Afghanistan: Northern Alliance Must Offer Surrender Option

Israel fails to address increasing use of torture in Israel-Occupied Territories:

Torture Not an Option Human Rights Watch

South Africa: Stop Court Fight on AIDS Drugs

Egypt: Overturn Boy's Conviction for Homosexuality

U.N: Dangers in Anti-Terror Treaty

(New York, November 21, 2001) Now that the United Nations has decided to
schedule more time to complete a comprehensive treaty on international
terrorism, governments should revise the text in order to avoid doing
serious damage to human rights protections, Human Rights Watch said
today.

As a result of a resolution adopted today by the General Assembly's
Sixth Committee, negotiations on the Comprehensive Convention on
International Terrorism will recommence at the end of January. Human
Rights Watch warned that portions of the treaty, as now drafted,
undermine refugee protections, freedom of expression, and the laws of
war. "In the rush to take action against terrorism, governments must be
careful not to trample on human rights," said Richard Dicker, Director of Human Rights Watch's
International Justice Program. "There's time to fix what is wrong with
this treaty."

International refugee law already prevents individuals who have
committed terrorist acts or other serious crimes from benefiting from
refugee protection, Dicker said, and the tighter restrictions on
refugees in the draft treaty could keep innocent refugees and
asylum-seekers from gaining protection.

The draft text could also greatly restrict freedom of expression by
treating a journalist who supports a political objective as a potential
terrorist. Finally, the treaty could undercut the laws of war by
criminalizing acts committed in an internal armed conflict that are not
prohibited by humanitarian law.

Although negotiations on this treaty had been underway for several
years, pressure to complete the text intensified in the wake of the
September 11 attacks. However, negotiations stalled at the end of a
two-week session on October 26, in large part because of an effort to
exempt individuals struggling against "foreign occupation" from
consideration as terrorists.

After the Security Council adopted Resolution 1373 on September 28 and
the General Assembly held its Plenary Debate on terrorism in early
October, Secretary-General Kofi Annan tried to bring the opposing sides
together. The Secretary-General convened several meetings with key
ambassadors in early November. During last week's General Debate,
high-level discussions with foreign ministers continued, but no
agreement was reached.

South Africa: Stop Court Fight on AIDS Drugs

(New York, November 21, 2001) Appealing to his history of leadership in
the country’s struggle for rights and freedoms, Human Rights Watch today
urged President Thabo Mbeki to have his government drop its fight
against a legal appeal for low-cost AIDS treatment for pregnant women.

The South African government is currently in court fighting a case
brought by the Treatment Action Campaign of South Africa to ensure
HIV-positive women have access to affordable antiretroviral treatment

to reduce the risk of transmission of HIV to their newborns. A
hearing in the case is scheduled for November 26 in the Pretoria High
Court. President Mbeki has at various times denied that the human
immunodeficiency virus is the cause of AIDS and has alleged
dangers of anti-AIDS drugs that are unproven in clinical science.

“Mbeki should pull the government out of this case and support
programs to help newborns start life free of HIV,” said Peter Takirambudde,

executive director of Human Rights Watch’s Africa Division. “Even in much lower-income African
countries, women increasingly have access to this treatment.”

South Africa has the largest number of persons living with HIV/AIDS of
any country, about 4.2 million, according to United Nations figures. The
Medical Research Council of South Africa recently estimated that 7
million persons could die of HIV/AIDS by 2010, mostly young adults in
their prime. Although South Africa has resources to provide treatment to
a significant number of AIDS sufferers, the government has consistently
resisted supporting treatment programs.

In April 2001, South Africa won a victory against 39 pharmaceutical
companies that had sued the government because of the provisions of a
1997 law that would have facilitated the production and importation of
generic drugs for HIV/AIDS. The opportunity for treatment programs that
was created when the companies dropped their suit in the face of
national and international pressure has been left unused by the
government, which does not fund treatment programs on a significant
level.

“President Mbeki could go a long way to redeeming his mishandling of
AIDS by supporting the treatment for mother-to-child transmission,” said
Takirambudde.

Human Rights Watch urged President Mbeki to lead the government in
increasing budgetary support for HIV/AIDS programs – currently allocated
less than 1 percent of the national budget – and in working with the
medical and public health leaders in South Africa who are already
mobilized to strengthen both prevention and treatment programs.

“President Mbeki’s questioning of the science of HIV/AIDS and the South
African government’s active refusal to support programs of known
effectiveness is helping to fuel the AIDS crisis in South Africa,” said
Takirambudde. “This is much worse than the government inaction we have
seen so often regarding HIV/AIDS.”

Egypt: Overturn Boy's Conviction for Homosexuality

(New York, November 20, 2001) - A sixteen-year-old boy's prosecution and
conviction for engaging in sexual relations with men violates
international standards, Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Egyptian
authorities released today.

Convicted of "debauchery" on September 18 after police coerced him into
giving a confession, the boy received a sentence of three years'
imprisonment with labor followed by three years of probation. His
appeal, originally set for October 31, will be heard on November 21.

Human Rights Watch called on Egypt's prosecutor general to ask the
appeals court to overturn the conviction, citing discriminatory
application of the law, charges of torture during interrogation,
prolonged pretrial detention, limited access to counsel and family
members, and a failure to protect the boy's privacy during the court
proceedings.

"This case has been marred by a host of human rights violations," said
Clarisa Bencomo of the Children's Rights Division of Human Rights Watch.
"It should never have come to trial."

The youth has said that police extracted a confession from him after
subjecting him to painful beating on the soles of the feet. He did not
have access to a lawyer during his interrogation, and he was not allowed
to contact his family during the first two weeks of his detention. Press
and spectators were allowed to attend and report on the September and
October hearings, and the boy's name, photo, and accounts of the charges
and sentence have appeared in Egypt's semi-official press.

The boy was one of fifty-six people detained and charged with similar
offenses after a crackdown in May against men presumed to be gay. The
others, all adults, were prosecuted separately before an Emergency State
Security Court, which reached a verdict on November 14. Twenty-three
were sentenced to between one and five years of hard labor; twenty-nine
were acquitted.

Last week, Egyptian authorities made four additional arrests of men
presumed to be gay, according to reports in the Egyptian press.

Egypt does not expressly outlaw homosexual acts. Instead, authorities
initially accused the boy of "abuse of religion" (istighlal al din).
Interrogated before he was allowed to contact a lawyer, the boy denied
the initial accusation but admitted to engaging in sexual acts with men,
leading prosecutors to charge him with debauchery (mumarasat al fujur).
Three years' imprisonment followed by a similar period of probation is
the maximum sentence that can be imposed under this provision, contained
in Law No. 10 of 1961 on the Combat of Prostitution.

"Egyptian authorities targeted these individuals solely because of their
presumed sexual orientation," Bencomo said. "By discriminating against a
group of its citizens in this way, Egypt has violated a fundamental
principle of human rights law."

In addition, criminalization is not an appropriate response to sexual
activity on the part of a child, Human Rights Watch argued.
International law does not permit the criminalization of sexual
relations between consenting adults of the same sex; a child should not
be held criminally responsible for an act that would not, under these
standards, be subject to criminal responsibility if committed by an
adult.

The arrests and convictions also take place in a climate of serious
erosion of basic civil rights for Egyptian citizens. The country has
been under continuous emergency rule since October 1981, following the
assassination of Anwar Sadat. Following a resurgence of political
violence in the early 1990s, the government introduced antiterror laws
that gave the security and intelligence services greater powers of
arrest and detention, enabling them to round up thousands of suspects.

Afghanistan: Northern Alliance Must Offer Surrender Option

Executions of Taliban Defectors in Kunduz Condemned

(New York, November 20, 2001) - Human Rights Watch today called upon
Afghanistan's Northern Alliance to respect the laws of war in Kunduz,
and to accept any offer of surrender by any Taliban or allied troops,
including foreign elements.

Human Rights Watch also urged foreign fighters with the Taliban to
respect the laws of war. In Kunduz, detailed and credible reports have
emerged that foreign fighters have begun summarily executing local Taliban
fighters who were considering surrendering to the Northern Alliance.

Following their retreat from the northern city of Mazar-i Sharif,
thousands of Taliban fighters have been surrounded by the Northern
Alliance in Kunduz, the only northern city remaining under
Taliban control. According to numerous sources, a significant number of
foreigners who fought with the Taliban-identified by various sources as
Pakistanis, Arabs, Chechens, Central Asians, and Chinese fighters-are
also surrounded in Kunduz.

"If the Northern Alliance kills any fighters without accepting their
offer of surrender, that's a war crime," said Sidney Jones, Executive
Director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. "The Northern
Alliance must respect the laws of war for foreign fighters in Kunduz, no
less than Afghani ones."

Since surrounding the Taliban and their foreign allies in Kunduz, senior
Northern Alliance leaders, while encouraging the surrender of Afghan
Taliban troops, have repeatedly stated that they will not accept
surrender offers from the foreign fighters, preferring to kill them
instead. Pir Muhammed, a senior Northern Alliance commander, told the
New York Times: "These foreigners have killed thousands of civilians.
Their hands are covered with blood. We will avenge this." A
second senior Northern Alliance commander, General Daoud Khan, told
the Associated Press: "For the foreign terrorists… there will be no
negotiations, we will not deal with them, they are killers."

The laws of war explicitly outlaw orders refusing to accept the
surrender of an adversary, a practice known as "giving no quarter."
Article 40 of Protocol I additional to the Geneva Conventions, which
reflects customary international law applicable to the current conflict
in Afghanistan, states: "It is prohibited to order that there shall be
no survivors, to threaten an adversary therewith or to conduct
hostilities on this basis." The authoritative commentary of the
International Committee of the Red Cross makes clear that this article
also protects foreign fighters such as those involved in Kunduz:

"[A]ny order of 'liquidation' is prohibited, whether it concerns
commandos, political or any other kind of commissars, irregular troops
or so-called irregular troops, saboteurs, parachutists, mercenaries or
persons considered to be mercenaries, or other cases. It is not only the
order to put them to death that is prohibited, but also the threat and
the execution, with or without orders."

"The law is absolutely clear on this point," said Jones. "The Northern
Alliance can fight the Taliban if they refuse to surrender, or arrest
them for crimes they may have committed if they do surrender. But the
Northern Alliance cannot refuse to accept an offer of surrender by the
foreign fighters if such an offer is made."

Human Rights Watch is also deeply concerned by credible reports of
large-scale summary executions of would-be Taliban defectors by foreign
fighters in the city of Kunduz. Such executions, if confirmed, are
clearly crimes prohibited by international law.

"The way to stop war crimes in Afghanistan now is to start talking about
future prosecution of the guilty," said Jones. "The international
community needs to let those on all sides who are thinking about
committing war crimes in Afghanistan know that they will be brought to
account for their atrocities."

Israel fails to address increasing use of torture in Israel-Occupied Territories:

20 November 2001

GENEVA -- The Israeli government has failed to address the
evidence of increasing use of torture by its law enforcement
officials, Amnesty International said today as the United Nations
Committee Against Torture prepares to examine the country's third
periodic report.

Amnesty International's briefing to the Committee stated
that, since the September 1999 High Court of Justice judgement
which banned interrogation methods constituting torture, there
has been strong evidence that these methods - including sleep
deprivation often seated in painful positions; prolonged
squatting on haunches; painful handcuffing - are now being used
again.

"We regret that notwithstanding the High Court of
Justice's 1999 ruling and the Committee Against Torture's clear
statement in 1997 that these methods constitute torture, the
State of Israel, in its report to the Committee, continues to
deny this," says Amnesty International.

"This failure to acknowledge that these methods of
interrogation are illegal under Article 1 of the Convention has
been an important factor in encouraging their revival,
particularly over the past year," says the organization's
briefing to the Committee.

In addition detainees have frequently been held in
prolonged incommunicado detention for more than 20 days without
being given access to lawyers or families; the UN Special
Rapporteur on torture stated in 2001 that Israel's use of
prolonged incommunicado detention was "itself a practice
constituting cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".

In its briefing to the Committee Against Torture Amnesty
International raises incidents of torture, prolonged
incommunicado detention and brutality against Palestinians by
members of the security forces and expresses concern that
security force members appear to benefit from impunity for
torture or ill-treatment of Palestinians.

The organization stresses that the practice of
administrative detention without charge or trial, indefinitely
renewable, which the Committee Against Torture raised in 1998 as
an apparent breach of the prohibition on cruel, inhuman and
degrading treatment, still continues.

Amnesty International also called on the Committee
Against Torture to declare that the demolition of Palestinian
homes constitutes cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment under
Article 16 of the Convention Against Torture. The European Court
of Human Rights has deemed Turkish demolition of houses to
constitute inhuman treatment in breach of Article 3 of the
European Convention of Human Rights.

"More than 500 homes have been demolished in the Occupied
Territories during the past year, making a minimum of 2,000
Palestinians homeless, the vast majority of them children," the
organization said. "There can be no excuse for inflicting
hundreds of human tragedies".

Amnesty International also considers that other forms of
collective punishment carried out by the Israeli authorities,
including the prolonged closures of towns, villages and whole
areas, denying freedom of movement to Palestinians, and prolonged
curfews might also fall under Article 16 of the Convention.

Torture Not an Option Human Rights Watch issues Backgrounder

(New York, November 20, 2001) Human Rights Watch today issued a detailed
rejection of the suggestion made by some commentators that torture or
the involuntary administration of "truth serums" should be permitted
against September 11 detainees who are suspected terrorists or who may
have information about them.

As this statement explains, the prohibition against torture is firmly
embedded in customary international law, international treaties ratified
by the United States, and U.S. law. The prohibition against torture is
absolute and applies even during times of armed conflict or when
national security is threatened. The United States may not use torture
as a means to obtain information from detainees, nor may it send
detainees to another country to be questioned by security forces who use
torture. The mistreatment of detainees forbidden by
international human rights law includes the use of truth serums - which,
in any event, like torture, frequently yield unreliable information.

Other issues discussed in the statement include: why efforts to limit
torture to the "ticking bomb scenario" invariably fail, and why the
granting of "use immunity" to overcome violations of the right against
self-incrimination does not avoid the unconditional prohibition of
torture and other mistreatment.