…call on the United Nations’ Human Rights Rapporteurs and the International Criminal Court to intervene, investigate and hold armed state actor and armed non-state actor perpetrators accountable
…urge the incoming Trump Administration to adopt the Reports as working document on human rights and international development partnership policies on Nigeria and its Government
A group of international respected persons and scholarly experts including serving and retired academic professors, doctorate degree holders from various academic disciplines, Catholic Priests and Pastors of international Christian religious standing, local and international human rights and humanitarian experts, democracy and rule of law advocates, etc., have risen and thrown a strong weight behind the two recent special international reports, unveiled by ‘Expert-Leaders’ of the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety). The two Reports unveiled on Sunday, December 22, 2024, in Enugu contained shocking and chilling revelations regarding the “warzone” situation in Eastern Nigeria particularly in the South-East, covering August 2015 to December 2024.
The Reports, titled: “Ocean Of Innocent Blood Flowing In Eastern Nigeria: 282 pages” and “Human Rights Made In Nigeria: 154 pages”; “is a catalogue of the armed state actor and armed non state actor atrocities in the East since August 2015 or in the past nine years and four months (August 30, 2015-December 31, 2024); during which the Nigerian Security Forces (NSFs) unlawfully killed 32,300 defenseless citizens including the abducted and disappeared; tortured and bodily lacerated tens of thousands; burned down or razed 6000 civilian homes valued at over N450billion; raided 300 defenseless Igbo communities; sacked their 180,000 inhabitants; and frightened and forced over 1million others to flee their homes”.
“…During which Government-linked and non-Government linked armed non state actors killed over 14,500 defenseless citizens, abducted over 65,000 others and forced estimated 55,000 of them to pay ransoms estimated at over N500billion and extra N50billion realized from sold millennium cars seized from the abducted victims; and razed or burned down civilian properties valued at over N60billion and aided by biased Nigerian Security Forces to influx and proliferate estimated 2.7m illicit Small Arms and Light Weapons across Eastern Nigeria”.
The Intersociety’s Special Reports further “catalogued and exposed massive arbitrary arrests, perpetual detentions arising from uninvestigated and un-triable phantom allegations, kangaroo arraignments, late night abduction and face-bagging of unarmed Igbo civilians to secret military detention facilities in northern Nigeria, torture and bodily lacerations, open killings, secret, extralegal and extra jus executions, innumerable cases of enforced disappearances and the victims’ dead bodies’ criminal interments; perpetual concealment of the arrested and abducted citizens’ whereabouts and denial of access to their families, lawyers and physicians; invasion and wanton destruction of civilian dwelling houses; indiscriminate resort to false labeling, mass criminalization, class stigmatization, ethnoreligious profiling, hate and discriminatory policing and soldiers, selective and discriminatory law enforcements and their operations, flagrant resort to prosecutorial vindictiveness and hearsay conclusions, unchecked and untamed military and police roadblock and barrack-extortions and other corrupt practices including monetization and commercialization of criminal investigations and prosecutions and crime detections and controls, etc.; all of which had arisen from the military siege and terror in Eastern Nigeria since August 30, 2015 or past nine years and four months-using “IPOB/ESN/Biafra Terrorism” as a pretext.
It is also part of the Intersociety’s Reports’ findings that: “(1)out of every fifteen citizens accused of being “seriously involved in Biafra/ESN/IPOB Terrorism” in the South-East, fourteen are most likely to be innocent or falsely labeled (note that no law in Nigeria or any part thereof permits security personnel or any of them to kill unarmed citizens under the use of force rule and proportionality of same); (2) out of every fifteen citizens arbitrarily arrested and detained without trial in connection with the above spurious charges”, fourteen are most likely to have been arbitrarily arrested and detained outside the law without trial; (3) out of every fifteen persons killed in the open by the military or police crack squads in connection with the same, thirteen are most likely to be defenseless and unarmed; (4) out of every fifteen unarmed citizens arrested alive, detained and tortured or starved to death in detention over the above, the same number (fifteen) are most likely to be defenseless, innocent and unarmed. (5) Out of every fifteen unarmed citizens abducted outside their family knowledge and official records by soldiers or military personnel over “Biafra/IPOB/ESN Terrorism”, fourteen are most likely not going to come back alive and; if arrested by DSS and their likes, ten run the high risk of being tortured and killed in custody; (6) out of every fifteen unarmed citizens arrested by police crack squads over the above, seven run the high risk of not returning to their families alive; (7) out of every fifteen civilian houses or homes burned down or wantonly destroyed by military personnel or police crack squads, the same number (fifteen) are most likely not linked to ‘military necessity’; (8) out of every fifteen criminal allegations such as “involvement in ESN/Biafra/IPOB terrorism”; leveled against members of indigenous South-East and Igbo South-South civilian population, fourteen most likely do not to have anything in connection with the so called “ESN/Biafra/IPOB-terrorism” or linked to ‘military matters or necessity. All the above is in addition to the fact that 95% of police or military or spy police-issued security intelligence information and law enforcement operations’ reports in the South-East and the South-South are highly questionable and most likely to be concocted or twisted or falsified”.
We hereby call on the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions; the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Religious Freedom; the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders; the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights of the Internally Displaced People; the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Arrest and Detention; the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing (anti-Domicide); the UN Special Rapporteur on Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Office; the UN Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, New York, USA and the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to urgently intervene, investigate and identify and hold armed state actor and armed non-state actor perpetrators involved accountable and sanction those public office holders, aiding, abetting and sponsoring them appropriately.
We also urge the incoming Trump Administration in the United States to adopt the Reports as a working document on the assessment of Nigeria’s human rights records and the USA’s future international development partnership with the Government of Nigeria. The incoming Donald Administration is particularly called upon to ensure that the Government of Nigeria is compelled to respect the International Freedom of Worship or Belief, or risk being enlisted in the “Country Of Particular Concern (CPC)” under “the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) of 1998”.
In line with the Intersociety’s seventy-six recommendations contained in its Special Reports, we are calling on Nigeria’s International Development Partners including Member-States of EU, the United States, the United Kingdom and the Canada to: 1. Critically study the Reports and have them reflected in future development and defense, security and safety supports or aids as well as supports for promotion of democracy, rule of law, human rights and humanitarian assistance to Government of Nigeria and ensure that such supports or aids are not channeled into “instruments of violence or state terror and persecution” against defenseless members of the Eastern civilian population and their properties particularly on the grounds of faith or religion and ethnicity.
They are further urged or called upon to particularly ensure that such development assistance and human rights and humanitarian supports amounting to billions of dollars yearly are not channeled into extrajudicial killings, abductions, torture and other cruel treatments, enforced disappearances, civilian house burnings, false labeling, class criminalization, ethnoreligious profiling and persecution, prosecutorial vindictiveness and hearsay conclusions, etc., targeted at defense Eastern civilian population and their defenseless properties. The Government of Nigeria shall be compelled to frontally address pandemic and endemic corruption in the country’s security (military, police and secret police) sector and digitalize law enforcement operations including preventive, detective, investigative policing and crime detection; all of which have become a modern trend around the world for more than ten years. It must further be noted that “Digital Policing/Security” has become the speediest way by which struggling countries have leveled up with advanced countries because it is quantitative, qualitative, cheaper, available, avoidable, less corrupt, human rights and rule of law friendly and importable or exportable.
Signed:
Mazi Luke Nwannunnu, (Forum Coordinator)
Chairman, Igbo Genocide Survivors’ Committee
Ekwenche Research Institute and Organization
Chicago, Illinois, USA
Prof Justin Akujieze, Renowned Physicist
Board Chairman, Ekwenche Research Institute and Organization
Chicago, Illinois, United States
Father Ignatius Nwankwocha
Chair, Home Affairs, Ekwenche Research Institute and Organization
Chicago, Illinois, United States
Nze Amadiebube Mbama
Renowned International Financial Expert/Consultant
Chair, Global Igbo Leaders (GIL), United States
Chief John (Ugonna) Gregg (American)
International Human Rights and Democracy Campaigner
United States of America
Mr. Bernhard Wanner (Swiss)
Sustainability and Quality System Manager
International Human Rights Campaigner
Zurich, Switzerland
Dr Ahamefule, Festus, BSc., M. D,Dph.
Madrid, Spain
Mazi Oluchi Ibe
Political Analyst/Writer
Washington DC, United States
Mazi Udeh Christian Iwuagwu
FCCA, Financial Analyst
London, United Kingdom
Dr James Achike
Design Technologist/Strategic Planner
Vienna, Austria
Austin Okeke Esquire
President, Igbo Board of Deputies International
South Africa
Prof Jerry Chidozie Chukwuokolo
University Don and Frontline Human Rights Advocate
Enugu, Enugu State, Nigeria
Engineer Ikenweoke Nwandu
Computer Security Expert and Leading Human Rights Advocate
Enugu, Enugu State, Nigeria
Comrade Aloysius Emeka Attah, M.Sc.
Human Rights Advocate and Chair, South-East CLO
Onitsha, Anambra State, Nigeria
Father Dr. Tobe Nnamani
Lecturer, Catholic Social Teaching-Bigard Memorial Seminary
ED, Peoples’ Creative Empowerment International
Enugu, Enugu State, Nigeria
Sir Ifeanyi Ejiofor Esq (KSC)
Chief Counsel/Principal Partner
I.C. EJIOFOR & CO., Abuja and Nnewi, Nigeria
Rev Ifesinachi Jerry Ifeacho (Pastor)
Chairman, Billie Human Rights Initiative
United Kingdom
Dr. (Chief) Sylvester Onyia
President, American Military Veterans of Igbo Descent (AVID)
United States of America
Dr (Sir) Festus Okere
President, World Igbo Congress (WIC)
Houston, Massachusetts, United States
Prof Chijioke Uwasomba
Department of English, Obafemi Awolowo University
Ile-Ife, Osun State, Nigeria
Father Emefiena Ezeani, PhD
Catholic Priest and University Lecturer
Unubi, Anambra State, Nigeria
Links to the Special Reports:
Ocean Of Innocent Blood Flowing In The East:
https://intersociety-ng.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/NIGERIA-OCEAN-OF-INNOCENT-BLOOD-FLOWING-IN-THE-EAST-oringinal_11zon.pdf
Executive Summary to the Report:
https://intersociety-ng.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Executive-Summary-Of-Ocean-Of-Innocent-Blood-Flowing-In-The-East.pdf
Human Rights Made In Nigeria:
https://intersociety-ng.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/HUMAN-RIGHT-MADE-IN-NIGERIE_compressed.pdf
