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Lawyers for the leader of a Tutsi anti-genocide organisation in the capital, Bujumbura, who has been imprisoned without charge since 2 May, have called for his immediate and unconditional release, a Burundi news agency, Net Press, reported on Thursday.
Burundi's new penal code, enacted since the installation of a transitional national government on 1 November 2001, forbids holding anyone in prison without charge.
The president of Puissance d'autodefense-Amasekanya, Diomede Rutamucero, was arrested after members of his organisation staged a protest in Bujumbura against the Arusha peace accord and the adoption of laws on provisional immunity for returning political leaders, many of whom they hold responsible for massacres of Tutsis.
On Wednesday, authorities informed Rutamucero that he had been arrested in connection with a complaint a government minister lodged on 27 April, claimed that members of Amasekanya had been singing offensive and intimidating songs.
A regional analyst told IRIN that Rutamucero's detention was an attempt by authorities "to get anti-genocide organisations to shut up".
"You can't charge someone over what someone else said," he added, referring to Rutamucero's imprisonment on the basis of what members of his organisation said.
This is the 15th time during the current tenure of Burundi President Pierre Buyoya that Rutamucero has been imprisoned. Under a deal to end the brutal eight-year civil war largely between the ruling Tutsi minority and the majority Hutu opposition, Buyoya, a Tutsi, is heading the new power-sharing administration for 18 months until mid-2003. During this period, Domitien Ndayizeye, a Hutu, serves as vice-president. Ndayizeye is then to assume the presidency for the next 18 months.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
