afrol News, 17 December - Human Rights Watch says the ruling junta leader Captain Moussa Dadis Camara could be held accountable for the September massacre of more that 150 opposition supporters at the national stadium.

The HRW report says the killings were calculated and designed to silence opposition against its protests to military rule. The report further accuses the Guinean security forces of mass raped of opposition supporters and demonstrators at a rally in Conakry.

The report based on interviews with 240 people including victims, witnesses, military personnel, medical staff and diplomats describes in detail the killings, sexual assaults, and other abuses at an opposition rally in a stadium in Conakry, the capital, committed by members of Guinea's elite Presidential Guard.

It further details how the military government's security forces engaged in an organised cover-up, removing scores of bodies from both the stadium and hospital morgues and burying them in mass graves.

The government's official death toll is 57, but HRW investigation found that the actual death toll is likely to have been between 150 and 200.

"The serious abuses carried out in Guinea on 28 September were clearly not the actions of a group of rogue, undisciplined soldiers, as the Guinean government contends," said Peter Bouckaert, Emergencies director at Human Rights Watch.

The group also said this was a crime against humanity, coming under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.

HRW said the circumstances of many of the killings and abuses, most of which were against peaceful and unarmed protesters, suggested they were carried out with consent or an explicit order coming from the junta, potentially Camara himself.

The report further said the Guinean military government has failed to investigate and to hold accountable any member of the security forces for their role in the killings, rapes, and other abuses.

The UN has set up an international commission of inquiry, which has already visited Guinea. Human Rights Watch called on the UN secretary-general to promptly make public the commission's report and ensure that its findings are discussed and implemented.

Reports said the 28 September massacre followed by the botched assassination attempt of Captain Camara on 3 December, has deepened divisions between the soldiers who seized power in a December 2008 coup after the death of long-serving President Lansana Conte.

By staff writer

© afrol News

Related pages and feature

Current afrol News Top Stories