UN reports gang-rapes by security forces, claims of mass graves in Burundi

 

Protesters drag a female police officer accused of shooting a protestor in the Buterere neighbourhood of Bujumbura, Burundi, May 12, 2015. Photo/REUTERS

The United Nations has documented cases of Burundi's security forces gang-raping women during searches of opposition supporters' houses and heard witness testimony of mass graves, UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein said on Friday.
Violence has worsened in Burundi since President Pierre Nkurunziza decided to run for a third term - a move opponents say was illegal - and won a disputed election in July. At least 439 people have been killed and 200,000 have fled.
Western powers and African states fear the crisis that has so far largely followed political allegiances could spiral into a renewed ethnic conflict.
Burundi's 12-year civil war, which ended in 2005, pitted an army led by the Tutsi minority against rebel groups of the Hutu majority.
"The 11 December attacks against three military camps and the large-scale human rights violations that occurred in their immediate aftermath appear to have triggered new and extremely disturbing patterns of violations," Zeid said in a statement.
"All the alarm signals, including the increasing ethnic dimension of the crisis, are flashing red," he said.
Zeid said the United Nations had documented 13 cases of sexual violence with a pattern of security forces allegedly entering the victims' houses, separating the women and raping or gang-raping them.
During the searches, police, army and Imbonerakure militia forces also arrested many young men who were later tortured, killed or taken to unknown destinations, Zeid said.
The United Nations is also analysing satellite images to investigate witness reports of at least nine mass graves in and around Bujumbura, including one in a military camp, containing more than 100 bodies in total, all of them reportedly killed on December 11, 2015.
One of the sexually abused women testified that her abuser told her she was paying the price for being a Tutsi. Another witness said Tutsis were being systematically killed, while Hutus were being spared.
"And, in the Muramvya neighbourhood, the decision to arrest people was also reportedly largely made on an ethnic basis, with most Hutus being released, according to several different witnesses," the statement said.

 Burundi is not on the brink of another genocide but what’s unfolding is worrying

 As many as 100 people have been killed in Burundi’s capital city Bujumbura over the past four days, after opposition groups attacked government military bases on Friday. Security forces have reportedly raided neighborhoods killing both opposition activists and civilians, leaving their bodies in the streets, in what is the worst spate of violence since April when president Pierre Nkurunziza ignored widespread protests and sought a third term.

Human rights observers say that mass arrests have also been made. The US ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Powers warned over the weekend that the situation could “devolve into mass violence” if both sides don’t negotiate. Both the US and Canada have advised their citizens to leave or avoid the country.

The small central African country has experienced two genocides in the last 50 years driven by tensions between Tutsis and Hutus—the last one left 300,000 dead and is believed to have triggered ethnic killings in neighboring Rwanda in 1994 that left 800,000 dead. But worries about another genocide are unfounded, analysts say.

“It is essentially a political conflict,” Carina Tertsakian, a researcher on Burundi for the nonprofit, Human Rights Watch, told Quartz. “It opposes on one side, the president and the ruling party who have been trying to cling on to power and on the other side, his opponents, and those opponents include a mixture of both Hutu and Tutsi… It’s very different from what took place in Burundi in the 1990s.” While politicians on both sides have tried to use ethnic language to whip up popular support, few Burundians are taking the bait, according to Tertsakian. “They are saying, ‘We don’t want to relive that.'”

The structure of the government and military also make it unlikely that violence will devolve into genocidal killing. Burundi’s armed forces are now composed of both Hutu and Tutsi and local and national government bodies, including the parliament and the senate are split 60% to 40% between Hutu and Tutsis, according to Patrick Hajayandi, with the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation. “In such a sensitive political climate, hyperbole can make the already precarious situation more fragile,” he wrote in the Guardian.

The fact that this is mainly a political conflict does not make it any less deadly or intractable. Before this weekend’s violence, more than 240 people are believed to have been killed, according to the UN. The fledgling economy will take a further hit. Foreign aid, which accounts for half of the government’s budget, is plummeting and its few exports of coffee are also suffering. The World Bank has predicted its economy will contract by 2.3% this year.

Burundi’s conflict is already spilling over into the region. More than 200,000 Burundians have fled to Rwanda, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and to a lesser extent Uganda, putting pressure on food supplies and prompting friction between Burundians and their local hosts. The government of Rwanda has been accused of adding fuel to the conflict by supporting armed opposition groups and their recruitment of Burundian refugees. (Rwanda denies these allegations.) Still, in some cases opposition groups have formed in neighboring countries and launched incursions into Burundi.