Gendarmes storm central prison, end protest

Inmates in five Burundi prisons suspended on Friday an 11-day protest after paramilitary forces stormed the country's main detention facility in the capital, Bujumbura. The chairman of the Association for the Defence of Human Rights and the Rights of Detainees, Pierre Mbonimpa, told IRIN on Monday that roughly 400 gendarmes used tear gas to flush the prisoners from their cells. He added that the prisoners had spent three days in the prison yard without food. An inmate, who spoke under the condition of anonymity, told IRIN they had been denied food, water and visits from friends and family. The prisoners had barred new detainees from entering the prisons and prevented others from making their court appearances. Mbonimpa said the gendarmes were screening prisoners in order to transfer the suspected masterminds of the protest to other institutions. He added that an arrangement had been reached to end similar actions in four other prisons. After meeting inmate representatives at Mpimba Prison on Sunday, Justice Minister Didace Kiganahe announced that an agreement had been reached to suspend the strike for 15 days, to allow time for a negotiated solution. The prisoners agreed to this on condition that the gendarmes were withdrawn. The gendarmes left shortly after Kiganahe's meeting with the prisoners. The prisoners began their coordinated protest on 19 July demanding they be released unconditionally, in "compliance" with the 2000 Arusha peace accords and the global ceasefire agreement between the Burundi transitional government and the former rebel movement, the Conseil national pour la defense de la democratie-Force pour la defense de la democratie (CNDD-FDD). In a primary meeting with inmate representatives at Mpimba on 23 July, Kiganahe told the prisoners there was no legal framework under Arusha for their release. He said those accords and the global ceasefire deal only granted provisional immunity to political leaders who returned from exile and members of CNDD-FDD. At least 4,000 inmates consider themselves to be political prisoners and want to benefit from the provisional immunity of the accords. The inmates include former government soldiers convicted for their involvement in the 1993 coup d’etat in which the country's first democratically elected president, Melchior Ndadaye, a Hutu, was killed. Some of the prisoners have also been charged with taking part in massacres or looting during the country's decade-long civil war. A commission set up on 23 March to look into prisoner's cases and determine who should benefit from the provisional immunity had proposed the release of 101 military prisoners and 1,370 CNDD-FDD combatants. So far, 11 military prisoners and 443 combatants have regained their freedom.