Burundian police and administrative officials must take stronger measures to prevent and punish pre-election violence, Human Rights Watch said today. Members of various political parties, especially their affiliated youth movements, have clashed on a number of occasions since November 2009. In most cases, police have not conducted thorough investigations and no one has been held accountable.
The most recent episode, on April 10, 2010, involved violent clashes between members of the opposition party National Liberation Forces (Forces nationales de libération, FNL), and members of the ruling party, National Council for the Defense of Democracy-Forces for the Defense of Democracy (CNDD-FDD) in the Kinama neighborhood of Bujumbura. Ruling party members also attacked journalists covering the clashes. The police illegally detained several FNL members afterward.
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