Peter Tatchell outlines his plans to have President Mugabe of Zimbabwe arrested at the Commonwealth summit, on charges of torture under the UN Convention Against Torture 1984 and Australia’s Crimes (Torture) Act 1988
COMMONWEALTH SUMMIT, BRISBANE, 2002
President Mugabe has beefed up his security ahead of the Commonwealth summit in Brisbane in 2002, with his bodyguards under-going special Russian-backed training. He fears a repeat of my attempts to arrest him in London in 1999 and in Brussels in 2001. His fear is justified. I am going to Brisbane to seek to have him arrested. International and Australian law are on my side. Mugabe has broken the law against torture; I am endeavouring to enforce it.
Mugabe Must be Put on Trial
At the Commonwealth summit in Brisbane I will attempt to have President Mugabe arrested by the Australian authorities on charges of torture and crimes against humanity – under the international human rights laws that have been used to arrest the ex-Yugoslav President, Slobodan Milosevic.
Milosevic is under arrest. Mugabe will be next.
My two previous attempts in London and Brussels failed, but I will keep trying until Mugabe is in jail, which is where he belongs. My motive is to end his tyrannical, homophobic regime and ensure democracy and human rights for all Zimbabweans – black and white, gay and straight.
Mugabe knows what to expect from me. There are no surprises. My objective is to have him arrested under the UN Convention Against Torture 1984. I have nothing to hide. All my plans are in the open. Mugabe is the one who has to hide behind dozens of bodyguards because he fears being arrested and put on trial for human rights abuses.
I am not afraid of Mugabe or his henchmen. If he has me beaten up again, that will not save his regime. The international outcry would help hasten his downfall.
I will be acting alone, non-violently, and in cooperation with the Australian legal authorities. Why is Mugabe so afraid of me? My only weapons are words and the legal authority of international human rights law.
The Legal Case Against Mugabe
Australia, Britain and most other Commonwealth countries have signed the UN Convention Against Torture 1984. Under this Convention the signatory states pledge to arrest any person who commits an act of torture anywhere in the world. Australia has incorporated this UN Convention into its own domestic law, the Crimes (Torture) Act 1988. This is the legal basis for my bid to have Mugabe arrested by the Australian authorities. If they refuse, I will try to get a court order for the arrest of Mugabe. My actions will seek to enforce the international law against torture, which Australia has ratified and promised to uphold.
Amnesty International, with corroboration from the Zimbabwe High Court, have evidence that in 1999 Mugabe condoned the torture of two black journalists, Ray Choto and Mark Chavunduka of The Standard newspaper in Harare:
“Military interrogators beat both men all over their bodies with fists, wooden planks and rubber sticks, particularly on the soles of their feet, and gave them electric shocks all over the body, including the genitals. The men were also subjected to ‘the submarine’ – having their heads wrapped in plastic bags and submerged in a water tank until they suffocated”.
Amnesty International news release, 21 January 1999.
During his torture, Choto was told that Mugabe had ordered them to be tortured. Mugabe has since publicly refused to condemn their torture, and has tacitly endorsed it, suggesting that the two men got what they deserved.
I will be taking with me to Australia signed affidavits from Ray Choto and Mark Chavunduka, attesting to their torture by the Zimbabwe authorities. These affidavits will be presented to the Attorney-General, with a request that he authorise Mugabe’s arrest and trial.
Given this overwhelming evidence, the Australian government has a moral and legal duty to arrest and prosecute President Mugabe on charges of torture.
The Myth of Head of State Immunity
The claim that Mugabe has Head of State immunity, and therefore cannot be prosecuted, is a legal fiction. Under the UN Convention Against Torture there are no exemptions. No one is immune.
The Australian government, however, claims that Heads of State have absolute immunity from prosecution for torture under Section 5 (1) of the Crimes (Torture) Act 1988 and Section 3A of the Crimes (Internationally Protected Persons) Act 1976.
This interpretation does not stand legal scrutiny. It is customary law that international human rights statutes take precedence over domestic legislation. In other words, individual states – particularly those that have signed and ratified binding human rights conventions – cannot use national law to invalidate international legislation, especially where crimes against humanity are involved.
Over 50 years ago, following the Nazi atrocities, the Nuremberg Tribunal verdicts established the international human rights principle that nobody is above the law. This principle still applies. It has been recently reiterated in the case of Slobodan Milosevic. He was indicted for war crimes while he was still Head of State. It was recognised in his case that Heads of State do not have immunity from prosecution for crimes against humanity, such as torture. The indictment and arrest of Milosevic has created the precedent under which Mugabe can also be arrested and put on trial.
I expect Australia to uphold the Nuremburg principles and enforce the UN law against torture by arresting President Mugabe when he arrives in Brisbane.
Mugabe’s record of human rights abuses
Mugabe is the key person behind the current terror campaign in Zimbabwe. He is giving the green light to the torture and murder of black farm workers, white farmers and supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.
Mugabe has a long history of human rights abuses. As well as attacks on the lesbian and gay community, he is implicated in the massacre of up to 20,000 people in Matabeleland during the 1980s, restrictions on strikes and demonstrations, the intimidation of the press and judiciary, infringements of trade union rights, and police brutality against peaceful protesters.
In the single month of July 2001, the Amani Trust in Harare, which monitors human rights abuses, recorded 11 politically-motivated murders, 61 disappearances, 104 cases of unlawful detention, and 288 incidents of torture. Nearly all the victims were black opponents of the Mugabe regime, mostly supporters of the democratic opposition, the MDC.
Lesbians and gay men have been frequent targets of Mugabe’s wrath. He has denounced gay people as “sexual perverts”, “beasts” and “worse than dogs and pigs”. Rejecting calls for homosexual human rights, Mugabe says: “we don’t believe they have any rights at all”. Since his comments, lesbians and gays in Zimbabwe have been beaten, arrested, framed on trumped-up charges, and threatened with death.
Mugabe’s homophobic hate campaign began in 1995, when the human rights group Gays And Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ) was banned from exhibiting at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair. The following year at the Book Fair, GALZ members were attacked and threatened by government stooges, forcing them to flee.
In recent months, GALZ’s offices in Harare have been vandalised by pro-Mugabe vigilantes. They have ordered GALZ members to leave the country, threatening reprisals if they stay.
President Mugabe has got away with assaults on human rights for too long. The time has come for Australia and the Commonwealth to show him that he cannot terrorise his people with impunity.
If Slobodan Milosevic is to stand trial in The Hague, why shouldn’t Mugabe?