RSF condemns government's refusal to produce detainees in court

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Thursday condemned the Liberian government "for refusing to comply with an order from the country's highest military court to produce the living bodies" of journalist Hassan Bility and two other detainees. "The Minister of Defense has rejected the military court's order, issued on 25 July, as null and void, stating that the court had not been authorized by any competent authority to intervene in the case. How are we not to take this as a pretext?" RSF secretary-general Robert Ménard said in a letter to Liberian President Charles Taylor. According to RSF, one of the judges that ordered the government to produce "the living bodies" of the men by 7 August had been summoned to appear before the Minister of Defence to explain "actions incompatible with his status". Bility has been reported missing since 2 July and RSF fears he may have been tortured to death. The government should allow the Red Cross to see the journalist in order to establish that he has not been beaten or roughed up, the media watchdog said in a statement. "RSF had alerted the chairperson of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, Diego Garcia Sayan, on 3 July," it added. "Previously, on 28 June, the organisation asked Information Minister Reginald Goodridge to quickly provide proof of the accusations against the journalist, or to release him. Until now, the organisation has received no response from the authorities." Men in plainclothes arrested Bility, editor of Liberia's Analyst Newspaper, Ansumana Kamara and Abubakar Kamara on suspicion of "operating a LURD [Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy] terrorist cell in Monrovia". They have since been held incommunicado. Several human rights groups, including Amnesty International, accused the government of violating the men's constitutional rights by refusing to bring them to court. The US State Department last month condemned "the government of Liberia's failure to follow the rule of law."