Fred Mukinda
1 October 2008
Nairobi — Some of the people arrested in Kenya last year and held in Ethiopian jails are missing, a global human rights watchdog has claimed.
US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report yesterday saying that of the 150 people arrested, 90 were surrendered to Somalia before being taken to Ethiopia.
And a local group, the Muslim Human Rights Forum says 27 people, among them seven Kenyans, cannot be traced and wants the Government "to make a full and public disclosure of all prisoners in its custody or transferred to Somalia, Ethiopia or elsewhere."
The HRW report says at least 10 people are still in prisons, while others were released after being tortured.
Those arrested, according to the report, were from more than 18 countries including the United States, UK and Canada in an operation on the Somali border.
"They were held for weeks in Nairobi without charge. In January and February 2007, the Kenyan Government then put dozens of them -- with no notice to families, lawyers or the detainees themselves -- on flights to Somalia, where they were handed over to the Ethiopian military," reads the report.
It also says that Ethiopian forces arrested an unknown number of people in Somalia. The 54-page report called "Why Am I Still Here?" further claims US officials in Addis Ababa interrogated detainees.
Both human rights groups claim that those arrested were fleeing the fighting in Somalia after the fall of Islamic Courts Union militia that had taken over Mogadishu.
"The dozens of people caught up in the secret Horn of Africa renditions in 2007 have suffered in silence for too long," said Ms Jennifer Daskal, a senior counter-terrorism counsel at HRW and author of the report.
Unlawful
"The governments involved -- Ethiopia, Kenya and the US -- need to reverse course, renounce unlawful renditions and account for the missing," she added.
HRW claimed to have spoken by telephone to several Kenyans in detention in Ethiopia, many of whom complained of physical ailments.
The report also claims Kenyan authorities visited those in custody in mid-August this year and promised to have them sent home.
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