Amnesty urges Nigerian govt to release panel’s report on rights abuses

Amnesty International on Friday urged the Federal Government to release the reports on alleged rights abuses by security agents in the country.

The government had in 2017 set up a presidential panel to investigate the allegations of extra-judicial killings, rape, torture, and enforced disappearances by the military and other security agents.

Amnesty had accused the security forces of extra-judicial executions of 500 Shiite members and pro-Biafran supporters between 2015 and 2016.

To the chagrin of Nigerians and the international community, the findings of the panel have not been made public three years after it completed its assignment.

READ ALSO: Protect your freedom of expression, Amnesty Int’l tells Nigerians

Worried by the development, the rights watchdog in a statement issued by its director in Nigeria, Osai Ojigho, described the non-release of the report by the federal government “a gross display of contempt for victims.”

Ojigho said: “Victims and the larger public in Nigeria deserve to see and scrutinise the findings.

“We are calling on President Muhammadu Buhari to fulfill the promise he made in 2015 to end impunity by immediately releasing the report.”

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