VI. MILITARY ABUSES

Reprisals on Civilians for Rebel Attacks

When camp residents lived in their own homes, soldiers sometimes attacked them in reprisal for FNL activity in the area, assuming they had provided lodging, food, information, or other support for the combatants. In a number of cases, witnesses complained that after they had fled nearby combat, they returned to find that soldiers had burned their homes.48 When local people moved to the camps, soldiers generally desisted from reprisal attacks; this was one of the reasons why residents found life more "secure" in the camps. But in several instances, soldiers still punished civilians for their supposed support for the FNL.

After FNL combatants attacked soldiers near Nyambuye camp in December 1999, soldiers came to the camp the next day and ordered residents to vacate the camp and gather at the nearby administrative zone office. There they beat men, women, and children, accusing them of having lodged the rebels. One woman said that the soldiers "kept demanding to know where are the rebels, where do they come from. They said, `They [the rebels] are your children.' They hit many people, trying to get information, even old women and children too."49 According to another woman, soldiers beat young men especially harshly. She saw them beat one man, who seemed to be about twenty-five years old, so violently that he died on the spot. "After some time," she said, "he just stopped moving."50 Several others had their arms broken and remain disabled by their injuries six months later.51

At about 9:00 a.m. on Thursday, March 9, 2000, the FNL led a small attack on the military post at Cinkona, adjacent to Kavumu camp. The fighting was sporadic and ended around 11:00 am. when the FNL combatants fled into the hills. Later that afternoon, soldiers rounded up camp residents who were cultivating on the surrounding hills. They accused them of supporting the rebels and took them to the Cinkona post. There they beat several persons, including one thirty-three-year-old man whom they hit with fists, sticks, and a belt. He sustained injuries on his head and legs and required stiches to close one head wound.52

On Sunday April 9, FNL combatants attacked soldiers who were accompanying civilians from Nyambuye camp to market. At a place called Remba, they ambushed the twelve soldiers, reportedly killing ten of them, including a captain. Three persons, purportedly civilians from Nyambuye, took shelter in abandoned houses during the exchange of fire. When military reinforcements arrived from Mutanga North, they supposedly found the three and killed them. According to one witness, the soldiers then refused to allow people from the camp to bury the dead for a week.53

After the attack on May 15 near Kinyankonge mentioned above, soldiers ordered all civilians out of the camp while they searched it for rebels. Soldiers beat several camp residents with sticks. One man, wounded on the top of his head and below his eye, required treatment at a hospital in the city.54

Killings and Beatings of Suspected Rebels and Supporters of Rebels

From the beginning of the regroupment, military authorities have made clear that anyone found outside designated camps in questionable circumstances will be treated as a rebel. In early May, soldiers shot and killed four persons whom they discovered outside Nyambuye camp site.55

On March 17, a frail forty-year-old mother of six was authorised to go tend to her fields several miles from the Kabezi camp. She was cultivating in the company of a small group of men and women at around 11:00 a.m. when some ten soldiers surprised them by running directly at them. Throwing down her hoe, the woman fled in fear with bullets flying all around her. She was shot in the foot from a distance of about twenty yards. The soldiers came to question her only after having shot her. They then asked why she had fled. She told them just that she had been afraid. It is difficult to believe that soldiers could have taken her for a combatant at such close range.56

On Saturday, May 6, there was a skirmish in the morning between FNL rebels and soldiers near the Ruyaga camp. Later that afternoon soldiers under the command of a lieutenant found two young men, Albert Simbakwira (also known as Bucumi) and Audifax Nduwayezu, from Ruyaga camp between that camp and the nearby camp at Kavumu. Although the two showed their identity cards and claimed to have authorization to be outside the camp, the soldiers took them back to the military post at Cinkona, beating them on the way.

A witness who was at the post provided the following account of the subsequent treatment of the two. He said soldiers gave the two men hoes and told them to dig graves the right size for their own bodies. Soldiers then tied Audifax up, the witness said, and suspended him on a rope between two poles. They beat him with large sticks on the back and head while ordering him to confess to being a rebel. He refused to do so.

The witness said that soldiers then tied Albert's arms and legs together behind his back and suspended him from a rope and beat him to make him confess to being a rebel. After some time, Albert stated that he had been a corporal with the FDD. One of the soldiers shot his gun into the air in celebration at the confession. According to the witness, Albert told the soldiers that he had some Kalaschnikov guns stored at his home in the camp. When asked to identify other rebels, Albert said that most who had fought with him were now dead, but later he told the soldiers that Audifax was also part of the rebellion and that he had three grenades at the camp. Audifax was then beaten again but still maintained his innocence. The two spent the night tied up at the post.

At about 2 p.m. the next day, a Sunday, soldiers brought Albert to Ruyaga camp, dressed in military fatigues. Witnesses who saw him there stated that he looked clearly like he had been beaten. Two people remarked that burn marks were visible on his arms. One speculated that the marks had been made by hot oil, but it is possible that they were severe rope burns from the way he had been tied up and suspended in the air while being beaten. Soldiers searched his shelter for guns but found none. They took him back to the military post and his current whereabouts are unknown.

Audifax was released on Sunday afternoon. Two weeks later the marks on his arms where he had been tied up were still clearly visible.57

Soldiers have also severely beaten and killed suspected rebels taken from inside the camps. On Sunday, May 14 Nicodeme Sibomana, thirty-four, finished work as usual at a small eating place inside Ruyaga camp and left for home at about 6:00 p.m. He never reached his destination, a small, banana-leaf shelter located ten minutes walk away. According to witnesses, his elderly mother, for whom he was the sole source of support, went to look for him and was told by others in the area that soldiers from the nearby post had taken him away. When Nicodeme still had not returned on Monday, she asked for information at the military post and was told to come back the next day. Just after daybreak Tuesday morning, she and a younger woman set out once more for the military post. About one hundred yards short of the post, they found Nicodeme dying by the side of the dirt road. His body was bruised and swollen in many places, his mouth was full of sand mixed with blood, and blood was coming also from his ears and nose. Nicodeme was carried to the local clinic, a few dozen yards from where he lay, and the medical assistant in charge was summoned. She could do nothing for him and he died almost immediately after her arrival.

According to a neighbor who was present, one of the soldiers from the post came by as the family was washing the body and preparing it for burial. He said he was sorry for Nicodeme's death. The family refused to bury Nicodeme until the communal administrator, who lived at the camp, brought the case to the local military commander. The administrator supposedly asked some of the soldiers why they had beaten the man to death and they replied that they had thought he was a rebel.58

The family asked the communal administrator to provide a coffin since it was the soldiers who had killed their relative. The administrator instead provided a blanket. A judicial officer (officier de la police judiciaire) of Bujumbura-rural, Antoine Nduwayezu, came to hold a hearing on Nicodeme's death and his family buried him.59

In mid-April soldiers arrested three young fishermen accused of being rebels and took them to the post at Kiyange. There they were reportedly beaten before being taken to an intelligence agency known as the Special Research Bureau (Bureau Special de Recherche, BSR) and to the military camp at Kamenge, known as the camp d'intervention. According to witnesses, two were beaten to death and their bodies discarded at a garbage dump, where they were found on April 26. The third was released in late April, so badly beaten that some weeks later he still found it difficult to walk. 60

In a number of other cases, soldiers have beaten suspected rebels severely enough to leave them disabled for months, if not permanently. One man, taken by soldiers at the end of January when he was returning from work to Nyambuye camp, was badly beaten on the back and legs. Four months later, he still had trouble walking.61

Soldiers in several different posts tied victims up tightly-using a form of tying called imvuto-and suspended them in the air before beating them. One man from the camp at Nyambuye was subjected to this abuse on February 9, supposedly under the direction of Capt. Michel Ngarambe, also known as " Commandant Gisanganya," and was beaten on his legs, back and hands. The marks of deep rope burns on his arms as well as signs that two of his fingers had been broken were clearly visible four months later.62

The Search of Kavumu Camp

Combatants of the FNL came into the camps to recruit and mobilize adherents as well as to collect contributions. Military authorities, concerned that the rebels were increasing their support within the camps, decided in early Mayto search Kavumu camp, where they anticipated finding some ten rebels as well as weapons. As Col. Samuel Gahiro, explained to Human Rights Watch researchers,

We had information that the rebels were coming from the hills to Kavumu camp where they would get healed [if injured] and would get food and money. People living within the camp itself told us this. They said even that there were arms in the camp.63

The operation was large and well-organized. On Saturday night May 6, soldiers from Cinkona and other posts surrounded the camp to keep anyone from leaving. Early the next morning, Sunday May 7, civilian and military authorities from the level of the provincial governor and the regional military commander on down came to supervise the search. They arrived in several jeeps, accompanied by 180 national policemen (gendarmes), some ten former rebels dressed in military uniform, and other young hangers-on called doriya (see below), some of whom arrived in pickup trucks. According to Colonel Gahiro, only the national policemen entered the camp; soldiers merely maintained a secure outer perimeter.

Authorities directed all camp residents to assemble either on a high plateau overlooking the camp or in an open space lower down the hill next to a small market. The national policemen, accompanied by the doriya and abashingantahe, began searching the shelters, supposedly looking for arms as well as for anyone who had not responded to the call to assemble. One woman who was preparing to bury her recently-deceased husband had stayed with his body. When the soldiers or policemen discovered her still in her shelter, they beat her with sticks and ordered her to go to the assembly point. In another case, a thirty-year-old man had stayed at home to care for a brother who was too ill to be moved. Two soldiers entered the shelter while two national policemen waited outside. The soldiers asked the man what he was doing and where he had hidden the arms. He replied that he had no weapons and that he was taking care of his sick brother. They began to hit him with their sticks and he fled outside. There the national policmen told him he should take his brother and go to the assembly point, but the soldiers inside told him instead just to go immediately so he left his brother behind and went to the gathering. When he returned later in the morning, he found the shelter ransacked and his brother dead on the floor, whether from natural causes or from mistreatment by the soldiers was unclear.

As the national policemen began moving through the camp, authorities were directing residents on the upper plateau to line up, in separate lines for men and women, to present their identity papers to the authorities. Several residents recount that they recognized the former rebels who accompanied the soldiers and realized that they intended to point out others supposed to be supporting the rebellion. Residents were also convinced that the military going through the site were looting their property.

Some people broke away from the group on the plateau and began running down among the shelters. People shouted that the military had come to pillage their goods and some began throwing rocks at them. According to camp residents, they acted to stop the pillaging; according to Colonel Gahiro, they acted to prevent the identification and arrest of rebels who were in the crowd.

The soldiers or national policemen arrested six young men and one young woman, supposedly for throwing stones at them. At least one of the seven was also identified as a rebel by one of the former rebels participating in the operation. The seven were transported into the city where at least several of them were beaten in the course of being interrogated. Five were subsequently released, one after his parents paid a substantial fine.

Seeing the potential for serious disorder and perhaps injury and loss of life, authorities abruptly halted the operation and ordered the military and police to leave the site, which they did shortly before noon. According to Colonel Gahiro,they did not arrest any rebels nor did they find any weapons in the camp. He also maintains that the soldiers and police did not engage in pillage, although he conceded that the former rebels with them might have stolen some things.

Camp residents say that the policemen and soldiers and their young followers stole radios, clothing, goats, beer, and other property. Administrative officials have confirmed this information.64 Several said that the looted property was taken away in the pickup trucks.

A witness not connected with the camp saw many of the soldiers or police come down the hill on foot and stop at the university just across from the road leading up to the camp. According to him, they were in boisterous spirits, not suggesting a failed operation, but rather one which had brought them at least a certain amount of beer which they had apparently already consumed.

Residents of Kavumu rapidly publicized the events and drew international attention to the case, which had taken place only several miles from downtown Bujumbura. On Tuesday, May 9, the governor and other military and civilian officials came to the camp to talk with the abashingantahe and the people about the complaints of pillage. They reportedly asked for an inventory of missing property to be done and promised an investigation.65

The Case of Jean-Marie Bigirimana

A twenty-five-year-old man, Jean-Marie Bigirimana, was arrested at Kavumu on May 7, supposedly because he had thrown stones at one of the colonels commanding the operation. Rather than being taken with the seven other young people mentioned above, he was brought straight to the Cinkona military post. A person who was there that morning confirmed that Bigirimana arrived there. He stated also that soldiers tied Bigirimana up, whipped him, and struck him in the chest with a sharp instrument. The injuries caused considerable bleeding. According to this witness, a colonel and a communal administrator were also at the post later in the day and saw Bigirimana, wounded and in a blood-soaked shirt, but did nothing about his situation.

Bigirimana's parents asked administrative officials for information about his whereabouts, but received no answer. On May 19, the first day after the incident when residents of Kavumu were permitted to leave the camp to go cultivate their fields, several found a headless, eviscerated body suspended between two trees near the Cinkona post. It was believed to be the body of Bigirimana.66

.
Rape and Sexual Abuses of Women

Residents of camps in the communes of Mutimbuzi, Isale, Kanyosha, Mutambu, and Kabezi reported cases of rape and sexual abuse of women by soldiers since the establishment of the camps. In a number of cases, soldiers have raped women, often after having encountered them in a secluded place outside the camp or after having brought them to the military post on some pretext. In many other cases, soldiers have used their authority to pressure women to engage in sexual acts against their will, sometimes in return for implied or explicit promises of protection or small payments.67

On April 18 four soldiers raped and brutally abused three young women, aged twenty-five, nineteen, and sixteen, who had come from the Nyambuye camp to get water at the place called Gasanga. They found the young women at the watering place at about 6:30 p.m., just when it was beginning to get dark, and forced them to go a short distance away where they began raping them. Other camp residents who saw the crime taking place went to alert one of the abashingantahe, who came with others to rescue the victims. But because the water source was so far from the camp, the rescuers arrived only after the women had already been abused for more than an hour. Two of the women were ableto walk back to Nyambuye with the support of others, but one was so badly injured that she had to be transported by stretcher. She was then taken to the Prince Regent Charles Hospital, where she remained under treatment for eleven days. The crime had been so public and the woman's injuries so grave that her family dared to complain to the local administrator at Isale commune and to "Commandant Gisanganya" Ngarambe at the Gitezi military post, the commanding officer of the soldiers in question, who themselves were at the neighboring post of Shesheka hill. The commandant supposedly answered that it had been so dark at the time of the rape that the victims could not have seen the assailants clearly and were mistaken in thinking they had been soldiers; the rapists, he is reported to have said, had been rebels. The soldiers suspected of having committed the crime have apparently since been transferred to another post.68

In other cases reported by the women at Nyambuye, a fifteen-year-old girl was raped by a soldier alongside the path as she came home from selling cassava at the market of Gahabwa. In this case, the family mobilized other camp residents for support, and went to complain to the commander of the post. He apparently did nothing to punish the suspected rapist, who was transferred to another post not long after.69 Another woman from Nyambuye camp, this one twenty-two years old, was attacked by a soldier when she went to get water. But others nearby came running and the soldier himself fled.70 Women at Nyambuye became so concerned about the abuses of girls and young women by the soldiers at the nearby post that they decided to send young men or older women (who are generally respected for their age) when soldiers required the delivery of water or other services there (see below).71

One family in a camp for the displaced72 has been victimized three times in the last six months, twice by armed men in uniform who forced their way into their home and robbed them. On the third occasion, on a Saturday night in mid-May, four men-three of them in uniform-forced their way into the home, where parents were sleeping with their eight children. They demanded money but, dissatisfied with the amount, two of them then raped two daughters of the family, one thirteen years of age, the other fourteen. Then then brutalized the girls, one by kicking her in the genitals, the other by sticking a wooden paddle in her vagina. The father of the family ran from the house seeking help. One of the men in uniform shot him in the back, killing him immediately. Relatives of the victims state that soldiers committed these crimes but have brought no formal complaint against them. Asked why not, one family member replied, "Complain? To whom?" In previous cases of crimes that they knew of, victims received no help from either local civilian or military officials, who always took the position that the crimes had been committed by rebels. The attack took place in a zone where there are many military posts and aroused sufficient commotion that others resident in the area heard the sounds clearly. Yet no soldiers came to the rescue of the family during the attack nor did any civilian or military officials come later to inquire into the circumstances of the crime.73

In another case that took place in mid-January of this year, soldiers sent several girls from Nyamaboko camp, one of them seventeen years old, to buy beer for them in Buhonga. On the way home, the seventeen-year-old was stopped at the base of Gisovu hill by a soldier. The others continued on their way, leaving her alone with the soldier. He told her to put down the beer and to take off her clothes. When she refused, he raped her at knife-point. She has complained to no one and is just relieved that the soldier in question has since been transferred elsewhere. She lives in fear that she has contracted AIDS from the rape.74

Another woman of Nyamaboko camp, aged twenty-seven and the mother of two children, suffered an attempted rape by two soldiers who pushed their way into the place where she lived in October 1999. When they tried to force her to engage in sex with them, she screamed, attracting the attention of neighbors who intervened and drove them away. Although she was not physically harmed, the incident has caused problems between her and her husband who now fears she may have been infected with the HIV virus and will no longer live with her.75

Fear of soldiers is so great that sometimes people refuse to intervene even if it is clear that a rape is taking place. Three young women, two aged twenty and one aged eighteen, were attacked by soldiers when they went to deliver water at Nyamaboko camp. A resident of the camp reported that those who heard their screams and cries for help did not dare go to their rescue.76 In another case, a young woman from Nyambuye camp was bringing water to the military post with a group of others. When they arrived, a soldier demanded sex from one of them, a teenager. She

refused him and he began to hit her with a stick. The others dared not defend their friend and took flight.77

Residents of Muberure camp said they knew of two cases of rape, one of a woman who was bringing water to the post, another of a woman who was caught returning from her fields in the afternoon. One witness from Muberure stressed that soldiers often raped after they had been drinking, an observation made also by women from the Kabezi camp who deplored particularly the behavior of a group known as the mobile squad (groupe mobile). These soldiers, identifiable by their red berets, abused camp residents after they returned from several weeks fighting in the interior. In the first weeks after regroupment, a military post was located within the camp at Kabezi. Soldiers from this post were said to have raped young girls on several occasions, usually by bringing them back to the post.78

Many witnesses stressed that girls and women also often engage in sex with soldiers against their will but without being subjected to the actual use of physical force. They include women who are too afraid to resist demands from a soldier; those who hope to win help or protection-perhaps from other soldiers-in return for sex; and those who provide sexual services in return for small gifts or payment. One woman, herself a widow trying to raise four children, explained that some women heading households may be particularly vulnerable to such demands because of the need to protect and feed their children.79

Forced Labor

In the period immediately after the "regroupment," soldiers forced groups of men to accompany them as they searched for rebels in the vicinity of the newly established camps. More recently, they required groups of men to join them on patrols looking for rebels, to go with them to clear underbrush (an operation meant to deny cover to rebels), or to help them in moving goods and equipment from one post to another. Men from Nyamaboko, Kiyenzi, Muberure, Kabezi, Mubone, and Nyambuye all reported having been required to accompany soldiers for work outside the camp. In these operations, the military generally made the civilians walk in front of them so as to shield them from any ambush by the rebels. Camp residents were required to do this work only occasionally but they particularly disliked it because it exposed them to serious risk.80 As one witness commented:

Soldiers surprise people when they need men for the patrols. They come and grab strong men, whoever is around, and make them go out on patrol. Some go and do not come back. People do not want to do this work.81

Groups of civilians accompanying soldiers to cut brush and clear banana fields were fired on by rebels in two incidents at Chewe and Kinyovu. During one work party in mid-May, a soldier was killed by rebel fire, although the civilians escaped serious injury.82

Soldiers generally require camp residents to provide them with firewood and, if there is no water at the post-as is sometimes the case-with water for drinking and bathing. Many men said that they had to find and provide firewood to soldiers once or twice a week. In some cases, households had to supply one person to fetch water every day. At Nyambuye, the water source was one hour by foot down a steep hill from the site and the work was usually done by women. Two frequently burdened with this task complained about how much time it took. They said that soldiers would not let cultivators leave for their fields until their daily quota of water had been provided.83

Those who refused to work or who were deemed to have done insufficient work were beaten or were refused permission to go their fields the next time they wished to do so.84 As one witness who provided firewood to the soldiers at Muberure once a week stated, "People get wood and water for the military. They are asked and those who refuse are hit, so no one refuses."85 One man who refused was struck so hard with a stick that his arm was broken.86

Threats and punishment notwithstanding, people did occasionally refuse to do the work demanded by the soldiers. In one case in Nyambuye in May, the local representative of the people was beaten on the legs and back because he could not get the necessary number of workers to fetch water.87 In mid-May, the people of Nyabibondo camp also refused to work for the soldiers and threw stones at them. They wrote to the minister responsible for Bujumbura-rural, informing him that soldiers at the Mbare post:

force us to carry their food, rice, to the military post and then to cut wood and bring them water. Those who cannot or do not do so are beaten. They make us carry cases of beer that they then sell [for a profit]. . . . If you dare to say a word against them, they imprison you and you have to pay 5,000 [U.S.$4] francs to get out and even if you pay it, you do not always get out.88

The soldiers came into the camp and beat a number of people after which the residents agreed to resume the work, provided the soldiers stopped the beatings.89

Camp residents were occasionally asked to help soldiers with other work, such as helping to build a structure at a military post or helping to transport beer that the soldiers would then sell to others. Those with cash available sometimes bought themselves free of such requirements, usually for 1,000 Burundian francs, a sum which would pay the school fees for the year for a child at primary school.90

In one exceptional case, women of the Kavumu camp were required to cultivate fields for the benefit of soldiers at the Cinkona post. One woman, aged about fifty, told Human Rights Watch researchers that she worked mostThursdays in a group of about forty women who cultivated corn, cassava, and beans for the soldiers. She said that women from each of the thirteen sectors of the camp took turns working in the fields.91

In a meeting with Human Rights Watch researchers, the minister of defense acknowledged that civilians were providing services to soldiers at military posts near the camps, but he described this as a matter of practice, with variations between camps, rather than as a policy. He said that in some situations the civilians had volunteered to provide the services to show their appreciation for the protection afforded by the soldiers, but he admitted that this was not the case in most camps. He recognized that requiring these services represented an abuse that should be stopped.92

Looting of Civilian Property

When the government forced people to leave home for the camp sites, most took little if any of their property with them. Just as the process was beginning, governmental authorities visited Kabezi camp on September 29 and promised the people that when they were allowed to return home they would find their houses in the same condition as when they left them.

But within days looters had stripped many houses of their sheet metal roofs and of the most valuable items inside. The people of Kabezi camp were allowed to go home to fetch food and other supplies after one week in the camp. They found that the promise of security for their belongings had already been violated and that the roofs and other property had been taken from their houses. While looting happened quickly in some areas, in others it took place only months later. Residents of Maramvya and Muberure reported that their roofs were stolen along with other property only in January, 2000. In some cases, soldiers also burned or otherwise destroyed houses so that they would not be used for shelter by FNL combatants.93

As these areas had been emptied of people, there were few witnesses to the thefts, but camp residents accuse soldiers and their helpers of the pillage. They say that only the military could carry out such widespread pillaging of the countryside: they are the only ones with virtually uninterrupted access both to the area and to markets in the city, as well as the only ones with numerous vehicles available to transport the booty.94

People living in camps in Kanyosha, Mutimbuzi, Isale, and Kabezi communes said they saw soldiers driving vehicles towards the city that were filled with goods from the countryside. As one witness from Kabezi said, "We have seen trucks go by full of sheet metal, furniture, filled with stolen goods. . . pots and pans, mattresses, tables, and chairs." 95 According to camp residents, the metal roofing is often used to build stables for cattle of the rich and the household goods are sold on the black market in Bujumbura.96

In one exceptional case, residents of Kiyenzi-Kamutwe camp stated that they could actually see soldiers pillaging the homes on nearby hills. One witness explained that Kamutwe hill is higher than the surrounding hills, with an excellent view of the countryside, and that people had nothing to do except watch their houses being pillaged by the military.97

Representatives of international humanitarian organizations working in Bujumbura-rural have also reported the widespread looting in the province to Human Rights Watch researchers. Researchers from the Burundian human rights organization Iteka have also documented looting by soldiers in this region.98

Camp residents stated that some civilians, particularly the doriya-young helpers of the soldiers-aided the soldiers with the looting. One witness explained that these helpers were allowed to leave the camp in the evenings to remove sheet metal roofs and to collect the goods of value from inside the houses. They then bring the goods to designated places on the sides of the dirt roads to be picked up by soldiers the next day. His own house was pillaged with the door smashed in, his radio stolen, pots destroyed, and two mattresses gone.99 Some victims lost not just household goods but implements for farming or for their trades. One carpenter complained that his tools had been stolen as well as the finished furniture awaiting delivery to customers.100

Several men of Nyambuye camp reported that soldiers know which residents work at salaried jobs in town and so will be bringing home their pay at the end of the month. They "request" a share of the payment as the men return to the camp. Others complained that soldiers sometimes simply appropriated objects or articles of clothing that they liked.101

48 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, February 24; Mukonko, March 10

49 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 20, 2000.

50 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 7, 2000.

51 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, March 3, 7, and 20, 2000.

52 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 17, 2000.

53 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, April 24, 2000.

54 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 16, 2000.

55 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, June 2 and 5, 2000.

56 Human Rights Watch interview, March 25, 2000.

57 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura and Bujumbura-rural, May 11, 12, 13, 16, 18, and 19, 2000.

58 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 24, 2000.

59 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura and Bujumbura-rural, May 19 and 24, 2000.

60 Human Rights Watch interview, May 20, 2000.

61 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, June 2, 2000.

62 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, June 2 and June 5, 2000.

63 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 18, 2000.

64 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 12; Bujumbura-rural, June 14, 2000. 2000.

65 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura May 8, 10,12, 13, 16, 18, and 20, 2000; Kavumu, May 18, 2000.

66 Human Rights Watch interviews, Kavumu, May 18; Ruyaga, May 19; Bujumbura, May 16, 18, and 20.

67 Human Rights Watch interviews, Maramvya, February 10; Bujumbura, February 22 and 24, March 1, 12, and 13; May 20, 2000.

68 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, June 2 and 5, 2000.

69 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 20, 2000.

70 Human Rights Watch, Bujumbura, March 7, 2000.

71 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 20, 2000.

72 See below for distinction between camp for the displaced and regroupment camps.

73 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 20, 2000.

74 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 13, 2000.

75 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 13, 2000.

76 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 1, 2000.

77 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 7, 2000.

78 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, February 24 and March 12, 2000.

79 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 1 and 7, 2000.

80 Human Rights Watch interview, Mubone, March 6; Bujumbura, February 22 and 24, March 13, and June 2, 2000.

81 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, February 24, 2000.

82 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, June 2, 2000.

83 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, March 7, 2000.

84 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, February 22 and 24, March 15 and 20, May 16, June 2 and 5, 2000.

85 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, February 24, 2000.

86 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 3, 2000.

87 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, June 2, 2000.

88 Letter from residents of Nyabibondo camp to Monsieur le Ministre encadreur de la province de Bujumbura-rural, May 15, 2000.

89 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 16, 2000.

90 Human Rights Watch interviews, Bujumbura, March 3 and 12, 2000.

91 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, February 14, 2000.

92 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, May 18, 2000.

93 Human Rights Watch interviews, Maramvya, February 10; Bujumbura, February 24 and March 12, 2000.

94 Human Rights Watch interview, Kabezi, January 20, 2000; Bujumbura, March 7 and 12, 2000.

95 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 12, 2000.

96 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, January 18, 2000.

97 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, February 22, 2000.

98 Human Rights Watch interview, Kabezi, January 20, 2000; Ligue Burundaise des Droits de l'Homme Iteka, Bulletin d'Information, October-December 1999, p. 9.

99 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, February 22, 2000.

100 Human Rights Watch interview, Kavumu, February 12, 2000.

101 Human Rights Watch interview, Bujumbura, March 3, 7 and 20, 2000.