Amnesty International Report 1997 - Chad

Dozens of suspected opponents and critics of the government, some of them prisoners of conscience, were detained without charge or trial. One prisoner of conscience was convicted after an unfair trial. Torture, including rape, and ill-treatment were widespread; several people may have died under torture. One person died in custody apparently as a result of harsh prison conditions. Four members of an armed opposition group arrested in Sudan "disappeared" after being forcibly returned to Chad. Scores of people were extrajudicially executed. Armed opposition groups were reportedly responsible for grave abuses. Armed opposition groups remained active, particularly in the south, west and east of the country, and launched sporadic attacks against the Chadian armed forces. Conflict, however, was on a lesser scale than in previous years. The security forces continued to carry out human rights violations during counter-insurgency operations. In January, a conference hosted by President Omar Bongo of Gabon failed to effect a reconciliation between armed opposition groups and President Idriss Déby. A new Constitution was approved by referendum in March. In July, President Déby began a second five-year term in office after defeating General Abdel Kader Kamougué in the first ever presidential elections. The Union des syndicats du Tchad, Federation of Trade Unions of Chad, was suspended for one month for calling for a boycott of the second round of voting, alleging irregularities in the first round. Several human rights groups were threatened with suspension by the Minister of the Interior when they also contested the results of the first round. Legislative elections scheduled for November, which would have ended the period of transition initiated after the 1993 Conférence nationale souveraine, Sovereign National Conference, were postponed until 1997. A prisoner of conscience was convicted after an unfair trial. In March, Delwa Kassiré Koumakoye, former Prime Minister of the transitional government and President of the opposition party Rassemblement national pour la démocratie et le progrès, National Rally for Democracy and Progress, was arrested and sentenced following an unfair trial to three months' imprisonment for illegal possession of weapons. The arrest and conviction appeared to have been motivated by a desire to prevent Delwa Kassiré Koumakoye from standing in the presidential elections. His bodyguard, arrested at the same time, was released without charge or trial after 18 days. He claimed to have been tortured (see below). Maître Issa Hassan Goffa, a court clerk, was arrested and held for one day for supplying a copy of Delwa Kassiré Koumakoye's police record, a document necessary for him to submit his candidature. Scores of political prisoners, many of whom may be prisoners of conscience, remained in detention without charge or trial, and arrests of possible prisoners of conscience, including human rights activists and leaders of political parties, continued. Tohnel Doumro, an employee of the Secours catholique pour le développement, Catholic Development Aid, was arrested in November and held at the gendarmerie in Bousso for "collaborating with the enemy". Mahamat Abdelhaq, President of the Association tchadienne pour la défense des droits de l'homme, Chad Association for the Defence of Human Rights, was arrested in December and held at Abéché on suspicion of having links with the armed opposition Front national du Tchad, Chad National Front. At the end of the year both had been transferred to the gendarmerie in N'Djaména; neither had been formally charged. More than 20 political prisoners arrested in previous years were still in detention. They included Benoït Djebongoum, Samuel Dingambaye and Célestin Ndoubaye, who had been arrested in the two Logone regions between July and October 1995, on suspicion of collaborating with the Forces armées pour la République fédérale (FARF), Armed forces for a Federal Republic, and the Mouvement pour la démocratie et le développement (MDD), Movement for Democracy and Development, armed opposition groups which receive support in the area. They appeared to have been arrested simply because of where they lived. Since their transfer to N'Djaména, in October 1995, and subsequently to Faya Largeau, there had been no official confirmation of their whereabouts. They were believed to have been kept chained together in groups of four and beaten during their detention. It was learnt that Mahamat Dare and Mahamat Sokou, also arrested in 1995 in the Logone district, died in detention later that year as a result of ill-treatment and inadequate diet. A number of prisoners of conscience and political prisoners were released uncharged. Many of those arrested during the year were held for several days. In March, at the time of a referendum on the adoption of the Constitution, Mayo Kebi, the head of the Ligue tchadienne des droits de l'homme, Chadian Human Rights League, in Bongor, was arrested and held for several days for asking a village headman to follow the instructions of the Commission électorale nationale indépendante (CENI), Independent National Electoral Commission. He was released without charge. In July, Ngarlégy Yorangar Le Moïban, leader of the opposition party Front d'action pour la République, Action Front for the Republic, was arrested and held for two weeks at Bebédjia, Logone Oriental, where he was campaigning in the second round of the presidential elections on behalf of General Kamougué, leader of the Union pour le renouveau et la démocratie, Union for Renewal and Democracy. He was subsequently transferred to the gendarmerie's National Section for Investigation in N'Djaména. He was released after two weeks without charge. Following his release he was reported to have received a number of threats from members of the security forces. In August, at least 13 N'Djaména University students were arrested following a demonstration to demand payment of grants. They were held for periods of up to eight days before being released without charge. In October, Hadge Awatif, whose husband Mamadou Bisso was extrajudicially executed in January 1992 by the Chadian armed forces, was detained for a few hours at the ans headquarters in N'Djaména for offering her condolences to Bichara Digui's family (see below). Two Tama tradesmen and tribal chiefs, arrested in September 1995 by the Agence nationale de sécurité, National Security Agency, the counter-espionage service, which has no legal powers of arrest or detention, and transferred subsequently to the Renseignements généraux, General Intelligence Service, in N'Djaména, were released in February without charge or trial. They had been accused of financing the Armée nationale tchadienne en dissidence (ANTD), Dissident Chadian National Army, an armed opposition group. In March, seven people from the two Logone regions of southern Chad, including high-school students Guillaume Ngarmadji, Joseph Morgoutoum and Alain Natimbaye, were released without charge or trial. They had been arrested in July 1994 on suspicion of belonging to an armed opposition group, the Comité de sursaut pour la paix et la démocratie (CNSPD), Committee of National Revival for Peace and Democracy. Despite peace agreements, known as the Bangui II Accords, concluded in August 1994 between the CNSPD and the Chadian authorities, and despite two amnesties which should have led to their release, these seven people were held for more than 18 months. There had been no official confirmation of their whereabouts. There were continuing reports of torture and ill-treatment by members of the armed forces; torture was often used to extract confessions. New methods included submerging detainees in the River Logone in sacks. The discovery of several mutilated and unrecognizable bodies in the River Logone in June suggested that such torture sometimes resulted in death. No investigation was known to have been carried out as a result of the discovery. Former prisoners of conscience reported that they were tied to a vehicle in the "arbatachar" position, where the arms are painfully tied behind the back (see Amnesty International Report 1996), and dragged for a kilometre along the banks of the Logone river. Women and girls reported that they had been raped by the armed forces. Between September and December, three young girls were raped by members of the armed forces in Ngalaba, Logone Oriental. Bachaïn Massingar, Delwa Kassiré Koumakoye's driver, who was arrested in March, was subjected to torture and ill-treatment, including threats and mock executions, to force him to incriminate his employer. In March, members of the security forces, claiming to be in pursuit of FARF members, fired on civilians at Goré village market, Logone Occidental. At least 11 people, including two children, were seriously injured. Rimoumbubue Diallo, aged 13, had an arm and leg amputated as a result of injuries he sustained; Benjamin Bjekoungaye's femur was fractured by a bullet; and several others, including Jacqueline Djenon, received bullet wounds requiring lengthy hospitalization. Prison conditions continued to be harsh, sometimes amounting to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. Severe overcrowding appeared to be common. In March, Mbaïlassem Gédéon, a former soldier suspected of being a member of an armed opposition group, who was arrested by gendarmes from the Moundou rural prefecture without the knowledge of the public prosecutor, was found dead at the Moundou criminal investigation brigade. The Public Prosecutor informed his superiors that Mbaïlassem Gédéon had apparently suffocated as a result of the heat in an overcrowded cell. The judicial authorities had not opened any investigation by the end of the year, nor had any action been taken against the men on guard duty at the time. In April, new information came to light about the "disappearance" of Alyo Bouka, a member of the CNSPD arrested in July 1994 in Logone Occidental. Confirmation was received that he had been held for 24 days in the military quarters outside Moundou brewery and transferred by Hercules C-130 plane to N'Djaména. He was last seen in November 1994 at the Camp des martyrs prison in N'Djaména after he had confessed to being a CNSPD member. In August, four members of armed opposition groups, the Conseil national de redressement, National Council for Recovery, and the ANTD, "disappeared" after being forcibly returned to Chad. They were among several members of Chadian armed groups arrested in El Généina, Sudan, by members of the Sudanese security forces and reportedly transferred to N'Djaména by the ans. None has been seen since. Bichara Digui, a member of the opposition Rassemblement pour la démocratie et le progrès, Rally for Democracy and Progress, was shot in August by three unidentified men, believed to be members of the security forces, as he returned to his home in N'Djaména. Moussa Brahim, his driver, was seriously injured. Members of the security forces who were nearby did not intervene. A few months before his death, Bichara Digui, who had been detained previously without charge or trial for over a year, had revealed that since his release in December 1994, he had been summoned on a number of occasions to interviews with the Chadian authorities, including the President and the presidential staff, where he had reportedly been threatened with death on account of his past links with Abass Koty Yacoub, extrajudicially executed in 1993 (see Amnesty International Report 1994). No investigation had been carried out into Bichara Digui's death by the end of the year. In November, the Director General of the National Gendarmerie signed an order instructing members of the gendarmerie to extrajudicially execute persons caught in the act of committing a crime. In the following weeks scores of people were extrajudicially executed, including five people in Gaoui, and nine in Mayo-Kebbi, suspected of theft. In November, members of the Garde nationale et nomade du Tchad, Chad National Nomadic Guard, extrajudicially executed Ngarmadjim Raphaël following mass arrests when a member of the Guard died in a fight. In February, the death sentences passed in August 1994 on Daoud Ahmat Chérif, Awat Abdou and Yacoub Issaka were reported to have been commuted to life imprisonment. Daoud Ahmat Chérif and Awat Abdou had been sentenced to death for murder, and Yacoub Issaka for an attack on Gninguilim market-place which caused 64 civilian deaths. In August, on the occasion of his investiture, President Déby commuted all death sentences passed in 1994 and 1995 to life imprisonment. No new death sentences were reported to have been passed. Armed opposition groups were responsible for human rights abuses, including hostage-taking. In June, during the presidential elections, four men were abducted in Ngara, Lake prefecture, by MDD forces. The four, including Soumaïne Adam Moustapha, a member of the CENI, were reportedly collecting ballot boxes. They were apparently taken over the border to Nigeria, where they were handed over to the authorities in November, and eventually returned to Chad in December. FARF members were reportedly responsible for the execution of the chief of Tilo village, Mondji Laokoura, in December. There were reports of human rights abuses, including rape, carried out by armed opposition groups in previous years. In June 1995, four girls had been raped by FARF members as they returned to their village in Logone Occidental. Amnesty International delegates visited Chad in April to investigate reports of human rights violations, particularly in the south of the country, and met members of human rights organizations and senior government and military officials. The delegates called on the authorities to release prisoners of conscience, condemn torture, open independent and impartial inquiries into cases of torture and extrajudicial execution and to adhere to the international human rights treaties ratified by Chad in 1995. Despite generally acknowledging the violations documented in Amnesty International's reports, government and military officials did not seem willing to open impartial investigations into human rights violations committed by the security forces. Also in April, Amnesty International submitted information about its concerns in Chad to the UN Commission on Human Rights under the confidential 1503 procedure. In October, Amnesty International published a report, Chad: A country under the arbitrary rule of the security forces with the tacit consent of other countries, which documented human rights violations by the security forces and abuses by armed opposition groups carried out since 1995. Amnesty International also expressed concern to foreign governments, particularly France and China, that military, security and police transfers had contributed to human rights violations in Chad.