination practiced by the government against Muslims.

  • Azerbaijan: Impunity for Torture

    Azerbaijani security forces regularly torture those in custody, and get away with it, according to a this report. The international monitoring group charged that Azerbaijan has failed to enact legal reforms and that corruption is rampant in the criminal justice system.

  • Yugoslav Government War Crimes in Racak

    The village of Racak, about half a kilometer from the town of Stimlje, had a pre-conflict population of approximately 2,000 people. During the large-scale government offensive in August 1998, the Serbian police shelled Racak, and several family compounds were looted and burned.

  • "Ethnic Cleansing" in the Glogovac Municipality

    On June 15, 1999, Serbian and Yugoslav forces withdrew from the town of Glogovac in the Drenica region of central Kosovo, in accordance with the agreement signed by NATO and Yugoslavia's military leadership.

  • Republic of Belarus

    Violations of Academic Freedom

    This report by Human Rights Watch details how President Aleksandr Lukashenka's government has suppressed research on controversial topics, re-centralized academic decision- making, and maintained a ban on political activity on campuses.

  • Ticking Time Bombs

    NATO's Use of Cluster Munitions in Yugoslavia

    The announcement by the U.S.

  • Backgrounder on Turkey's State Security Courts

    On February 15, 1999, Abdullah Ocalan, leader of the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK), was apprehended in Kenya and transported to Turkey, where he has been held ever since on the prison island of Imrali.

  • Backgrounder on Repression of the Kurds in Turkey

    Denied political, and cultural rights, Kurds have been the principal victims of the Turkish state's excesses since the military coup of 1980. (It should be noted that, ironically--or tragically--the majority of victims of PKK abuses have also been Kurds.)

  • Money Talks

    Arms Dealing with Human Rights Abusers

    Bulgaria has earned a reputation as an anything-goes weapons bazaar where Kalashnikov assault rifles, mortars, antitank mines, ammunition,explosives and other items are available for a price — no matter who the buyers are or how they might use the deadly wares.