Wednesday 12 August 2015

Amnesty International wants UN troops implicated in rape probed


Global human rights watchdog, Amnesty International, has called for the probe of the rape of a 12-year-old girl and the killings of a 16-year-old boy and his father by United Nations peacekeeping forces in the Central African Republic.
It added that those implicated in the crimes should be suspended immediately and for the duration of the investigation.

The incidents reportedly took place on August 2 and 3, 2015 as peacekeeping forces from the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in the Central African Republic were carrying out an operation in Bangui’s PK5 Muslim enclave.

AI, in a statement on Tuesday by its Senior Crisis Response Adviser, Joanne Mariner, said it interviewed 15 witnesses in the immediate aftermath of both incidents as well as the girl and members of her family, noting that a nurse who examined the girl found medical evidence consistent with sexual assault.

“Our evidence strongly suggests that a UN peacekeeper raped a young girl and that UN peacekeeping forces indiscriminately killed two civilians.

“An independent civilian investigation must be urgently launched and those implicated must be suspended immediately and for the duration of the investigation,” Mariner stated.

The girl was said to have been hiding in a bathroom during a house search at approximately 2am on August 2, when a man allegedly wearing the blue helmet and vest of the UN peacekeeping forces took her outside and raped her behind a truck.

“When I cried, he slapped me hard and put his hand over my mouth,” the girl had told AI officials.

AI said it was informed by a MINUSCA spokesperson that the operation was carried out by Rwandan and Cameroonian police and gendarmes belonging to the UN peacekeeping forces.

It added that during armed clashes with residents of the enclave early in the morning of August 2, a Cameroonian soldier was killed and nine other soldiers were injured. The following day UN peacekeeping forces returned to PK5.

AI said it was informed by witnesses that the peacekeepers were not under any threat, but began shooting indiscriminately in the street where the killings had taken place.

Balla Hadji, 61, and his son, Souleimane Hadji, 16, were struck by bullets in front of their house.

The human rights group said it was informed by an unnamed MINUSCA spokesperson that the agency had opened an initial internal investigation into the operation.
Punch

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