Yemen urged to address rights abuses

Activists claim that the government is using the war on terror as an excuse to harry its political opponents and critics.

SANA'A // Local and international human rights groups are urging participants in a conference on Yemen in London on Wednesday to press the country's government to respect human rights and not use the war on terrorism to further violate them.

In a letter to the conference participants, civil society activists, who gathered in Sana'a yesterday, said the government was deceiving its international partners by presenting political activists as terrorists, citing the trials of people opposing the war in the country's north as well as those members of the southern movement, which is demanding autonomy in the region. "Terrorism should be defined so that it is not manipulated politically by any party - and support to the government should be conditioned by the improvement of media environment work and [stopping] the harassment of journalists and activists," the human rights groups said in the letter, which was signed by 156 people - everyone in attendance.

"Failure of development, increasing unemployment and corruption are reasons for terrorism and therefore support should be increased and monitored at the same time," the letter added. The London meeting, called by the British prime minister, Gordon Brown, is to focus on shared analysis of the challenges Yemen is facing, including the reasons for radicalisation and instability, according to the organisers.

The conference comes in the aftermath of the Christmas Day attempt of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian, to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight over Detroit, Michigan. Mr Abdulmutallab had attended Arabic language classes at a school in Sana'a and had been in contact with al Qa'eda operatives in the country. Al Qa'eda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed responsibility for his unsuccessful attack. Yesterday, Osama bin Laden, the al Qa'eda leader, claimed responsibility for ordering the attempted bombing in an audio message.

Amal Basha, the chairwoman of the civil society meeting, said in a speech yesterday that focusing solely on military action in the fight on terrorism will not be fruitful. "Drying up terrorism's intellectual, ideological springs, as well as its political, economic and cultural reasons, is more effective in the long run. "Wars, preventive strikes and killing outside the law, repressive arrests and detentions, torture, false trials are all terrorism crimes that are equal in our views to terrorism of armed individuals or militias. They strip the government of legitimacy in their war on terrorism and contribute into generating a good bastion for terrorism," she added.

Mohammed Ayesh, a journalist and human rights activist, said in a research paper presented in the meeting attended by foreign diplomats and academics, as well as activists and the media, that the Yemeni government had manipulated the war on terrorism in its fight against al Houthi rebels in the northern province of Sa'ada and against separatist activists in the south. "The government has tried its best to convince the international community to label the Houthis as terrorists and has so far failed to do so," Mr Ayesh said.

"It has also tried to claim there is a link between al Qa'eda and the southern movement activists, though everybody knows that they have genuine political, economic and rights demands." Mr Ayesh said the government had arrested 864 activists in the south between March and July 2008 and that 95 of the detainees have faced trial in a terrorism court. The US-based non-governmental organisation Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Yemen's human rights violations have alienated large segments of Yemeni society, weakening the government's ability to address the threat posed by al Qa'eda.

"Efforts to fight al Qa'eda in Yemen will be ineffective if they ignore the country's grave human rights situation," said Tom Porteous, director of Human Rights Watch's London office, in a statement on Saturday. "The grievances caused by the government's repressive practices and violations of the laws of war exacerbate Yemen's instability." The Yemeni government has been launching air strikes against al Qa'eda for more than a month now. Dozens of civilians were killed in a strike in a Abyan province on December 17, sparking nationwide anger.

HRW urged countries co-operating with Yemen in the fight against terrorism to heed lessons from Afghanistan and Pakistan, in particular that such military tactics as air strikes that cause high civilian casualties undermine efforts to reduce local support for al Qa'eda. Armed militant groups thrive when the government does not have the support of its people, and repressive police and military tactics can create resentment, causing counterterrorism efforts to backfire, HRW said in the statement.

In their handling of the conflict in the north, and social unrest in the south, the Yemeni authorities have flouted the requirements of international law, according to HRW, which recommended the deployment of a UN human-rights monitoring mission to report publicly on rights abuses by all parties in Yemen. "Yemenis are entitled to protection from violence by government security forces and rebel groups," Mr Porteous said. "Yemen urgently needs a UN protection mechanism to halt the slide into even greater violence."