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This article participates on the following special index pages:
Marange, Chiadzwa and other diamond fields and the Kimberley Process - Index of articles
Zimbabwe
diamond fields activist must be released
Amnesty
International
July 06, 2010
Amnesty International
today called on the Zimbabwean government to release an activist
who is being detained after he exposed human rights violations in
the country's Marange
diamond fields.
Farai Maguwu has been detained since June 3, and charged with "publishing
or communicating false information prejudicial to the state",
after he reportedly told a diamond trade monitor about human rights
violations carried out by security forces in the Marange diamond
fields.
The activist had handed himself in to the police after members of
his family were beaten and interrogated by state officials.
On Friday, a Harare Magistrate denied Farai Maguwu bail after the
state prosecutor said more time was needed to complete investigations.
Lawyers are appealing the court's decision to deny him bail.
"Farai Maguwu is being persecuted for carrying out his lawful
work of monitoring and documenting alleged human rights violations
by security forces at some of Zimbabwe's richest diamond fields,"
said Erwin van der Borght, Amnesty International's Africa
director.
"We consider Farai Maguwu a prisoner of conscience and call
on the authorities to release him immediately and unconditionally."
Farai Maguwu's
lawyers say their client is being detained as a way of punishment
for revealing human rights violations to a diamond monitor from
the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KP), which is aimed
at certifying rough diamonds as being free from links to violence.
Abbey Chikane, the KP monitor on Zimbabwe, stated in his report
on the country's compliance with the KP scheme that he met
with Farai Maguwu in the presence of state intelligence officers,
raising fears that he seriously compromised Farai Maguwu's
safety.
The monitor's statement
calls into question the Kimberley Process' methods for protecting
people who provide information about human rights violations at
Zimbabwe's diamond fields.
Farai Maguwu is head of the Centre
for Research and Development (CRD), an organization that, as
an official observer of the Kimberly Process, has been central in
investigating human rights violations against local people in Marange
diamond fields.
The activist is being charged under Section 31 of the Criminal
Law (Reform and Codification), a section that violations the
right to freedom of expression and falls short of the standards
set out under the Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of
Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect
Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedomswhich
states that everyone has the right to know, seek, obtain, receive
and hold information about all human rights and fundamental freedoms.
This includes the right to submit to governmental bodies, agencies
and organisations concerned with public affairs, criticism and proposals
for improving their functioning, and the right to draw attention
to any aspect of their work that may hinder or impede the promotion,
protection and realisation of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
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