The UN human rights office on Tuesday condemned attacks and
threats made against its investigators by senior Burundian officials and by
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte. “On Nov 9, Duterte threatened to slap UN special rapporteur
Agnes Callamard if she investigates him for alleged extrajudicial killings,”
human rights spokesman Rupert Covlille said. In April 2016, the ICC announced
it had launched a “preliminary examination” of the situation in Burundi, at the
time more than 430 people had reportedly been killed.
This ongoing step,
which under ICC procedures determines whether a full investigation should take
place, focuses on “killing, imprisonment, torture, rape and other forms of
sexual violence, as well as cases of enforced disappearances that have been
allegedly committed since April 2015.” In
October 2016, President Pierre Nkurunziza signed legislation calling for
Burundi’s withdrawal from the ICC, notification of which was later that month
sent to the UN secretary-general.
Under the Rome Statute, actual withdrawal takes place a year
after such notification. The Burundian government rejected the commission and
did not allow members to visit the country. Interviews were conducted in
neighbouring countries, to where hundreds of thousands of Burundians have fled
since 2015. On Sept. 1, Burundi’s parliament announced it would set up its own
commission, made up of 12 lawmakers, to look into the UN commission’s findings.
Speaking to
overseas Filipino workers in Vietnam, Duterte railed, “I will slap her in front
of you. Why? Because you are insulting me. “Why? Because you yourself do not
believe in the research of your own organisation.” The Philippines leader’s new
beef with the French UN official is that she supposedly brought in an expert
who supposedly said on television that drugs are harmless. Duterte did not name
this “doctor” but identified them as “itim (black).”
NAN
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