Condemn the Arrest and Torture of LGBT Human Rights Defender
On July 25, 2008, at 3:00 p.m., Ugandan police arrested and tortured a key Ugandan human rights activist--one of three who had been detained slightly more than a month ago while peacefully demonstrating for access to HIV services. Usaam Mukwaaya was on his way back from Friday prayers when he was stopped by a police patrol car and taken off a motorbike taxi that he had hired to transport him. Three men in police uniform and a fourth in civilian attire put Mukwaaya in the patrol car. He was driven to a building where he was led through a dark hall to an interrogation room, and aggressively questioned about the Ugandan LGBT movement. Mukwaaya was cut around the hands and tortured with a machine that applies extreme pressure to the body, preventing breathing and causing severe pain.
Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG)--a coalition of 3 LGBTI organizations in Uganda--and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) searched unsuccessfully for Mukwaaya from 3:00 p.m. on July 25 to the morning of July 26, 2008, inquiring as to his whereabouts at five police stations in Kampala. On July 26, 2008, at about 11:40 a.m., Mukwaaya was driven from the building where he'd been held for about 30 to 45 minutes and dumped. Shaken and bruised, he boarded a motorbike taxi to the city center and telephoned colleagues from SMUG who found him weak, filthy and without shoes and some of his clothing.
[More details here.]
On July 25, 2008, at 3:00 p.m., Ugandan police arrested and tortured a key Ugandan human rights activist--one of three who had been detained slightly more than a month ago while peacefully demonstrating for access to HIV services. Usaam Mukwaaya was on his way back from Friday prayers when he was stopped by a police patrol car and taken off a motorbike taxi that he had hired to transport him. Three men in police uniform and a fourth in civilian attire put Mukwaaya in the patrol car. He was driven to a building where he was led through a dark hall to an interrogation room, and aggressively questioned about the Ugandan LGBT movement. Mukwaaya was cut around the hands and tortured with a machine that applies extreme pressure to the body, preventing breathing and causing severe pain.
Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG)--a coalition of 3 LGBTI organizations in Uganda--and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) searched unsuccessfully for Mukwaaya from 3:00 p.m. on July 25 to the morning of July 26, 2008, inquiring as to his whereabouts at five police stations in Kampala. On July 26, 2008, at about 11:40 a.m., Mukwaaya was driven from the building where he'd been held for about 30 to 45 minutes and dumped. Shaken and bruised, he boarded a motorbike taxi to the city center and telephoned colleagues from SMUG who found him weak, filthy and without shoes and some of his clothing.
[More details here.]
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