News From the Washington file: Western Hemisphere Human Rights Record Mixed, State Department Says
01 April 2003 By Scott Miller <a href=usinfo.state.gov>Washington File Staff Writer
(Most governments respected citizens' rights, though problems persist) (1040)
Washington -- The majority of governments in the Western Hemisphere respected the human rights of their citizens in 2002, though problems persist in many of these countries as well as in other nations that received poor evaluations in the Department of State's 2002 human rights report.
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Among the hemispheric nations that the State Department's "Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2002", released on March 31, ranked as having a poor human rights record were Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela, and Colombia.
As in Haiti, member's of Venezuela's security forces committed "numerous and serious abuses" in 2002. Despite improvements in some areas, the Venezuelan government's human rights records remained poor.
The report found that Venezuela's police and military committed extrajudicial killings of criminal suspects, with police allegedly linked to vigilante death squads responsible for dozens of killings.
Investigations into forced disappearances by security forces remained extremely slow, the report noted, and the government failed to punish police and security officers guilty of abuses.
Arbitrary arrests and detentions in Venezuela increased in 2002, and impunity was "one of the country's most serious human rights problems."
Police rarely arrested suspects, the report said, and when they did, often the suspects were soon set free. Crimes involving human rights abuses did not proceed to trial due to delays, the report added.
Government intimidation was another serious problem in Venezuela in 2002 as the president, officials in his administration, and member of his political party frequently spoke out against the media, the political opposition, labors unions, the courts, the Catholic Church and human rights groups.
Many persons interpreted these remarks as tacit approval for violence, and threatened, intimidated or physically harmed individuals opposing the government, the report found.
Immediately proceeding a temporary alteration of constitutional authority in April, the government of briefly deposed president Hugo Chavez abused its power by requiring television and radio stations to broadcast speeches favorable to the government and by cutting the transmission of television stations that refused to do so, the report said.
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The full text of Western Hemisphere section of the 2002 Human Rights Report is available at: www.state.gov
(The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: usinfo.state.gov)
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