NAIROBI, Kenya
The armed men kicked down the door during the
night. Within minutes, men wearing police uniforms seized the opposition figure
and left. It was the last time Chantal saw her husband.Opposition candidate Agathon Rwasa attends the congress of the opposition Congres National pour la Liberte (National Freedom Council) party
The disappearance in Burundi’s Gihanga district in
November led Chantal to flee to neighboring Congo, she told The Associated
Press, giving only her first name out of fear of retaliation.
Her husband is one of at least 20 opposition
members in Burundi who have been seized over the past year, Agathon Rwasa, leader
of main opposition party CNL, told the AP. Some were tortured in the custody of
intelligence officials, he said, citing survivors or representatives and family
members able to speak with them in prison.
“They are accused of having weapons in their houses.
(The government) also pretends that they have ties with some rebel or armed
groups,” Rwasa said. “How come they always pretend that CNL members are in
collusion with such kind of behavior?”
Such accounts have led human rights groups to warn
that Burundi’s government has shown little if any improvement under President
Evariste Ndayishimiye, who took office after the death of President Pierre
Nkurunziza in 2020 with talk of reforms after years of deadly political
crackdowns.
The United States in November terminated its
sanctions program on Burundi, citing “changed circumstances and positive
political developments” there. The United Nations Human Rights Council
suspended the mandate of its commission of inquiry on Burundi, and the European
Union delegation in the country agreed to resume political dialogue with local
authorities.
But concerns remain. In a case that drew even Ndayishimiye’s attention, well-known CNL opposition figure Augustin Matata was seized in November and held by intelligence services.
He died in December after being tortured, which
Burundi’s National Human Rights Commission acknowledged, in an unusual move.
The organization has been criticized by human rights groups for not denouncing
violations. The commission also alleged it had documented cases of torture in
the intelligence cells, but it didn’t give details and would not tell the AP
whether the cases involved CNL members.
A senior intelligence officer was imprisoned for
Matata’s death and in December Burundi’s president surprised many by speaking
to reporters about the case.
“People being tortured by the intelligence, it is a
crime, you know that,” Ndayishimiye said. “And I am going to reveal to you that
the person who did this shouldn’t have been in the service that day.” Some in
Burundi “still have a spirit of wild beasts,” he added.
But the government has denied that people are being
disappeared. The spokesman for the security ministry, Pierre Nkurikiye,
recently told journalists there are no such known cases, and he called on
families to report allegations to police instead of airing them on social
media. Government spokesman Prosper Ntahorwamiye told the AP that “if
(families) really have cases, the courts are there for that.”
Such attitudes leave observers worried.
“Since President Ndayishimiye came to power, we
have continued to document cases of enforced disappearances and torture, often
implicating the military, the police or the national intelligence service. Many
victims are perceived opposition members or suspected of working with armed
groups,” Lewis Mudge, Central Africa director at Human Rights Watch, told the
AP.
He said his group since Ndayishimiye’s election has
documented how authorities consistently failed to investigate the dozens of
dead bodies that were found, often mutilated and showing signs of execution or
torture, along a river separating Burundi and Congo.
Ending such abuses should be a top priority if
Ndayishimiye and Burundi’s government are serious about rights reforms and
addressing “the pervasive system of abuse that became entrenched under
Nkurunziza’s presidency,” Mudge said.
In December, the U.N. Committee Against Torture
deplored Burundi’s lack of cooperation in its work, saying the committee had
received 14 torture complaints against the government since 2014. Asked whether
any of the cases were received since Ndayishimiye took office, the committee
told the AP it could not immediately disclose details.
In a recent report, the independent Initiative for
Human Rights in Burundi noted the recent cases of arbitrary arrest and torture
and urged the international community to pay attention.
“Do not take the government’s fine human rights
promises at face value while it continues to torture and eliminate suspected
opponents,” the group said. - AP
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