• Bulgaria : Pushbacks, Abuse at Borders

    In research in six countries between October and December 2015, Human Rights Watch interviewed 45 asylum seekers and migrants from Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq who described 59 incidents of summary returns from Bulgaria to Turkey between March and November. Twenty-six people said they had been beaten by police or bitten by police dogs. All but one said they were stripped of their possessions, in some cases at gunpoint by people they described as Bulgarian law enforcement officials, then pushed back across the border to Turkey.

    https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/01/20/bulgaria-pushbacks-abuse-borders
    #Bulgarie #asile #migrations #réfugiés #push-back #refoulement #frontières #violence

    • HWR: continuano gli abusi contro i migranti in Bulgaria

      “Abbiamo visto la macchina della polizia e abbiamo cominciato a correre. Un ragazzo ha urlato e quando ci siamo girati abbiamo visto il cane che lo mordeva, trascinandolo per almeno 15 metri. Poi sono arrivati otto poliziotti, che hanno iniziato a picchiarlo […]. Poi un altro poliziotto mi ha colpito sulla testa col calcio della pistola. Sanguinavo copiosamente […]. Ci hanno preso due telefonini, i soldi e le scarpe nuove. Poi ci hanno trasportato fino al confine, e a forza di bastonate ci hanno fatto riattraversare il confine con la Turchia”.

      http://www.balcanicaucaso.org/aree/Bulgaria/HWR-continuano-gli-abusi-contro-i-migranti-in-Bulgaria

  • Selon Human Rights Watch, la coalition saoudienne a utilisé des bombes à sous-munition - accusées d’être en pratique du même type que les bombes à fragmentation, et donc de toucher notamment des civils - sur deux quartiers peuplés de Sanaa.
    Précision : ces armes sont américaines, comme en témoigne une photo avec le numéro de série des armes.
    Yemen : Coalition Drops Cluster Bombs in Capital
    Indiscriminate Weapon Used in Residential Areas / HRW 07.01.16
    https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/01/07/yemen-coalition-drops-cluster-bombs-capital-0

    (Beirut) – Saudi Arabia-led coalition forces airdropped cluster bombs on residential neighborhoods in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, early on January 6, 2016. It is not yet clear whether the attacks caused civilian casualties, but the inherently indiscriminate nature of cluster munitions makes such attacks serious violations of the laws of war. The deliberate or reckless use of cluster munitions in populated areas amounts to a war crime.
    “The coalition’s repeated use of cluster bombs in the middle of a crowded city suggests an intent to harm civilians, which is a war crime,” said Steve Goose, arms director at Human Rights Watch. “These outrageous attacks show that the coalition seems less concerned than ever about sparing civilians from war’s horrors.”
    Residents of two Sanaa neighborhoods described aerial attacks consistent with cluster bomb use.

    https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/styles/node_embed/public/multimedia_images_2016/yemen.jpg?itok=hosj047d

    Markings on a remnant of a CBU-58 cluster bomb found near al-Zira`a Street in Sanaa on January 6, 2016 indicating that it was manufactured in 1978 at the Milan Army Ammunition Plant in the US state of Tennessee.

    • HRW recommande du coup au gouvernement américain de suspendre la vente d’armes permettant des bombardements aériens tant que des enquêtes sérieuses n’ont pas été menées sur la possibilité de crimes de guerre :

      Neither Yemen, Saudi Arabia, nor any of the other coalition countries are party to the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions, the international treaty banning cluster munitions. A total of 118 countries have signed and 98 have ratified the treaty. Human Rights Watch is a co-founder of the Cluster Munition Coalition and serves as its chair.
      On November 17, the US Defense Department announced that the State Department had approved a sale of US$1.29 billion worth of air-to-ground munitions, such as laser-guided bombs and “general purpose” bombs with guidance systems – none of which are cluster munitions. The US should not sell aerial bombs to Saudi Arabia in the absence of serious investigations into alleged laws-of-war violations in Yemen, Human Rights Watch said.

      Bon, entre nous, je doute que l’on n’en entende autant parler que des « barrels bombs » d’Assad...