Jul 27. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Friday called on Burkina Faso authorities to conduct an “urgent and impartial” investigation after a video circulated on social media showing a group of men in military uniform dismembering a corpse to eat it.
“The Burkinabe authorities should immediately open a transparent and impartial investigation into this brutal incident and appropriately punish all those responsible (…) regardless of their rank,” HRW said of the incident, which involved at least 18 men.
The Burkinabe Armed Forces on Friday condemned “these macabre acts” and held responsible “alleged members of the Defense and Security Forces and the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP)”, two groups of civilians who accompany Burkinabe soldiers during their operations against Islamist armed groups.
The uniforms and equipment of the men in the images – Kalashnikov assault rifles and military helmets – appear to confirm the involvement of these two forces, HRW said in a statement.
An investigation by the NGO suggests that the 81-second video was recorded between April and May near the town of Nouna, in the northeastern Boucle du Mouhoun region.
Since taking power in a coup in September 2022, junta chief Ibrahim Traoré has increased the use of VDPs – authorised to take part in counter-terrorism operations for the first time in 2020 – and in October 2022 launched a campaign to recruit 50,000 more.
HRW has called on Burkinabe authorities to crack down on “military and civilian auxiliary units that commit abuses” and to “thoroughly investigate and prosecute those involved.”
“The gruesome video showing soldiers mutilating a corpse highlights the pervasive lack of accountability for atrocities that military units have committed in Burkina Faso in recent years,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, HRW’s Sahel researcher.
The UN has also called on governments to put pressure on the military junta to “put an end to atrocities such as those shown in the video,” recalling that the mutilation of corpses in non-international armed conflicts constitutes a war crime, according to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), of which Burkina Faso is a party.
Add Comment