06 11 13 HRW – Uganda/Rwanda: Forcible Return Raises Grave Concerns

(Nairobi,
November 5, 2013) – A Rwandan refugee who had served as a bodyguard for Rwandan
President Paul Kagame was forcibly returned by Ugandan police to Rwanda after
going missing on October 25, 2013, Human Rights Watch said today. His
whereabouts were unknown for six days. The man, Joel Mutabazi, is now in police
custody in Rwanda, in an undisclosed
location.

Mutabazi had survived a bungled abduction in Uganda in August as well as an
assassination attempt in July 2012, in both cases by unknown perpetrators. The
Ugandan police were informed about all these incidents and had agreed to provide
him with 24-hour security.

Ugandan
authorities have said they are investigating the incident and have suspended the
Ugandan police officer who arrested Mutabazi and erroneously handed him over to
the Rwandan authorities, according to a government statement.

“The
Ugandan police have utterly failed to protect this refugee, who was clearly at
serious risk,” said Daniel Bekele, Africa director
at Human Rights Watch. “It’s unconscionable that they handed him over summarily
to the police force of the country whose persecution he fled.”

Rwandan and
Ugandan authorities claim that Mutabazi is accused of terrorism and other
offences in Rwanda, and was the subject of an international arrest warrant
issued by Rwanda. But the Ugandan government statement admits that handing
Mutabazi to Rwanda without any court proceedings is contrary to its “established
legal procedure” and the “Police Code of Conduct.”

The
Ugandan authorities should immediately put in place effective measures to
protect Rwandan refugees and asylum seekers, particularly those whose security
is at risk, Human Rights Watch said. The Ugandan authorities should urgently
complete the investigation they have announced into Mutabazi’s handover to
Rwanda and publish its findings without delay.

Mutabazi should
be transferred back to Uganda and subject to a formal extradition procedure in a
Ugandan court, including consideration of the human rights implications of the
transfer and his refugee status, Human Rights Watch said.

“Uganda had
granted Mutabazi refugee status in 2011, which means his risk of persecution in
Rwanda had been established and recognized,” Bekele said. “If Uganda is serious
about remedying the error of handing him over to Rwanda without any legal
process, they should ask the Rwandan authorities to return him and allow the
Ugandan courts to decide the extradition request.”

Mutabazi was
first arrested in Rwanda in 2010. According to sources interviewed by Human
Rights Watch, the government accused him of being close to General Kayumba
Nyamwasa, a prominent Rwandan government opponent exiled in South Africa. Mutabazi was
detained incommunicado for several months in a military camp in Rwanda and there
is credible evidence he was tortured.  

In
2011 Mutabazi fled Rwanda and sought asylum in Uganda, where he was granted
refugee status in October 2011. On July 12, 2012, a man armed with a gun came to
his house in Kasangati, a suburb of Kampala, and fired at Mutabazi, but missed
him. After this incident, the Ugandan government and the office of the United
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) arranged for Mutabazi to be
placed under police protection in a guesthouse in a different area. 

On
August 20, 2013, a group of armed men, some in Ugandan police uniforms, others
in civilian clothes, abducted Mutabazi from the guesthouse, forced him into a
car, and drove off with him. Some of the men in the car were speaking
Kinyarwanda, the language of Rwanda, Mutabazi has said. Mutabazi was released
the same day, after senior Ugandan government and police officials intervened. 

The
Ugandan authorities and the UNHCR then arranged to move Mutabazi to a different
location, where he was under 24-hour police protection. It was from this second
location that he disappeared on October 25.

Human
Rights Watch wrote to the Ugandan inspector general of police, General Kale
Kayihura, on October 30 for an explanation of Mutabazi’s disappearance, and
tried to call him, but has not received a reply. The Ugandan police spokesperson
refused to discuss the case when contacted by telephone and referred Human
Rights Watch back to General Kayihura.

On
October 31, the Rwandan police announced that Mutabazi was in their custody. In
a public statement, they said the Ugandan authorities had handed him over
because he was wanted for terrorism and other crimes in Rwanda.

In a
press release on October 31, the Ugandan minister for relief, disaster
preparedness, and refugees, Hilary Onek, claimed that Mutabazi had escaped from
his hotel, police had apprehended him, and “in an error of judgment and
misinterpretation of the International Arrest Warrant, [a police officer]
regretfully handed him over to the Government of Rwanda officials.”

At
the time of Mutabazi’s abduction in August, the Ugandan police issued a
statement saying they were responding to an extradition request from the Rwandan
police, via Interpol, alleging that Mutabazi was wanted in connection with armed
robbery in Rwanda. The statement said, however, that, “The Uganda Police Force
would not hand over the suspect to any country, without going through legal
procedures of deportation or extradition, as the law requires.” No such
procedures were followed in either August or October.

In an
October 31 statement, the Rwandan police said that Mutabazi is wanted for
“terrorism and other crimes” and suspected of involvement in grenade attacks led
by the Rwanda National Congress, General Nyamwasa’s exiled opposition group, in
collaboration with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a
predominantly Rwandan armed group operating in eastern Congo that consists in
part of people who took part in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Human
Rights Watch met with the Rwandan police commissioner for public relations and
community policing, Damas Gatare, on November 1, but he said he could not
provide details of the case beyond what was in the official police statement. He
would not disclose whether Mutabazi had access to a lawyer. When Human Rights
Watch asked him where Mutabazi was detained, Gatare said that investigations
were ongoing and that “depending on the nature of the case, we might not
disclose the location.”

Human
Rights Watch expressed concern that Mutabazi could face an unfair trial
in Rwanda, as has been the case with other alleged criminal suspects whom
the government accused of having links with the opposition. Rwandan judicial
authorities should ensure that due process is respected and proceedings conform
to international fair trial standards.

“We
are worried about Mutabazi’s well-being in Rwanda,” Bekele said. “The Rwandan
authorities should guarantee his safety, publicly disclose his whereabouts,
allow him access to a lawyer and visits by relatives, and, if he is to be
charged, promptly bring him before a court.”

UNHCR should accelerate the
determination of refugee claims by Rwandan asylum seekers in Uganda and expedite
the third-country resettlement of Rwandan refugees who might be at risk in
Uganda, Human Rights Watch said.

For
more background information, please see below.

For
more Human Rights Watch reporting on Rwanda, please visit:
http://www.hrw.org/africa/rwanda

For
more Human Rights Watch report on Uganda, please visit:
http://www.hrw.org/africa/uganda

For
further information, please contact:
In London,
Carina Tertsakian (English, French): +44-207-618-4783; or +44-7903-503-297
(mobile)
In
Washington, DC, Maria Burnett (English): +1-917-379-1696; or maria.burnett@hrw.org. Follow on Twitter
@MariaHRWAfrica 

Background

Mutabazi’s
forced return to Rwanda and the earlier threats against him take place in the
context of a well-documented pattern of repression of Rwandan government
critics, both inside and outside Rwanda. Critics and government opponents have
been arrested, detained, and prosecuted in politically
motivated trials in Rwanda, and others outside the country have been
repeatedly threatened. Some have been physically
attacked and even
killed.

Rwandan
intelligence services have pursued suspected opponents abroad, particularly in
Uganda, where the geographical proximity and close links between the two
countries effectively allow Rwandan intelligence agents considerable freedom to
operate. Rwandan refugees and asylum-seekers in Uganda have frequently reported
to Human Rights Watch that they have been threatened and followed by people they
believe are Rwandan intelligence agents. Ugandan journalists trying to report on
difficulties facing Rwandan asylum seekers have raised similar concerns.

In August, around the time of Mutabazi’s abduction, another exiled
former member of the Rwandan security forces, Innocent Kalisa, was reported
missing in Uganda. His whereabouts and the circumstances in which he disappeared
remain unknown.

Pascal
Manirakiza, a Rwandan who had sought asylum in Uganda after escaping from the
M23, a Rwandan-backed armed group in the Democratic Republic of Congo, also
disappeared in August. He was found a few days later, alive but unconscious,
with serious injuries. 

On
November 30, 2011, an exiled Rwandan journalist, Charles Ingabire, editor of the
online publication Inyenyeri News and a vocal critic of the Rwandan
government, was
shot dead in Kampala.

Attacks on opponents and critics have also
taken place farther afield. In June 2010, General Nyamwasa narrowly escaped an
assassination attempt in South Africa. Nyamwasa, a former chief-of-staff of the
Rwandan army and once a close ally of President Kagame, became an outspoken
government opponent in exile and co-founded the opposition Rwanda National
Congress. In May 2011, two Rwandans living in the UK were warned by the London
Metropolitan Police that there were threats to their safety emanating from the
Rwandan government