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On occasion of the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) calls to put an end to arbitrariness against anti-slavery activists in Mauritania. 17 detained human rights activists – including Biram Dah Abeid, winner of the Weimar Human Rights Award 2011 – must be releases from prison immediately. Further, the Göttingen-based human rights organization demanded that the „Initiative for the Resurgence of the Abolitionist Movement“ (IRA) must be officially recognized, not constantly hindered in its work. This is the only way provide effective help for enslaved Mauritanians. For the prisoners, it is important not just to be pardoned by the President – as they insist that they are innocent and did not break the law.
Most of the detained slavery-critics were arrested on November 11 during a vigil against slavery and land theft in the town of Rosso in the south of the country. The authorities had not approved of their protest march through numerous villages, planned as a form of protest against the continued land theft and against the depletion of the black African population in the Arab-dominated country. Although slavery was officially abolished in Mauritania, about 500,000 black Africans are still treated as slaves: they are forced to work for their slaveholders throughout their lives, without payment.
On November 15, 2014, the magistrate in Rosso had ordered the activists to be transferred to the prison of the city and formal investigations to be taken up. The defendants are accused of „rebellion and incitement to public disorder“. They are facing several years in prison. „Anyone who systematically criminalizes and marginalizes human rights activists is a perpetrator,“ said the STP’s Africa-consultant Ulrich Delius.
Biram Dah Abeid during his election campaign tour in June 2014
Ulrich Delius, head of STP’s Africa department, is available for further questions: +49 551 49906 27 or 65]G378o2<:C72.
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