Burundi: Alert!! Alert!! Soldiers die, civilians are regularly beheaded. Who are the authors?
The government of Gitega boasts of having organized the May 2020 elections in peace, and that today there is total peace in Burundi. Not only that peace does not mean the absence of war, even physical security is threatened, the number of people who are killed per month rather suggests a situation of war.
Some media publishing on social networks give alarming results. The Gitega’s authorities will say that it is opposition media giving the incorrect figures. This is not at all true because a person declared dead does not return and besides, the official sources remain silent.
Look: according to these sources, in just a period of one month (almost the time of Evariste Ndayishimiye’s reign), more than 20 people were killed; 10 women including 05 raped; 10 men and 02 children. Most of these people were killed and then beheaded. Why this gesture? Why behead people? For what interest? What kind of strategy? What message? This practice is not new in Burundi, but it has started to gain momentum in recent days. Judge for yourself: Marie Annick Ndayishemeze from Musongati in Rutana (raped then beheaded); Annita Nsavyimana from Muramvya (raped then beheaded); Spés Nshimirimana of Karuzi (raped then beheaded); Bukuru of Ngozi (raped then beheaded); Annita Nshimirimana from Karuzi (raped and then beheaded); Prime Sindibagira from Gitega (killed then beheaded); Celestin Hakizimana and Nicodeme Ndikumana from Cibitoke (killed then beheaded). Two unidentified men were discovered floating on Lake Tanganyika, one in Mukungu / Nyanza-Lac and the other in Rukaramu, Mutimbuzi commune. The discovery of this last man dates from July 27, 2020. The population approached to try to identify the corpse, but the nearest military position, in collaboration with the administration, banned it and did bury it without any identification. It is this practice that is commonly used; and it is visible that it emanates from an instruction which was given by the power in place. Why would the power prevent the identification of the bodies found? Because it’s his organs that kill. There is no other possible justification (the example of Kayogoro in Makamba where Burundians from Tanzania were regularly stripped of their property, then sometimes killed is eloquent. It has been proven by the organs of the State that it was young imbonerakure supported by the administration that were responsible). The instruction was given by officials of the cnddfdd (including Gelase Ndabirabe) to no longer kill and take images (because leaks on social networks were frequent), to move the person to be killed to a locality far from home so that ‘it is difficult to identify. It is for this reason that the administration, in case of discovery of a corpse, hasten to have it buried.
Raping women and girls, then beheading them or beheading the men after killing them is a practice that comes from the FDRL-Interahamwe, those genocidaires who committed the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994. It is fair to imagine that they would be angry with the current power of Evariste Ndayishimiye because they are not sure that the fruitful relations they had with the previous power will remain intact. The message would be to tell him that if the conventions are violated, the security of the country will be affected. It is innocent Burundians who will pay the price. Another anger would come from the imbonerakure who see their colleagues who are starting to be arrested by the same state services that yesterday supported them in their hunt for opponents. This practice of killing and beheading would also be a strong message to new leaders.
These killings did not spare the men in uniform. Indeed, according to SOS media, 04 corpses of men wearing Burundian army boots and uniforms were discovered on July 27, 2020 by the population on Nyave hill, Ndora zone, Bukinanyana commune, Cibitoke province. It was 4km from the Kibira Nature Reserve. An elected member of the hill interviewed by the media regrets that this is the third time that corpses have been discovered in the locality and that the administration orders them to bury them without any identification. Note that 05 other bodies were discovered on July 22, 2020 in the same province of Cibitoke, in the Butahana area in Mabayi commune, still in military uniform of the national army. The silence of the Burundi National Defence Force can be interpreted in several ways. Either these people are members of the FDRL-interahamwe who are in the Kibira, who would wear Burundian military uniforms (easy thing). They would be killed by theirs (punitive actions) or by the Burundian soldiers who are in the positions around the Kibira. Or, it is Burundian soldiers who fall into ambushes by FDRL-intarahamwe elements who are in the kibira. The last version, not the least, is that these people are Burundian soldiers, Tutsis, killed by their Hutu brothers in arms. This purge within the military is on the agenda of the cnddfdd power. It would then be easy to do so from very remote and isolated military positions. They suspect that if Rwanda is attacked, the Tutsi soldiers could betray them. They are also troublesome witnesses of the relations between the soldiers of the national army and the elements of the FDRL-interahamwe (the latter receive logistics from the national army)
URN HITAMWONEZA recommends serious investigations, not only on these rapes and assassinations of civilians followed by beheadings, but also in these cases Burundian soldiers who are regularly killed, especially in the province of Cibitoke. The silence of the state for all these cases, the fact that the administration is busy burying these bodies without identification show the responsibility of the Burundian state in these killings. It is for this good reason that we ask that human rights commissions be set up at the level of the EAC, AU, or at the level of the UN to shed light on these cases and thus establish the responsibilities for punish the culprits. Allowing the situation to rot would be synonymous with complicity. We will continue to document these cases and alert the public until these nameless atrocities have come to an end.