Criticism of Algeria’s New General Amnesty

On February 27th, the Algerian cabinet, with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika presiding, approved a “Decree Implementing the Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation.” The key provisions are Articles 44 and 45:

Article 44: Citizens who, through their involvement or their determination, contributed to saving Algeria and protecting the nation’s institutions, performed acts of patriotism.

Article 45: No legal proceedings may be initiated against an individual or a collective entity, belonging to any component whatsoever of the defense and security forces of the Republic, for actions conducted for the purpose of protecting persons and property, safeguarding the nation or preserving the institutions of the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria. The competent judicial authorities are to summarily dismiss all accusations or complaints.

Pursuant to the decree, an estimated 2000 Muslim insurgents convicted or suspected of committing terrorist acts during Algeria’s decade-long internal conflict — which led to the deaths of more than 200,000 civilians — will receive pardons or have their sentences reduced. The first group of insurgents walked out of Algier’s central jail last Saturday.

Although the decree was overwhelmingly approved by the Algerian people in a referendum last September, a coalition of four leading human-rights groups — Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Center for Transitional Justice, and the International Federation for Human Rights — have issued a joint statement criticizing the decree as “a major setback for human rights in Algeria.” The groups’ major concern is the amnesty’s scope:

The measures include a blanket amnesty to be extended to the security forces and seemingly also to state-armed militias, while widening previous partial amnesties for members of armed groups, all of whom have committed crimes under international law and other grave human rights abuses that so far have not been investigated. The government presented the law as “implementing” President Bouteflika’s “Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation,” which Algerian voters approved in a referendum on September 29, 2005. However, that charter did not expressly mention any amnesty for security force members.

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The text [of the decree] does not explicitly mention members of civilian militias armed by the state, the so-called “Legitimate Self-Defense Groups.” However, the phrases “artisans of safeguarding the… Republic” and “belonging to any component whatsoever of the defense and security forces” suggest that the amnesty in fact covers abuses committed by members of these groups.

The decree also provides an amnesty to members of armed groups who surrender or are in prison, as long as they did not “commit, or were accomplices in, or instigators of, acts of collective massacres, rape, or the use of explosives in public places.” However, these exceptions, no matter how appropriate, do not extend to other grave crimes, suggesting that armed group members who murdered one or more persons will go free as long as the killings were not collective in nature. The amnesty would also cover other grave crimes committed by armed groups, including torture and the abduction of persons whose fate remains unknown.

The groups also criticize the decree’s lack of specificity regarding the procedural mechanisms that will be used to determine who will — and will not — benefit from the amnesty:

Moreover, no details have been provided concerning the mechanism or process for determining whether armed-group members applying for amnesty are ineligible due to their implication in “collective massacres, rapes, or the use of explosives in public places.” Given the virtual lack of investigations into these crimes when they were committed, a thorough vetting process today to exclude their perpetrators from the amnesty would require much political will and resources from the state. The Civil Harmony Law of 1999 created a screening mechanism that operated arbitrarily and with a lack of transparency, resulting in de facto wide-ranging impunity for abuses committed by armed groups.

Finally, the groups point out that the decree not only ends prosecutions for past crimes, but also potentially criminalizes public debate about the internal conflict itself. Article 46 states:

Anyone who, by speech, writing, or any other act, uses or exploits the wounds of the National Tragedy to harm the institutions of the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, to weaken the state, or to undermine the good reputation of its agents who honorably served it, or to tarnish the image of Algeria internationally, shall be punished by three to five years in prison and a fine of 250,000 to 500,000 dinars.