Armies of Liberation

Yes it does. The GCC plan was rejected in Yemen since May because it is clearly designed to retain most of the status quo and is the diametric opposite of the public consensus. Its also blatantly illegal and the US has lost its moral authority on human rights and democracy forever in Yemen. Via email:

Yemen: Reject Immunity Law for President Saleh and Aides
Unlawful Blanket Amnesty Bill Gives ‘License to Kill’

(New York, January 10, 2012) – Yemen’s parliament should reject a draft law that would grant amnesty to President Ali Abdullah Saleh and anyone who served with him for crimes committed during his 33-year rule, Human Rights Watch said today. The sweeping measure could result in impunity for serious international crimes such as deadly attacks on anti-government demonstrators in 2011.

“Passing this law would be an affront to thousands of victims of Saleh’s repressive rule, including the relatives of peaceful protesters shot dead last year,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Yemeni authorities should be locking up those responsible for serious crimes, not rewarding them with a license to kill.”

The draft law, which the parliament is expected to debate as early as January 11, 2012, violates Yemen’s obligations under international law to investigate and prosecute serious international crimes such as torture, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said.

Bowing to international pressure and 10 months of protests against his rule, Saleh agreed in November to cede power under an accord brokered by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). In exchange, the GCC deal instructed Yemen’s parliament, which the ruling party dominates, to act on an immunity law before Saleh is to step down formally on February 21, 2012.

The granting of immunity would not prevent courts in other countries from prosecuting serious human rights crimes in Yemen under universal jurisdiction laws, Human Rights Watch said. “Even if the Yemeni parliament grants immunity, the law will not hold water abroad,” Whitson said.

An article in the draft law bars its “repeal or appeal” by either lawmakers or the courts. However, article 51 of the constitution of Yemen says citizens have the right of recourse to the courts to protect their rights and lawful interests. Article 153 of the constitution designates the Supreme Court as the highest judicial authority in the land and empowers it to strike down laws that are unconstitutional.

The preamble to the immunity law wrongfully suggests it was drafted to implement United Nations Security Council resolution 2014 of October 21, 2011, Human Rights Watch said. In fact, the Security Council resolution calls on all parties in Yemen to implement a political settlement based on the GCC accord – rather than adopt the accord itself – and also emphasizes that “all those responsible for violence, human rights violations and abuses should be held accountable.”

International law rejects impunity for serious crimes, such as genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and torture. International treaties, including the UN Convention against Torture and the 1949 Geneva Conventions, require parties to ensure alleged perpetrators of serious crimes are prosecuted. As recently as January 6, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay reasserted that amnesty cannot be granted for serious crimes under international law.

Human Rights Watch has confirmed the deaths of 270 protesters and bystanders during attacks by government security forces and gangs on largely peaceful demonstrations against Saleh’s rule in 2011, most in the capital, Sanaa. Dozens more civilians were killed last year in apparently indiscriminate attacks by security forces on densely populated areas during clashes with armed opposition fighters. Human Rights Watch also has documented a broad pattern of international human rights violations and laws-of-war violations by government security forces in previous years, including apparent indiscriminate shelling in the 2004-2010 civil war against northern Huthi rebels and the use of unnecessary and lethal force since 2007 to quash a separatist movement in the south.

“From north to south to central Sanaa, the Saleh government has violated the basic rights of the Yemeni people,” Whitson said. “Without accountability for these crimes, there can be no genuine break from the past in a post-Saleh Yemen.”

For More Human Rights Watch Reporting on Yemen, please visit:

http://www.hrw.org/middle-eastn-africa/yemen

Related from from al Sahwa: Republican Guard kills four civilians in rural area

Alsahwah.net- Forces of the Republican Guard headed by Ahmed Ali Abdullah Saleh, son of the outgoing Yemeni president bombarded on Tuesday some villages of Bani Dihrah, killing four civilians including child.

For its part, Hood Organization for Human Rights and Freedoms affirmed that it received on Tuesday the corpses of the four killed civilians.

Hood said that forces of the Republican Guard rejected to allow human rights organizations to take the bodies of five civilians whow were killed five months ago.

On Sunday , the Republican Guards bombarded villages of Bani Jarmooz and Bait Dihrah, using mortars and machine guns against civilians wounding several and damaging many properties.

Yemen Observer:The leadership of Al Qaeda in Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) was seen in the southern province of Shabwah in the south East of Yemen, after they were defeated in Abyan, reliable sources in Shabwah said Tuesday.

The sources said they saw Fahd Al Qusu, Qasem Al Raimi, and Saeed Al Shihri along with tens of their companions including Saudis and Egyptians. (Read on …)

Important Statement on the current developments in Yemen

The National Organization for Defending Rights and Freedoms, (HOOD), expresses its deepest condolences to the Yemeni civilians and the victims’ families. Ten demonstrators died over the last two days of peaceful protests in the al-Mansurah district and al-Sheikh Othman in Aden. Eighty seven civilians in Taiz were injured after security forces threw a bomb at the demonstrators in Tahrir square and one of them is in the state of brain death. These attacks occurred while practicing their legitimate right to freedom of expression and their obligation to refuse oppression and corruption. (Read on …)

For more on the al Ghadeer arrests in Amran, click here. Mr. Baoum, leader of one of the southern independence factions was arrested early in November. More at Aden News Agency.

News Yemen: Political sources said Friday that presidential directives issued to release the leading figure in the Southern Movement, Hassan Baom, his son and his colleagues. Sources also said that 22 supporters of Houthis, arrested on the al-Ghadir Day in Amran, have been released.

Al-Haq party welcomed the releases of detainees and called on the government to release all detainees and make real peace in Sa’ada. It also called on political parties and human rights organizations to play a role over the detention of innocent people without any legal justification for more than five years.

Hopefully the statement indicates a real consensus, not some earlier statements, if only for the ability to move things forward. There’s no one to talk to when there’s eight groups and leaderships in the SMM. The July 17 JMP/ GPC agreement on dialog (which is stalled again) even if it reaches consensus, does nothing to address the southern issue. Some southerners consider the agreement a northern plot. The EU observers determination of the 2006 election as mostly free and fair (with massive reforms needed) neglected the boycotting southerners entirely.

Signatories of the current agreement include:
Supreme National Authority for the independence of the South:
Supreme National Council for the Liberation of South
Southern Democratic Assembly (TAJ)
Youth Union South (Ashajj)

An important statement of the components of independence

The latest developments in the political arena southern confirm beyond a shadow of
Doubt on the strength of the SPLM and the effectiveness of South peaceful struggle vital
Awareness of the project and the return of the South goes to accomplish the tasks ahead in
Forefront of independence and nation-building and the restoration of the Arab identity of the South
Based on the popular will, which has become dogma in the minds of our people
And the road to the ultimate salvation of the Yemeni occupation, despite our awareness of the seriousness of the conspiracies

Hatched against the draft independence.

The forces of South Independence Declaring its firm and principled position on the issue of
Our people in the south and the right to freedom and independence it is not concerned with any agreements
And conducted by the JMP with the occupation authority since the wake of the Yemeni
The war of summer 1994 through an agreement in February 2009 and the end of the agreement of July 17, 2010 (Read on …)

Personally I find Hamid al Ahmar, son of the late Sheik Abdullah al Ahmar, quite a bit better option than Ahmed Saleh, the president’s son, but its not my call. General Nuba is responding to the National Preparatory Committee’s attempts to form a national coalition for a just and unified Yemen. Some have charged the NPC is undermining the party system and not doing much else of anything besides holding meetings and issuing statements. Still any initiative that attempts to find a peaceful way out of the hell hole that Yemen has become is a good thing. Statement from General Nasser al Nuba who initiated the Southern protests in 2007.

Today is 07/07/2010 the third anniversary of the start of peaceful movement southern On this day of the year in 2007 Ostfti representatives of the people of the South in Liberty Square Incense breaker in the southern capital of Aden and decided to representatives of the people of the south, which is numbered tens of thousands of peaceful struggle until independence unfinished option strategic refusing any other options, which surveyed the illegal independence. (Read on …)

And a damned fine idea it is. ( For Nuba’s 2008 interview with me, click here.) The following is the google translated version of General Nuba’s statement today, original Arabic follows:

Gentlemen / presidents, kings, princes and leaders of the Arab nation distinguished

Peace be upon you and God’s mercy and blessings be upon you,,,

You are holding the Arab Summit Conference on the land of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya sister, our people (the people of the Democratic People’s Republic of Yemen) on the basis of religion and brotherhood and neighborliness and self-determination of peoples looking forward to your August Assembly and commented on by great hopes, to support him than Gore in the throes of the comprehensive blockade imposed by the Yemeni occupying forces since the war of aggression in 1994 and fully extend its influence by force of arms in the south and its people, who reached the highest levels these days of tight security during the closure of large areas and cutting off communications and barriers launched many military campaigns that led to the killing and displacement of innocent people and the destruction of of houses, mass arrests and use of artillery and missile and air strikes on villages and towns in different regions of the occupied south .. Therefore we appeal to your August Assembly to accelerate the formation of a fact-finding commission in the south for the crimes of the occupation forces against our unarmed people. (Read on …)

What a disaster!!! What a stupid and reckless move in such a volatile place. Did they rely on Yemeni intel sources? Could they be that stupid? Well you got duped President Obama, 14 kids are dead and Qasim al Reimi “escaped,” which in itself was entirely predictable. Saleh is brilliant tactician. He is wedded to the US now, despite the fact that he is a war criminal. (Read on …)