Web pages about "Lebanon"

Lebanon bus bomb kills 14, including civilians

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 17:21:10 +0100

A bomb attack on a commercial bus containing civilians in Tripoli, north Lebanon, on Wednesday 13 August killed at least 14 people, according to reports.

The bomb exploded while the bus was near a bus-stop on a busy street. The dead included both civilians and soldiers who were travelling on the bus or who were bystanders close to the scene of the explosion. Tens of others were injured.

The Tripoli area has witnessed considerable violence over the last year. This summer more than 20 people were killed in battles between two rival political groups.

Last year, over 40 civilians and 170 soldiers were killed during fighting between Fatah al-Islam, an Islamist armed group, which had installed itself in the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp, north of Tripoli, and the Lebanese army.

On 12 December last year, General Francois el-Hajj, the Lebanese Army’s chief of operations during the fighting in Nahr al-Bared, and a bodyguard, were killed in a car bomb attack in Ba’abda, outside the capital Beirut.

Amnesty International has condemned all attacks on civilians and has called for the Tripoli bomb attack to be investigated promptly, effectively and impartially. The organization has also called for those found responsible to be brought to justice in accordance with international fair trial standards.

Lebanon: Irene Khan urges action on human rights

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 11:15:34 +0100

(Beirut: 27 June) Secretary General Irene Khan called on top Lebanese officials today to reaffirm their commitment to human rights by taking concrete action, including the creation of a fully independent judicial system.

In a meeting with President Michel Suleiman, Ms. Khan urged him to show leadership for human rights issues during his term in office.

Ms. Khan, who also met with Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, asked all three leaders to work towards the establishment of a fully independent judicial system for Lebanon as a first step towards ending impunity. She stressed the need for full and independent investigations of human rights abuses during the recent incidents of political violence.

She also called on Lebanon to ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture.

Welcoming the initiative of the Parliament to develop a National Human Rights Plan, Ms. Khan said a widespread consultation on the project was needed.

She called for more protection for the rights of foreigners in Lebanon, in particular Palestinian and Iraqi refugees and migrant workers.

On Saturday, Ms. Khan will receive an Honorary Doctoral Degree from the American University of Beirut, in recognition for her contribution to human rights.

Lebanon: leaders must prevent human rights abuses

Tue, 13 May 2008 15:06:33 +0100

"They must also ensure that any person within their custody is treated humanely and is not subjected to torture or other ill-treatment."

Amnesty International called on the Lebanese authorities to ensure proper investigations into the killing and any other abuses of those not involved in the armed clashes that broke out last week between members of pro- and anti-government armed groups.

"Political leaders must ensure that anyone within their ranks suspected of having committed human rights abuses is handed over to proper judicial authorities to be investigated and brought to justice in full compliance with international human rights standards," said Amnesty International.

Amnesty International is urging representatives of Arab states who are expected to hold a meeting on the situation in Beirut on Wednesday to press all parties involved to put an end to all human rights abuses and ensure that the civilian population is spared.

Background Information

According to official figures, at least 62 people have died and 198 have been injured in the fighting which broke out on Wednesday 7 May in the capital Beirut, and gradually spread to other parts of the country. The fighting started when members of Hizbullah-led opposition groups clashed with pro-government forces in Beirut following government decisions to close down the group’s telecommunications network and to dismiss Beirut Airport’s head of security, who was seen as sympathetic to Hizbullah.

On Friday 9 May, whilst attempting to flee the Ras al-Naba'a area in Beirut, a 60-year old woman and her 33-year old son were killed when their car was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade followed by a salvo of bullets fired by armed men. The same day, two other sons of this woman were seriously injured when they were shot in the back by a group of armed men in the al-Nwairi area in Beirut, while on their way to find out what had happened to their mother and brother.

According to news reports, two civilians were killed at a 10 May funeral procession for a killed pro-government supporter, in Tariq al-Jdide, Beirut.

On Sunday 11 May, Hizbullah said that three of its members had been kidnapped in Aley, outside Beirut, by members of the pro-government Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) and that bodies of two of the men had been found. PSP leader Walid Jumblatt acknowledged that three Hizbullah men had been killed and that he would accept responsibility if reports that the men had been tortured before being killed were found to be true.

Lebanon leaders must prevent human rights abuses

Tue, 13 May 2008 17:33:02 +0100

All political leaders in Lebanon must clearly instruct their supporters to fully respect human rights and to refrain from recklessly carrying out attacks in heavily-populated areas that endanger civilians uninvolved in the clashes, Amnesty International said on Tuesday.

"They must also ensure that any person within their custody is treated humanely and is not subjected to torture or other ill-treatment."

Amnesty International called on the Lebanese authorities to ensure proper investigations into the killing and any other abuses of those not involved in the armed clashes that broke out last week between members of pro- and anti-government armed groups.

"Political leaders must ensure that anyone within their ranks suspected of having committed human rights abuses is handed over to proper judicial authorities to be investigated and brought to justice in full compliance with international human rights standards," said Amnesty International.

Amnesty International is urging representatives of Arab states who are expected to hold a meeting on the situation in Beirut on Wednesday to press all parties involved to put an end to all human rights abuses and ensure that the civilian population is spared.

Background Information

According to official figures, at least 62 people have died and 198 have been injured in the fighting which broke out on Wednesday 7 May in the capital Beirut, and gradually spread to other parts of the country. The fighting started when members of Hizbullah-led opposition groups clashed with pro-government forces in Beirut following government decisions to close down the group’s telecommunications network and to dismiss Beirut Airport’s head of security, who was seen as sympathetic to Hizbullah.

On Friday 9 May, whilst attempting to flee the Ras al-Naba'a area in Beirut, a 60-year old woman and her 33-year old son were killed when their car was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade followed by a salvo of bullets fired by armed men. The same day, two other sons of this woman were seriously injured when they were shot in the back by a group of armed men in the al-Nwairi area in Beirut, while on their way to find out what had happened to their mother and brother.

According to news reports, two civilians were killed at a 10 May funeral procession for a killed pro-government supporter, in Tariq al-Jdide, Beirut.

On Sunday 11 May, Hizbullah said that three of its members had been kidnapped in Aley, outside Beirut, by members of the pro-government Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) and that bodies of two of the men had been found. PSP leader Walid Jumblatt acknowledged that three Hizbullah men had been killed and that he would accept responsibility if reports that the men had been tortured before being killed were found to be true.

Israel: Winograd Commission disregards Israeli war crimes

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 11:39:03 +0000

Amnesty International called a report published yesterday by the Winograd Commission on Israel’s conduct in the war with Hizbullah in July-August 2006 “deeply flawed.”

The organization said that the report failed to investigate a crucial aspect of the war -- the government policies and military strategies that failed to discriminate between the Lebanese civilian population and Hizbullah combatants and between civilian property and infrastructure and military targets.

“This was yet another missed opportunity to address the policies and decisions behind the grave violations of international humanitarian law -- including war crimes -- committed by Israeli forces,” said Malcolm Smart, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme.

“The indiscriminate killings of many Lebanese civilians not involved in the hostilities and the deliberate and wanton destruction of civilian properties and infrastructure on a massive scale were given no more than token consideration by the commission,” said Smart.

Though not vested with the powers of an official state commission of investigation, the Winograd Commission had the power to subpoena witnesses and recommend the prosecution of officials it found to have been responsible for wilful or negligent criminal conduct.

However, the Commission chose to limit its work to reviewing military strategy and political decisions, and made no serious attempt to investigate violations of international humanitarian law, including war crimes, committed by Israeli forces or to recommend measures for holding those responsible for such violations to account. It recommends the development of mechanisms to ensure the effectiveness of fighting within the framework of international humanitarian law standards, immediate investigations by the army when there are concerns that international humanitarian law was violated and better preparedness for responding to humanitarian problems arising from military action. But it essentially brushed aside available evidence of serious violations of international law, claiming that interpretations of international humanitarian law are controversial, that it did not have the capacity to deal with the volume of data, that the alleged violations were already being investigated by other bodies, and that such allegations are used as propaganda against Israel -- whereas it did scrutinize military strategies and the conduct of certain operations in detail, including in cases which were already being investigated separately.

Based on its on-the-ground research and analysis of the conduct of hostilities in 2006, Amnesty International concluded that it was the Lebanese civilian population -- not Hizbullah combatants -- who paid the heaviest price of the Israeli army’s attacks. Of some 1,190 people killed, the vast majority were civilians not involved in the hostilities, among them hundreds of children. The overwhelming majority of homes, properties and infrastructure targeted in air strikes and artillery attacks were likewise civilian.

Other international human rights and humanitarian organizations and United Nations (UN) bodies that examined the situation reached the same conclusion. In its report of 10 November 2006 the UN Commission of Inquiry concluded that: “… a significant pattern of excessive, indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force by the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] against Lebanese civilians and civilian objects, failing to distinguish civilians from combatants and civilian objects from military targets”. A separate investigation by four UN independent experts also reported in October 2006 that “Available information strongly indicates that, in many instances, Israel violated its legal obligations to distinguish between military and civilian objectives; to fully apply the principle of proportionality”.

In addition, the launching of hundreds of thousands of cluster bombs, containing an estimated four million cluster sub-munitions (bomblets), in the last few days of the war left a deadly legacy. This is continuing to cause casualties among the civilian population, humanitarian workers, and mine-clearance personnel who put their lives on the line -- literally -- to clear unexploded ordnance.

"Although the Winograd Commission recommended that the army review its policies on the use of cluster bombs to ensure that the use of these weapons will not violate international humanitarian law and army discipline, it did not propose any concrete measures,” said Smart.

The Israeli government’s persistent refusal to hand over the cluster bombs strike data and the exact coordinates of the areas into which its forces fired the cluster bombs has made this already painstaking mine-clearance task more deadly and time consuming. To date, 40 people (27 civilians and 13 de-mining personnel) have been killed and 234 have been injured (200 civilians and 34 de-mining personnel) by unexploded ordnance and the United Nation Mine Action Coordination Centre (UN-MACC) has identified more then 900 sites contaminated by unexploded but still lethal remnants of cluster bombs and other ordnance launched by Israeli forces into South Lebanon.

Amnesty International called on the Israeli government to:

Provide to the UN-MACC the cluster bombs strike data and the exact coordinates of the areas into which its forces fired cluster bombs.
Establish an independent and impartial investigation into evidence indicating that its forces committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the conflict, including war crimes, and ensure that those responsible are brought to justice.
Revise its interpretation of the rules and principles relating to the concepts of military objective, military advantage and proportionality, to ensure that its interpretation is fully consistent with international humanitarian law, and that the Israeli military complies fully with the duty to take precautionary measures when carrying out attacks, as well as in defence, and does not carry out attacks as a form of collective punishment.
Announce a moratorium on the use of all cluster weapons and, in any event, ensure that such weapons are never again used in civilian areas under any circumstances.

The organization also called on Hizbullah, whose forces also committed war crimes during the 2006 conflict, to:

Renounce its unlawful policy of reprisal rocket attacks against the civilian population of Israel and ensure that its fighters comply fully with the need to take precautionary measures in attacks and in defence, including the need to distinguish themselves from non-combatants to the maximum extent possible.
Ensure that Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, the two Israeli soldiers captured by Hizbullah fighters on 12 July 2006, are treated humanely at all times and are allowed immediate access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Palestinian refugees suffer in Lebanon

Fri, 26 Oct 2007 20:34:12 +0100

Palestinian refugees in Lebanon face discrimination in employment and a lack of access to adequate education and housing.

A new Amnesty International report: Exiled and Suffering: Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, examines the wide range of restrictions that continue to impact on the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees.

More than half of the 300,000 Palestinian refugees residing in Lebanon live in 12 official Palestinian refugee camps. The area of land allocated for these camps has remained largely unchanged since 1948 despite significant population growth. In some households, families of 10 share a single room.

They continue to be denied the right to adequate housing, due to unacceptable levels of habitability and restrictions on property ownership.

In camps in the south of Lebanon, unreasonable restrictions have beenimposed on refugees' right to repair or improve their homes. Some refugees have been intimidated, fined and detained simply for seeking to build a brick wall to protect their home from the elements.

Palestinians continue to suffer discrimination and marginalization in the labour market, contributing to high levels of unemployment, low wages and poor working conditions.

The Lebanese authorities recently lifted a ban on 50 of the 70 jobs not permitted to Palestinians, but refugees continue to face obstacles finding employment in such jobs.

This lack of employment prospects has led to a high drop-out rate for Palestinian schoolchildren, who also have limited access to public secondary education. The resultant poverty is exacerbated by restrictions placed on their access to social services.

The Lebanese government must take concrete steps to end all forms of discrimination against Palestinian refugees and to fully protect and uphold their human rights.

The international community must also attempt to find a durable solution for refugees that fully respects and protects their human rights, including their right of return. This may involve providing financial and technical assistance to Lebanon, helping it provide the best possible human rights protection to its Palestinian refugee population.

Press Freedom: Journalists in need of protection

Wed, 03 May 2006 17:45:57 +0100

Since the beginning of the war in Iraq in March 2003, more journalists have been killed in that country than anywhere else in the world. The situation faced by journalists attempting to cover the events in that country highlight the need for greater international efforts to protect journalists in conflict situations.

Journalists fulfil a special role in conflict situations, providing details of incidents that parties to the conflict would sometimes prefer remained unknown by the general public.

In the first year of the conflict, journalists were primarily killed by US or Iraqi forces, usually reported as having been caught in the crossfire or accidentally shot, though journalists' organisations have charged that some of the attacks looked like deliberate targeting. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) said on 8 March 2006, the third anniversary of the US attack on Baghdad’s Palestine Hotel, that more than 100 journalists and media staff have lost their lives.

“...In many of these cases we still do not have concrete answers to hard questions about who is responsible and what happened,” said Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary.

In a recent case, the IFJ reports that Mahmoud Za'al, 35, a cameraman and reporter for the Iraqi television station Baghdad TV was shot on 24 January 2006 in Ramadi, while working on a social documentary. According to local reports, Mahmoud Za’al was allegedly shot in a cross-fire between US forces and insurgents.

Since 2004, however, both local and international journalists have increasingly been targeted by armed groups as part of their campaigns. Many local journalists are targeted because they work for foreign media and are accused of collaboration, while foreign journalists have been kidnapped and murdered in an attempt to put pressure on the foreign troops in the country.

Female journalists are among those targeted by armed groups. In February, a well-known correspondent for Al-Arabiya television and two members of her crew in Iraq were kidnapped and killed. Police found the bodies of reporter Atwar Bahjat, her cameraman Adnan Khairallah and soundman Khaled Mohsen on the outskirts of Samarra.

The IFJ has been campaigning for a similar level of protection as granted to humanitarian workers and UN staff in August 2003 to be extended to journalists in conflict situations. The organisation presented text for a suggested resolution of the Security Council to UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, at the World Electronic Media Forum during the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Tunisian, 16 November, 2005.

Amnesty International (AI) agrees that international measures must be put in place to protect journalists in conflict. AI calls on the incoming members of the Security Council to adopt measures that seek to prevent these attacks and hold those who carry them out accountable for their actions.

However, it is not just in conflict situations that journalists need protection. Across the world, in a range of different situations, journalists are attacked, imprisoned and forced into self-censorship by repressive governments. The common element in all of these is the unwillingness of some governments to allow alternative voices to emerge and, in many cases, a fear that journalists will expose abuses they have tried to keep quiet.

In Uzbekistan, journalists who have tried to publicise the killings in Andizhan last May have been threatened, assaulted, detained and forcibly confined to their homes. The "war on terror" is used as a pretext for tightening restrictions on freedom of expression. The situation has become so bad that, following the closure of several independent foreign media outlets, the BBC closed its Uzbekistan office last October due to the increased harassment of its staff by the authorities.

The "war on terror" has also been invoked in Pakistan to restrict journalists. Journalists have been denied permission to cover events in the tribal areas of the country where the army is engaged in operations against those linked to al-Qa'ida and the Taleban. Across the country, journalists covering the "war on terror" have been harassed, arbitrarily arrested. Some have "disappeared" for some length of time.

In one such case, journalist Hayatullah Khan was abducted by armed men on his way to cover a protest rally in Mirali Bazaar, North Waziristan, against a missile attack four days earlier. He is now thought to be detained, possibly having been handed over to US agencies, but his detention has not been acknowledged and his whereabouts remain unknown.

In Colombia, the continuing armed conflict, which the government sometimes describes as a "fight against terrorism", has, in some cases been used as a pretext to intimidate journalists who, along with trade unionists and social activists, are targeted by both army-backed paramilitaries and the armed opposition groups.

Members of the security forces and government officials have sought to stigmatize some journalists who expose human rights violations by associating them with the armed opposition groups, thus placing them at risk of attack by paramilitary forces. They are under particular threat in the run-up to the Presidential elections on 28 May.

In Lebanon, following the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri in February 2005 and the subsequent withdrawal of Syrian troops, several prominent journalists who had spoken out against Syrian practices were killed or seriously injured by bombs placed under their cars. Samir Qasir and Gibran Tueni MP, a senior journalist with and the editor of the daily al-Nahar respectively, were killed in June and December 2005. May Chidiac, a presenter with LBC television, lost an arm and a leg in a bomb attack against her in September 2005.

Journalists in Kenya have also found themselves targeted in a pattern of increased intimidation and harassment by the government. In March this year, the Information and Communications Minister Mutahi Kagwe and Government Spokesman Alfred Mutua warned the media of stern government action if the persisted in what was described as "misreporting and misrepresentation".

In one of a series of incidents, two groups of hooded armed people with gas masks staged simultaneous raids early on 2 March on the editorial offices of the Kenya Television Network and the Standard Group's printing press in Nairobi. They disabled broadcasting equipment, burnt thousands of copies of newspapers and removed computer equipment.

States have a duty to protect journalists and not to persecute them in an effort to control the free flow of information. A free media is not only beneficial, but necessary in a free society. By exposing human rights abuses and giving voice to marginalised parts of the community, the media can at its best encourage the proper application of justice and stimulate debates that can defuse situations that might otherwise lead to conflict. When faced with unjust restrictions and the threat of attack, self-censorship in the media can have the opposite effect, aiding the covering up of abuses and fostering frustration in marginalised communities.

International recognition of the importance of journalists and the need for them to work free from unjust restrictions and the threat of violence will help to put pressure on those states who seek to control the media. Journalism matters and it is time for those who recognise the importance of a free media to try to change the minds of those who do not.

Other countries:
Rwanda
Restrictions on the freedom of the press remain in force, belying the government's claims that it is building an open society. Journalists who voice concern or criticize the state authorities are intimidated into silence or forced into self-censorship. The climate of impunity is perpetuated by the lack of substantive measures to bring to justice perpetrators of past human rights violations against journalists, including physical attacks, unlawful detention, intimidation and harassment.

Cuba
The government retains complete control over all media outlets and private ownership of press, radio, television and other means of communication is prohibited by law. Independent journalists face intimidation, harassment and imprisonment for their work. There are currently 72 prisoners of conscience on the island, 14 of whom are journalists.

Bangladesh
Several journalists engaged in defending human rights have had their fingers or hands deliberately damaged so they can no longer hold a pen. The attacks form part of a situation in which hundreds of human rights defenders have received death threats and been physically attacked. Successive governments have consistently failed to protect individuals at risk, investigate the abuses committed against them and bring the perpetrators to justice.

Egypt
Restrictions on freedom of expression, association and assembly persist. A Bill introduced by President Mubarak in February 2004 that would abolish imprisonment for publishing offences has not been made law. In the meantime, journalists continued to be threatened, beaten, fined for libel or imprisoned because of their work. Crews and journalists of international TV channels were also stopped and detained for hours in the run-up to the May 2005 referendum on multi-candidate presidential elections in an apparent attempt to prevent them from reporting on demonstrations or gatherings related to the referendum.

Turkey
Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code, which prohibits "public denigration of Turkishness, the Republic or the Grand National Assembly of Turkey", violates the right to freedom of expression and is frequently used to prosecute journalists and others peacefully expressing their dissenting opinion. Amnesty International has been campaigning for the abolition of Article 301 in its entirety.

UK government’s 'war on terror' policies put people at risk of torture

Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:23:11 +0000

"Dear Mr Tony Blair… Please can you give me an answer to my question? Why is my dad in prison? Why is he far away in that Guantánamo Bay?". Anas al-Banna, son of Jamil al-Banna, when he wrote to the UK Prime Minister.

UK residents Jamil al-Banna, a Jordanian national, and Bisher al-Rawi, an Iraqi national, were arrested in Gambia in 2002, transferred to a US base in Afghanistan and then sent to Guantánamo. The UK authorities were implicated in their unlawful transfer to US custody.

The UK government has refused to date to make representations on behalf of these two men and another UK resident, Libyan national Omar Deghayes. A full judicial review of this refusal is pending.

The UK government has also refused to make representation on behalf of at least five other UK residents who remain in Guantánamo.

Despite Tony Blair’s statement that Guantánamo Bay is "an anomaly that at some point has to be brought to an end", the UK government has failed to follow up these words with strong action.

Moreover, the UK government is trying to undermine the absolute prohibition of torture by seeking to deport people it has labelled "suspected international terrorists" and a "national security threat" to places where they face a real risk of torture or other ill-treatment.

It is doing so by negotiating "diplomatic assurances" – in bi-lateral agreements known as Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) – with governments in countries where torture and other ill-treatment are a persistent problem.

The UK government has signed MoUs with Jordan, Libya and Lebanon and is negotiating agreements with Algeria and Egypt.

The UK’s policies and actions are effectively sending a “green light” to other governments to abuse human rights. The report United Kingdom – Human rights: a broken promise examines the damaging effect of the UK’s antiterrorism policies at home and abroad.

Since the attacks of 11 September 2001 the UK authorities have passed a series of new laws that contain provisions that contravene human rights law, and their implementation has led to serious abuses of human rights and has threatened the independence of the judiciary. These include a new Terrorism Bill, currently before Parliament, that if enacted would undermine the rights to freedom of expression, association, liberty and fair trial.