Human Rights Watch documented the killing of more than 30 Guérés who had been unable to flee with their families; in the vast majority of cases, the Republican Forces shot elderly victims at point-blank range. Scores of other refugees interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they left behind elderly loved ones in other villages around Toulepleu and Bloléquin, suggesting that this death toll could be even higher.
A 21-year-old Guéré woman from a village near Toulepleu described how in early March, she, her family, and five other villagers were detained. She was raped, her husband was killed for trying to defend her, and others were executed:
The village was attacked by rebels [around March 7]. The loyalists [pro-Gbagbo troops] had been in the village for some time before, but they fled right before the rebels arrived. My husband, two children, and I hid in our house. The rebels found us and took us to the village chief's house, where we were held for around a week, together with five other villagers, including two women.A 67-year-old woman from Doké, where fighting between Ouattara and Gbagbo forces took place on March 13, similarly described to Human Rights Watch the execution of 20 Guéré civilians, the majority elderly men and women:
Every day they took someone out and shot him in front of the house. The rebels would enter, take the person out, and then a shot would be fired and the person never came back. On the fifth day I was raped inside the house by one of the rebels. He raped me right in front of my children. When my husband tried to defend me, they took him outside, fired a shot, and he never came back.
Soon after, something was flying overhead. It went over twice, and all of the rebels left the village. That's when I took my children and came across to Liberia.
I woke up to gunfire the first day that they attacked Doké. I was in my house, and when I heard the shooting I ran outside. The rebels caught me immediately. Some of them were in military camouflage; some were in t-shirts with military pants. There were military cargo trucks and 4x4s around town. Six of them trapped me along with four other people. They locked us in one of the bigger houses in the village. When they put us there, one said, "We didn't come here for you. We didn't come here to kill you."An 84-year-old man held in another house in Doké with six other Guérés described how on the fifth day of their captivity, uniformed members of the Republican Forces locked the one-room house in which they were being detained and then opened fire through the walls. Five of the seven captives died immediately, all of them over age 50, and the witness had three gunshot wounds in his left leg.
The second day, they brought more people to the house. Some of them were from the village, mostly other aged or sick people that couldn't flee. And then there were similar people from neighboring villages that they brought there. Altogether we were more than 30, more than 40 people even. We were all over 45 years old.
It was this day that they started to kill. The rebels pulled people out of the house and then executed them right in front. I could look out and watch it all. I was so surprised the first time, we all cried out knowing then we were going to die. They grabbed an elderly man - it was three of them that came in - they pulled him outside, told him to start walking away, and then shot him from two, three meters away. His body just went down to the ground. Then they came in and grabbed another person. That day they killed our village chief. They demanded 100,000 CFA [about US$210] from him, but he said he didn't have any money. They shot him three times; it was the third shot that killed him.
In total they killed more than 20 people that were held there. I saw them all with my own eyes. This was over three days; they killed some every day. A few they killed by slitting the person's throat with a machete, but most [killings] were by gunshot. They killed mostly men, but they executed a few women as well. We the old and the sick couldn't flee from war. What fight did they have with us?
Once I overheard one of them say to another rebel, "These are people we're going to kill. These are the Guéré who brought on this war." But other than that, they didn't speak to us. There were many of them that did the executions. It changed every day. New 4x4s of rebels were always coming through, bringing new people. Doké became their base as they were looking to attack Bloléquin.
After three days of killings, they brought some of the bodies together and burned them. The smell was horrible from all the decaying bodies outside the house.
They'd slammed my foot with a Kalash that first day, so my foot was really inflamed. A young rebel came to me because of my injury and said that I was to go into the bush and collect wood to cook for them later. He told his friend that I couldn't run away because my foot was so inflamed. They didn't realize I was still strong, that I knew if I stayed I would be killed. So when I went into the bush to get that wood I made my escape.
I was in the bush for two weeks, arriving here nine days ago. I still don't know where my husband and children are. They fled when the fighting started, and I don't know if they escaped. I ask new refugees every day, but I still haven't heard.
Pro-Ouattara forces left the village - which was briefly taken back over by pro-Gbagbo forces without a fight that day - allowing the man to escape with the other survivor. They found a car that took them to Guiglo, where the Red Cross treated him. Faced with another imminent attack by the Republican Forces in Guiglo, the 84-year-old man spent two weeks traveling more than 100 kilometers on foot to cross
No comments:
Post a Comment