The civil engineering company Canstruct International Pty Ltd (‘Canstruct’) has taken on a toxic contract to run facilities on Nauru where the Australian government has trapped refugees in a system that amounts to torture, Amnesty International said today.

Canstruct, an Australian family-run company, has signed a contract to run refugee processing centres on the island, where hundreds of people have been forcibly transferred after trying to seek asylum in Australia. Australian officials have admitted this system is intentionally harsh.

“What is so deeply shocking is that Canstruct has taken on this contract despite a mountain of evidence which shows that Australia’s whole offshore processing system is inherently abusive.”

Audrey Gaughran, Amnesty International’s Director of Global Issues.

“What is so deeply shocking is that Canstruct has taken on this contract despite a mountain of evidence which shows that Australia’s whole offshore processing system is inherently abusive,” said Audrey Gaughran, Amnesty International’s Director of Global Issues.

“The company will provide the very services that sustain a system that keeps women, men and children trapped in a cycle of cruelty and desperation.”

Amnesty International has documented how Australia’s offshore refugee processing system is so deliberately and inherently cruel and abusive it amounts to torture, findings that have also been backed up by UN experts.

The refugees are trapped in a legal and emotional limbo on an island where they also face a risk of violence. Refugees and asylum seekers on Nauru have faced physical attacks and sexual assault by some members of staff at the refugee processing centres, as well as violence from the wider community, without anyone being held properly accountable.

Doctors and other experts have exposed the excruciating level of mental and emotional pain experienced by refugees, many of whom have suffered serious mental illness. The fear and isolation they experience is exacerbated by failures in health care which have left people with chronic illnesses unable to receive proper treatment.

Canstruct is taking up the contract from another Australian company, Broadspectrum, owned by the Spanish multinational Ferrovial.

Ferrovial, which was criticised for its role by human rights groups including Amnesty International, decided to end the contract on 31 October this year after buying Broadspectrum in April 2016. Broadspectrum has run the processing centres on Nauru since September 2012.

“Broadspectrum and Ferrovial have made millions from the suffering of people fleeing persecution. Canstruct needs to ask itself if it really wants to be the next company to become complicit in the Australian government’s illegal policies, and if it’s willing to expose itself to legal liability for being complicit in this system – as Broadspectrum and Ferrovial already have,” said Audrey Gaughran.

Background

Canstruct is a family run, Brisbane based civil engineering company with no past history of providing the kind of refugee support services it has now agreed to provide on Nauru. The company has provided construction services on Nauru in the past and built the refugee processing centres on Nauru, under three contracts with a combined final value of AUS$650 million (USD510 million). Canstruct also holds numerous other contracts with the Australian government.

Australia’s processing systems on Nauru and Manus Island are so fundamentally at odds with basic human dignity that Amnesty International believes it would be impossible for any company to operate the processing centres without causing or contributing to serious human rights abuses. Any company that provides these services is acting in direct contravention of its human rights responsibilities under international standards on business and human rights, and exposing itself to potential criminal liability and damages claims.

 

The Australian Government must do everything in its power to pressure the Myanmar Government to end the violence and ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya people to:

• use its influence to pressure the Myanmar authorities to end the violence and persecution against the Rohingya people and allow humanitarian agencies and independent investigators access to Rakhine state,

• immediately suspend the provision of military training and other military and security assistance,

• increase its humanitarian assistance for the crisis, in addition to the funds already pledged,

• agree to an emergency intake of refugees to Australia, and

• take a leadership role in pushing for a strong UN General Assembly resolution on the violence in Rakhine state and to hold an emergency ASEAN summit to facilitate discussions  with Myanmar.

More than 530,000 Rohingya men, women and children have fled northern Rakhine State in terror in a matter of weeks amid the Myanmar security forces’ targeted campaign of widespread and systematic murder, rape and burning, Amnesty International has said in its most detailed analysis yet of the ongoing crisis.

‘My World Is Finished’: Rohingya Targeted in Crimes against Humanity in Myanmar describes how Myanmar’s security forces are carrying out a systematic, organised and ruthless campaign of violence against the Rohingya population as a whole in northern Rakhine State, after a Rohingya armed group attacked around 30 security posts on 25 August.

Dozens of eyewitnesses to the worst violence consistently implicated specific units, including the Myanmar Army’s Western Command, the 33rd Light Infantry Division, and the Border Guard Police.

“In this orchestrated campaign, Myanmar’s security forces have brutally meted out revenge on the entire Rohingya population of northern Rakhine State, in an apparent attempt to permanently drive them out of the country. These atrocities continue to fuel the region’s worst refugee crisis in decades,” said Tirana Hassan, Crisis Response Director at Amnesty International.

“Exposing these heinous crimes is the first step on the long road to justice. Those responsible must be held to account; Myanmar’s military can’t simply sweep serious violations under the carpet by announcing another sham internal investigation. The Commander-in-Chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, must take immediate action to stop his troops from committing atrocities.”

Crimes against humanity

Witness accounts, satellite imagery and data, and photo and video evidence gathered by Amnesty International all point to the same conclusion: hundreds of thousands of Rohingya women, men, and children have been the victims of a widespread and systematic attack, amounting to crimes against humanity.

The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court lists 11 types of acts which, when knowingly committed during such an attack, constitute crimes against humanity. Amnesty International has consistently documented at least six of these amid the current wave of violence in northern Rakhine State: murder, deportation and forcible displacement, torture, rape and other sexual violence, persecution, and other inhumane acts such as denying food and other life-saving provisions.

This conclusion is based on testimonies from more than 120 Rohingya men and women who have fled to Bangladesh in recent weeks, as well as 30 interviews with medical professionals, aid workers, journalists and Bangladeshi officials.

Amnesty International’s experts corroborated many witness accounts of the Myanmar security forces’ crimes by analysing satellite imagery and data, as well as verifying photographs and video footage taken inside Rakhine State. The organization has also requested access to Rakhine State to investigate abuses on the ground, including by members of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), the Rohingya armed group. Amnesty International continues to call for unfettered access to the UN Fact-Finding Mission and other independent observers.

Murder and massacres

In the hours and days following the ARSA attacks on 25 August, the Myanmar security forces, sometimes joined by local vigilantes, surrounded Rohingya villages throughout the northern part of Rakhine State. As Rohingya women, men, and children fled their homes, the soldiers and police officers often opened fire, killing or seriously injuring at least hundreds of people.

Survivors described running to nearby hills and rice fields, where they hid until the forces left. The elderly and people with disabilities were often unable to flee, and burned to death in their homes after the military set them alight.

This pattern was replicated in dozens of villages across Maungdaw, Rathedaung, and Buthidaung townships. But the security forces, and in particular the Myanmar military, appear to have unleashed their most lethal response in specific villages near where ARSA carried out its attacks.

Amnesty International documented events in five such villages where at least a dozen people were killed: Chein Kar Li, Koe Tan Kauk, and Chut Pyin, all in Rathedaung Township; and Inn Din and Min Gyi, in Maungdaw Township. In Chut Pyin and Min Gyi, the death toll was particularly high, with at least scores of Rohingya women, men, and children killed by Myanmar security forces.

Amnesty International interviewed 17 survivors of the massacre in Chut Pyin, six of whom had gunshot wounds. Almost all had lost at least one family member, with some losing many. They consistently described the Myanmar military, joined by Border Guard Police and local vigilantes, surrounding Chut Pyin, opening fire on those fleeing, and then systematically burning Rohingya houses and buildings.

Fatima, 12, told Amnesty International that she was at home with her parents, eight siblings, and grandmother when they saw fire rising from another part of their village. As the family ran out of their house, she said men in uniform opened fire on them from behind. She saw both her father and 10-year-old sister get shot, then Fatima was also hit in the back of her right leg, just above the knee.

“I fell down, but my neighbour grabbed me and carried me,” she recalled. After a week on the run, she finally received treatment in Bangladesh. Her mother and older brother were also killed in Chut Pyin.

Amnesty International sent photographs of Fatima’s wound to a forensic medical expert, who said it was consistent with a bullet wound that “would have entered the thigh from behind.” Medical professionals in Bangladesh described treating many wounds that appeared to have been caused by gunshots fired from behind –matching consistent witness testimony that the military fired on Rohingya as they tried to run away.

In Chein Kar Li and Koe Tan Kauk, two neighbouring villages, Amnesty International documented the same pattern of attack by the Myanmar military.

Sona Mia, 77, said he was at home in Koe Tan Kauk when Myanmar soldiers surrounded the village and opened fire on 27 August. His 20-year-old daughter, Rayna Khatun, had a disability that left her unable to walk or speak. One of his sons put her on his shoulders, and the family slowly made its way toward the hill on the village’s edge. As they heard the shooting get closer and closer, they decided they had to leave Rayna in a Rohingya house that had been abandoned.

“We didn’t think we’d be able to make it,” Sona Mia recalled. “I told her to sit there, we’d come back… After arriving on the hill, we spotted the house where we left her. It was a bit away, but we could see. The soldiers were burning [houses], and eventually we saw that house, it was burned too.”

After the military left the village in the late afternoon, Sona Mia’s sons went down and found Rayna Khatun’s burnt body among the torched house. They dug a grave at the edge of that house’s courtyard, and buried her there.

Rape and other sexual violence

Amnesty International interviewed seven Rohingya survivors of sexual violence committed by the Myanmar security forces. Of those, four women and a 15-year-old girl had been raped, each in a separate group with between two and five other women and girls who were also raped. The rapes occurred in two villages that the organization investigated: Min Gyi in Maungdaw Township and Kyun Pauk in Buthidaung Township.

As previously documented by Human Rights Watch and The Guardian, after entering Min Gyi (known locally as Tula Toli) on the morning of 30 August, Myanmar soldiers pursued Rohingya villagers who fled down to the riverbank and then separated the men and older boys from the women and younger children.

After opening fire on and executing at least scores of men and older boys, as well as some women and younger children, the soldiers took women in groups to nearby houses where they raped them, before setting fire to those houses and other Rohingya parts of the village.

S.K., 30, told Amnesty International that after watching the executions, she and many other women and younger children were taken to a ditch, where they were forced to stand in knee-deep water:

“They took the women in groups to different houses. …There were five of us [women], taken by four soldiers [in military uniform]. They took our money, our possessions, and then they beat us with a wooden stick. My children were with me. They hit them too. Shafi, my two-year-old son, he was hit hard with a wooden stick. One hit, and he was dead… Three of my children were killed. Mohamed Osman (10) [and] Mohamed Saddiq (five) too. Other women [in the house] also had children [with them] that were killed.

“All of the women were stripped naked…They had very strong wooden sticks. They first hit us in the head, to make us weak. Then they hit us [in the vagina] with the wooden sticks. Then they raped us. A different soldier for each [woman].”

After raping women and girls, the soldiers set fire to the houses, killing many of the victims inside.

Deliberate, organised village burnings

On 3 October, the UN Operational Satellite Applications Programme (UNOSAT) reported that it had identified 20.7 square kilometres of buildings destroyed by fire in Maungdaw and Buthidaung Townships since 25 August. Even that likely underestimated the overall scale of destruction and burning, as dense cloud cover affected what the satellites were able to detect.

Amnesty International’s own review of fire data from remote satellite sensing indicates at least 156 large fires in northern Rakhine State since 25 August, also likely to be an underestimate. In the previous five years, no fires were detected during the same period, which is also the monsoon season, strongly indicating that the burning has been intentional.

Before and after satellite images strikingly illustrate what witnesses also consistently told Amnesty International – that the Myanmar security forces only burned Rohingya villages or areas. For example, satellite images of Inn Din and Min Gyi show large swathes of structures razed by fire virtually side by side with areas that were left untouched. Distinct features of the untouched areas, combined with accounts from Rohingya residents as to where they and other ethnic communities lived in those villages, indicate that only Rohingya areas were razed.

Amnesty International has noted a similar pattern in at least a dozen more villages where Rohingya lived in close proximity to people from other ethnicities.

“Given their ongoing denials, Myanmar’s authorities may have thought they would literally get away with murder on a massive scale. But modern technology, coupled with rigorous human rights research, have tipped the scales against them,” said Tirana Hassan.

“It is time for the international community to move beyond public outcry and take action to end the campaign of violence that has driven more than half the Rohingya population out of Myanmar. Through cutting off military cooperation, imposing arms embargoes and targeted sanctions on individuals responsible for abuses, a clear message must be sent that the military’s crimes against humanity in Rakhine State will not be tolerated.

“The international community must ensure that the ethnic cleansing campaign does not achieve its unlawful, reprehensible goal. To do so, the international community must combine encouraging and supporting Bangladesh in providing adequate conditions and safe asylum to Rohingya refugees, with ensuring that Myanmar respects their human right to return safely, voluntarily and with dignity to their country and insisting that it ends, once and for all, the systematic discrimination against the Rohingya and other root causes of the current crisis.”

Baseless allegations against 11 human rights defenders, including Amnesty International’s Turkey director and chair, should have been rejected in their entirety, said Amnesty International after an Istanbul court accepted the indictment.

“This indictment fails to provide a shred of incriminating evidence to substantiate the trumped up terrorism charges it contains. In accepting this indictment the Istanbul Court has missed a golden opportunity to bring this grotesque miscarriage of justice to a halt,” said John Dalhuisen, Amnesty International’s Europe Director.

“This is politically motivated prosecution aimed at silencing the work of some of Turkey’s most prominent human rights defenders. It beggars belief that anyone who has read the fantastical allegations laid out in the indictment could see it in any other way.”

“This is politically motivated prosecution aimed at silencing the work of some of Turkey’s most prominent human rights defenders. It beggars belief that anyone who has read the fantastical allegations laid out in the indictment could see it in any other way.”

With Australia’s election to the United Nations Human Rights Council last night in Geneva, Amnesty International is calling on the Australian Government to end its hypocrisy on human rights at home.

Despite its election to the Council, Australia continues its inherently abusive offshore detention regime, and oversees astronomical rates of Indigenous incarceration.

“If we’re serious about being a human rights leader we need to lead by example, instead of trampling on the rights of people fleeing persecution and the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.”

Michael Hayworth, Campaigns Manager at Amnesty International Australia.

“If we’re serious about being a human rights leader we need to lead by example, instead of trampling on the rights of people fleeing persecution and the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people,” said Michael Hayworth, Campaigns Manager at Amnesty International Australia.

“Leadership comes with consistency. We can’t say one thing on one hand and give whole hearted commitment to some human rights agendas while carrying out policies of deliberate abuse on the other. It’s completely hypocritical.”

Instead of offering protection to people who came to Australia seeking safety, Australia has subjected them to four years of suffering in its abusive offshore facilities on Manus Island and Nauru.

Australia locks up Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children 25 times more than non-Indigenous children. Cases of self-harm or abuse of Indigenous children have been reported in children’s prisons in every state and territory.

“Australia must demonstrate that it will be a principled, effective and accountable Human Rights Council member. It must protect the rights of Indigenous children, and refugees and people seeking asylum under Australia’s policies,” said Michael Hayworth.

On being elected onto the Human Rights Council, Amnesty International is calling on Australia to commit to:   

• Funding and implementing a measurable national plan to end the overrepresentation of Indigenous young people in the criminal justice system. This includes setting justice targets alongside the existing Closing the Gap targets and reporting on them annually.
• Working constructively with the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representatives and peak bodies. The Government must address the priorities set out in the Redfern Statement.This calls for a more just approach to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs.
• Ending Australia’s cruel practice of mandatory offshore processing and detention.
• Immediately bringing refugees and asylum seekers from Manus Island and Nauru to Australia for processing and protection.
• Increase Australia’s annual refugee resettlement intake to at least 30,000 people, prioritising those selected by UNHCR.
• Ensuring people who seek asylum in Australia are treated humanely. They must have their asylum claims assessed in a timely, fair and efficient manner, irrespective of their mode of arrival.
• Ending Australia’s moratorium on resettling refugees that have arrived in Indonesia after 1 July 2014.
• Working with other countries to adopt a responsibility-sharing approach to managing the flow of people seeking asylum and refugees.
• Supporting and advocating for increased humanitarian assistance, assistance for hosting countries. Improving capability for search and rescue and safe disembarkation at sea. Providing more efficient and effective refugee status determination and resettlement processes. Expanding other safe pathways for refugees to access protection (eg. through skilled migration, family reunion, student visas etc).

Marking the one-year anniversary since Iraqi forces and the US-led coalition launched the offensive to retake the city of Mosul from the armed group calling itself the Islamic State (IS),  Amnesty International’s Middle East Director of Campaigns, Samah Hadid said:

“The battle for Mosul has had catastrophic consequences for the city’s residents. Entire families were killed during the fighting, with many still buried under the rubble to this day. Warring parties placed little value upon civilian lives. Many of those lucky enough to escape are now living in unbearable conditions inside makeshift camps with an uncertain future.

“The international community must not forget about the people of Mosul. Funding for humanitarian assistance is urgently needed to help more than 800,000 people now living in tents without proper access to healthcare, food and water.

“Many of the displaced are also now living in fear. Enforced disappearances carried out by pro-government forces are on the rise, along with rushed and unfair trials, followed by executions carried out on the basis of ‘confessions’ extracted under torture. We urge the Iraqi authorities to ensure all trials adhere to international standards without resorting to the death penalty.

“It is also important that the Iraqi government and the US-led coalition acknowledge the grave loss of civilian life caused by the Mosul operation, as well as their role in it. They must ensure that reported violations are impartially investigated and those responsible are held accountable. The people of Mosul deserve to know that there will be justice and reparation for victims and their families. And the world needs to see that the lessons of the battle of Mosul are being learned so that civilians caught up in other battles are spared such catastrophic consequences.”

Actors James McAvoy, Claire Danes and Ben Stiller have joined a host of Hollywood stars in calling for the immediate release of 11 prominent human rights defenders in Turkey.

More than 20 celebrities – including Zoë Kravitz, Tim Roth, Mark Ruffalo, Whoopi Goldberg, Zach Galifianakis and Marisa Tomei – have signed a letter sent by Amnesty International USA to the Turkish ambassador.

The letter said: “The frequent attack on human rights defenders in Turkey is unjust and simply not acceptable.”

The letter said: “The frequent attack on human rights defenders in Turkey is unjust and simply not acceptable.”

They join a host of other celebrities including Patrick Stewart, Annie Lennox, Bono, and Peter Gabriel who have called for the release of the activists.

Today marks one hundred days since the wrongful arrest of 10 activists – including İdil Eser, the Director of Amnesty Turkey – at a meeting near Istanbul on 5 July. Taner Kılıç, Amnesty’s Turkey Chair, was arrested the month before and remains in detention. On 4 October, a prosecutor filed an indictment calling for jail terms of up to 15 years for all 11 activists on trumped-up terrorism charges.

Amnesty is leading a global demand for the immediate and unconditional release of the activists in Turkey.

John Dalhuisen, Amnesty International’s Europe Director, said:

“One hundred days ago, our colleagues were locked up for standing up for human rights. Every passing day further exposes the long reach of the post-coup crackdown and the deep flaws in Turkey’s justice system.”

In the coming days, Amnesty activists in more than 25 countries will hold more than 200 parties and stunts to mark İdil‘s 54th birthday on Saturday 14 October. These will range from a birthday party in the European Parliament, to a press conference in a makeshift prison in Madrid. Full-size paper cutouts of Idil will be present to highlight her absence.

The activists are accused of assisting a variety of ‘armed terrorist organisations’ with diametrically opposing ideologies. The charges against them include outlandish claims that standard human rights activities such as appealing to stop the sale of tear gas, making a grant application or campaigning for the release of hunger striking teachers were carried out on behalf of terrorist organisations.

After three months, the investigation has failed to provide any incriminating evidence to substantiate the prosecutor’s charges, nor has it shown how the supposedly secret meeting relates to terrorism in any way.