Amnesty International Report 1996 - Guinea

Dozens of opposition party supporters, including prisoners of conscience and possible prisoners of conscience, were detained for short periods. One political prisoner arrested in 1992 continued to be held without trial. There were new allegations of torture and ill-treatment of detainees. At least 16 prisoners died in custody in unexplained circumstances. Prison conditions were especially harsh. Six people were sentenced to death; there were no executions. Legislative elections, held in June, concluded the transition to democracy initiated in 1990. They were won by President Lansana Conté's Parti de l'unité et du progrès, Party of Unity and Progress. The run-up to the June elections was marked by arrests and intimidation of members and supporters of the main opposition parties, the Rassemblement du peuple de Guinée (RPG), Guinean People's Rally, and the Parti du renouveau et du progrès (PRP), Party of Renewal and Progress. Dozens of opposition party supporters, including prisoners of conscience, were detained during the year. At least 14 PRP activists were detained in January at Gaoual in Moyenne Guinée and taken to Boké, the regional capital. They were released when the PRP threatened to mount a protest demonstration. In March at least four people were detained in Kankan for wearing t-shirts bearing a picture of Alpha Condé, the RPG leader, and several RPG members were detained in April at Nzérékoré in Guinée Forestière. They were released uncharged after several days. In June Cheick Mohamed Diallo, one of the RPG's election candidates, and 30 of his supporters were briefly detained at Mandiana in Haute Guinée. They had been wearing opposition party t-shirts. Some were ill-treated in custody. Some detainees were held for several weeks. For example, Mamadi Sanoh and Fanta Condé were arrested at Kissidougou in Guinée Forestière in March and held for more than three weeks before being released without charge. There were further arrests of opposition supporters after a strike known as "ville morte" (dead city), launched by the opposition parties in September. Some were soon released but at the end of the year a few were still detained in Nzérékoré prison. Souleymane Diallo, the director of Lynx, a satirical newspaper, was detained for 24 hours in October. He was charged with offending the Head of State after the publication of an article in August deemed to be critical of the President. Souleymane Diallo was subsequently convicted and received a three-month suspended prison sentence and a fine. Six students, arrested in 1994 and each sentenced to one year's imprisonment and a fine, were released after they were pardoned by President Conté in February. Amadou ii Diallo continued to be detained (see previous Amnesty International Reports). He was arrested in October 1992 for allegedly attempting to assassinate the Head of State. No trial date had been set by the end of the year. There were allegations of torture and ill-treatment of political detainees and criminal suspects by police. Mamadi Sanoh told the press after his release in April that at Kissidougou Camp he had been brutally beaten by soldiers. Other opposition activists detained before the June elections alleged that they were ill-treated by the security forces. No action was taken by the government to investigate such complaints and to bring to justice those responsible. Sixteen criminal suspects died in unexplained circumstances at Conakry prison in the early hours of 1 January. They were reportedly beaten on two occasions before being placed in a cell without adequate ventilation, where most of them died apparently as a result of the beatings or suffocation. Thirteen of the victims were buried immediately. The Public Prosecutor announced that a judicial inquiry had been opened, without disclosing its terms, but no findings had been made public by the end of the year. Hundreds of criminal prisoners were held in conditions which amounted to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. At Nzérékoré prison, for example, prisoners were reportedly held naked in overcrowded and grossly insanitary cells and denied adequate food, exercise or medical treatment. One cell, known as "Burkina", contained 35 naked detainees and others shackled by their legs who were lying on bare ground covered in excrement. Prisoners were also held in severely overcrowded conditions and denied adequate food and medical care at Lola prison in Guinée Forestière. The non-governmental Association guinéenne des droits de l'homme, Guinean Human Rights Association, visited several prisons in 1994 and in March 1995 published a report describing the total lack of sanitation and basic facilities. At least six people were sentenced to death after being convicted of murder and other offences. All six lodged appeals which had not been heard by the end of 1995. There were no known executions. Amnesty International delegates visited Guinea in March and April and met local human rights and other organizations. Despite explicit assurances from the authorities that the delegation would be able to pursue its objectives without restriction, police confiscated two documents from Amnesty International's delegates at the airport, although the documents in question were publicly available in Guinea. In November Amnesty International published a report, Guinea: Does the political will exist to improve human rights?, which documented arbitrary arrests, torture, deaths in custody, prison conditions and the death penalty. The organization called on the authorities to conduct full investigations into human rights violations, to introduce and implement safeguards against such violations and to ensure that those responsible were brought to justice.