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Burundi says UN human rights investigators unwelcome

Xinhua, November 25, 2016 Adjust font size:

The Burundian government on Thursday declared the three UN investigators mandated to look into human rights violations in Burundi as unwelcome.

The reaction came in the aftermath of the appointment by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) earlier this week of three investigators to look into human rights violations in the east African nation following President Pierre Nkurunziza's third-term bid in April 2015.

"We are not part of the process of setting up the UN inquiry commission. As the government of Burundi, we are not involved any more in the investigation to be made by this commission," Burundian human rights minister Martin Nivyabandi told a press conference.

Nivyabandi defied the UNHRC report published in September last year, saying that the allegations therein were wrong, and said the deployment of the three investigators would be nothing but neo-colonialism.

"There are some international organizations whose goal is to destabilize some governments of Africa," warned Nivyabandi.

The commission made up by three investigators from Algeria, Benin and Britain is expected to give provisional reports in March and June, 2017, while the final report will be presented before a session of the UN Human Rights Council in September.

Relations between Burundi and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Burundi have been strained since the publication of the September report by three UN experts.

The experts documented 564 executions committed by the government and affiliated groups and confirmed targeted assassinations, arbitrary detention, torture and sexual violence. Enditem