HURIWA condemns police, military
over attacks on Aba traders
By Madu Onuorah
Abia State Governor
HE Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria
(HURIWA) has called on the Chief of Army Staff
(COAS), Maj.-Gen. Tukur Buratai, to order the
arrest and prosecution of army operatives who at
the weekend alleged killed innocent bystanders at
the Ariaria International Market in Aba, Abia
State.
It also demanded the arrest and prosecution of
some alleged rogue police officers who equally
killed a cobbler in Aba earlier yesterday at the
same market.
In a joint statement, the HURIWA National
Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and
National Media Affairs Director, Zainab Yusuf,
said the police officers who killed the shoemaker
must be prosecuted or the group would sue the
Inspector-General of Police, Solomon Arase, at
the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes
against humanity.
Similarly, the group gave the army hierarchy
seven days to arrest the said soldiers who
allegedly used brute force, which resulted to
death of over four traders in the market.
The statement read: “We have just defended the
military as an institution over its indictments by
Amnesty International for crimes against
humanity in its operations against terrorists in the
North East of Nigeria because we are convinced
that as an institution, it does not, as a policy,
tolerate human rights violations committed by its
operatives.”
According to the statement, the victims “were
forced on gun points to close shops following a
peaceful protest by other traders in another
section of the market over the extrajudicial killing
of an innocent shoemaker, who was hit by stray
bullets shot by some policemen who came to
arrest suspected hemp smokers, who nevertheless
ran away from the police.”
Should Buratai refuse its demand, the group said
it would also petition the United Nations Human
Rights Council, “and mobilise forces in the
organised civil society to sensitise the
international community that the new military
authorities in Nigeria have started executing
innocent persons in the guise of quelling civil
protests.
“President (Muhammadu) Buhari should show
Nigerians that he has truly become a democrat by
ensuring that those who carry out extra-legal
executions of unarmed civilians are prosecuted
and executed for mass murders.”
Abia State Governor www.ngrguardiannews.com/2015/08/huriwa-condemns-police-military-over-attacks-on-aba-traders/

Oh that's bad! Why bully civilians now.

source

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I think it is high time these excesses are given international coverage

This is what I have been waiting for

Zoo police.