Amnesty International's Secretary General, Irene Khan,...

Amnesty International's Secretary General, Irene Khan, declared in a press release in Bujumbura that the Government of Burundi must lift the blanket of impunity and take effective action to end the escalating pattern of killings of civilians by the armed forces. Speaking at the end of an official visit to Burundi, Irene Khan said that the military commanders of units suspected to be responsible for human rights violations must be suspended pending full and independent investigations to establish individual responsibilities for such killings. Irene Khan welcomed the assurances from the Government of Burundi to prosecute the military commanders responsible for the massacre in Itaba Commune, Gitega province. "For the sake of the women, children, and men who were killed brutally in Itaba, the words of the Government must now be matched by action", she added. "Previous promises by the authorities to investigate massacres and bring those responsible to justice have seldom materialised. Predictably, this has bred a culture of impunity that is manifested in a cycle of killings, of which Itaba is only a recent dramatic and tragic example. Sadly further killings of unarmed civilians have taken place since".