Human rights record "poor" - US State Department

In its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices series, released on Monday, the US State Department said the human rights record of President Denis Sassou-Nguesso's government remained poor in 2001. Although there were some improvements in a few areas, the report states, "serious problems remain". Security forces were responsible for "extrajudicial killings, as well as summary executions, rapes, beatings, physical abuse of detainees and the civilian population, arbitrary arrest and detention, looting, and solicitation of bribes". There were reports of security forces summarily executing soldiers responsible for abuses, the report stated, citing the example of one man shooting and killing a superior officer in August 2001, who was then arrested and summarily executed himself. Unlike in previous years, there were no reports of "undisciplined forces" committing abuses, the report states. Members of the security forces were involved in beating citizens however, looting their homes, extorting money from travellers at checkpoints, using beatings to coerce confessions or punish detainees, and raping female detainees. "A survey of 2,000 persons conducted by the police in August and September indicated that, of the 81 percent who had contact with police, more than 65 percent were dissatisfied with their treatment," the State Department added. Poor prison conditions, including overcrowding and a scarcity of food and health care, were blamed on a lack of resources. Women were incarcerated with men, juveniles with adults, and pre-trial detainees with convicted prisoners. The lack of an adequate judiciary system was also blamed on a lack of resources. "In practice, the judiciary continued to be corrupt, overburdened, under-financed and subject to political influence". Almost nothing remains of judicial records, case decisions and law books following looting during the civil conflicts in 1993-94, 1997, and 1998-99. Women continue to be discriminated against by the judicial system: adultery is illegal for women, but legal for men; polygyny is legal, but polyandry is not. While the Legal Code stipulates that 30 percent of a man's estate should be inherited by his wife, in practice the wife often loses all rights of inheritance upon her husband's death, especially in the context of traditional or common-law marriages. The indigenous pygmy ethnic group, who number tens of thousands, do not enjoy equal treatment in a predominantly Bantu society, the State Department says. "Pygmies were marginalised severely in the areas of employment, health, and education, in part due to their isolation in remote forested areas of the country." They are usually considered "socially inferior" and have little political voice, in a society where many have never even heard of the concept of voting. The Sassou-Nguesso government has also blocked the return from exile of some Congolese citizens. Officials of the previous government, including former President Pascal Lissouba and former Prime Minister Bernard Kolelas, remain outside the country, the report states. Kolelas's attempts to return failed on two occasions during the year, the government having intervened, and airlines refused to transport him.