Keeping power in check: this week in human rights

Hearts in our hands

"By locking away these people, the regime has ensured that the only space available in Syria is for brutality, violence, and inhumanity on a large scale," says Yara Badr while marking the third anniversary of the jailing of Mazen Darwish, her husband.

Mazen is director of the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression, and is languishing with his colleagues Hussein Ghrer and Hani Zaitani in a Syrian government jail solely for his human rights work. Hundreds of other human rights, media, legal and humanitarian workers are suffering the same fate... and worse.

It is not only the Syrian government that is targeting Syrians like Mazen but numerous opposition militias have also kidnapped, killed and silenced those who dare speak their truth and resist the depravity bedevilling their homeland.

Such voices are a threat to both political and religious extremists.

During this past week the Free Syria's Voices coalition ran its Hearts in our Hands campaign during which supporters shared pictures of themselves holding signs featuring hearts and messages in solidarity with the imprisoned Syrians.

Organisations from around the world have thrown their weight behind the campaign in the hope that it will ensure Mazen and his fellow detainees are not forgotten.

Last autumn Darwish won the PEN Internation Writer of Courage award. In acknowledgment of the award, Darwish wrote a letter from his prison cell, stating: "My hope is for a new social contract that frees my country from tyranny and terrorism and saves its children from sectarianism.

"Those who strive for real change through non-violent means and recognise the dignity of all may frighten the advocates of hate but it is they who will ultimately deliver Syria from the enmity in which it is currently engulfed."

	#ProtectLove #Syria Hussein's father wants his son too. #FreeSYVoices https://t.co/w7OAP7t22z pic.twitter.com/soN580uIja — Milia Eidmouni (@Milia1) February 16, 2015

A web of despair

The Polish officials who allowed the CIA to run a secret prison on their territory are under the kosh.

This week the European Court of Human Rights refused to reconsider its ruling that Poland hosted a "black site" in the US's international network of abductions, imprionment and torture.

The ruling obliges Warsaw to hold to account the officials who allowed the jail to operate, and will add further pressure on other EU countries to come clean on what role they played in the nefarious maze underlying the Bush-era "war on terror".

Poland will now have to hold investigate the country's involvement in the US scheme and pay compensation totalling $262,660 to two men who were held there.

Last December the fortress of secrecy around the international plexus of 'black sites' and what happened in them started to crumble when a US senate committee published a long-awaited report into the CIA's programme.

The report detailed a secret global network of prisons in which torture was used and virtually no useful intelligence was gained.

Questions persist over the extent of the UK's involvement and campaigners are pushing the UK government to set up a judge-led, independent inquiry.

Amrit Singh, a lawyer with the Open Society Justice Initiative said, "This judgment sends a message loud and clear that European states that collaborated in the CIA torture programme cannot evade accountability."

New masters, old tactics

Houthis are using torture as an integral part of their arsenal to quell the considerable opposition they face in Yemen.

Since it forced Abd Rabbo Mansour al-Hadi from the presidency late last month, the Houthi militia have become de facto rulers of the capital, Sanaa, and other parts of Yemen.

Amnesty International has gathered evidence revealing that a number of opponents have been tortured for days on end.

Salah Awdh al-Bashri, a 35-year-old father-of-seven, was among those kidnapped during a protest on 11 February. He died from injuries he suffered during hours of torture.

Others snatched at the same protest survived but were left battered and scarred and recounted tales of horrendous beatings and torture.

"The Houthis stooped to a dangerous new level of intimidation and violence to strike fear into anyone protesting their rule," said Donatella Rovera, Amnesty's senior crisis response adviser.

Citizen journalist Adel Shamsan recently told al-Araby al-Jadeed the Houthis' hardline tactics were a "carbon copy" of the authorities' reactions to the protests in 2011 that eventually deposed long-term autocrat Ali Abdullah Saleh.

The other side of the coin

In this blog last week we stated, "Any strategy to tackle IS that does not tackle the atrocities that helped give rise to IS is no strategy at all."

Several days later Human Rights Watch released an investigation which concluded that abuses by militias allied with Iraqi security forces in Sunni areas have escalated in recent months.

Sectarian militants have kidnapped, expelled and summarily executed with complete impunity, HRW says.

At least 3,000 people have fled their homes in the Muqdadiyya area of Diyala province since June 2014 and, since October, have been prevented from returning.

"Iraqi civilians are being hammered by ISIS and then by pro-government militias in areas they seize from ISIS," said Joe Stork, HRW's deputy Middle East and North Africa director.

"With the government responding to those they deem terrorists with arbitrary arrests and executions, residents have nowhere to turn for protection."

The Islamic State group publicise their horrors for good reason - fear fuels the hatred that sustains them. The media furore serves their purpose but it should not obscure monstrocities committed elsewhere. 

Sectarian violence is a pernicious disease regardless of who the perpetrator may be.

Delivered into the lion's jaws

For most Syrians, living in Lebanon life is a parlous and insecure affair - poverty, exploitation and mistreatment are rife.

The recent disappearance of two Syrian men after being arrested by the Lebanese General Security exacerbates this sense of vulnerability.

The agency, which is in charge for visitor entry and residency applications, has refused repeated requests for information on the whereabouts of Osama Qaraqouz and Bassel Haydar.

Their families fear they have been deported back to Syria and into the hands of the Syrian security services. If this is correct, the Lebanese government could be guilty of enforced disappearance.

"The Lebanese authorities need to come clean about what happened to these two men and whether they were sent into the hands of a government that is likely to torture them," said HRW's Houry.

The two men were transferred to the General Security from Roumieh prison where they had been serving short sentences for security related charges.

The Lebanese government has repeatedly assured it will not deport any Syrians to Syria but in reality, if indeed Osama and Bassel have been handed over to Syrian security services, it would not be the first time it has happened.

Lebanon's security services have the right to defend their country and imprison anyone who breaks the law, but to pass Syrians straight into the lion's jaws where torture or even death are likely would not only be morally bankrupt but also a transgression of the Convention on Torture, which Lebanon ratified in 2000.

We'll be keeping our eye on human rights transgressions across the region and bringing you another weekly digest next Friday. If you want to share any information or bring our attention to any campaigns please Tweet us at @alaraby_en.