Arbitrariness of the vice squad infringes peace agreement and human rights

The continuation of the "Trousers case” against the Sudanese journalist Lubna Hussein in Khartoum today, Monday, has been criticised sharply by the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfnV) as "discrimination against women by the highest judicial authority”. "The case in which the reporter is charged with wearing trousers has also an important political dimension since it infringes the peace agreement between North and South Sudan”, said the GfbV Sudan expert, Ulrich Delius. "The security laws on which Lubna Hussein and other women were arrested offend the spirit of this agreement of January 2005.” The Sudanese government has not to the present day carried out its obligation to finally abolish these security laws. The trousers case is then an indication of just how badly the peace process in Sudan is progressing.

Lubna Hussein is not the only one. Hundreds of poor women are sentenced to a lashing every year by incompetent special courts for supposedly infringing public morals”, reported Delius. It is only a few who have the courage to contradict the finding of the court and like Lubna Hussein to apply for a proper court hearing. On 26th March 2009 two Christian students from South Sudan were picked up by the vice squad on the street in Khartoum and brought to the police station for wearing trousers. Three days later they were fined by a special court although according to the peace agreement they should not be discriminated in Arab North Sudan on account of their faith. Two Ethiopian women were punished with 40 lashes because they could not pay the fine.

The women were punished on the basis of Article 151/152 of the Sudanese penal code and the security laws passed by all federal states of Sudan. "These laws contravene Article 5 of the African Charter of Human Rights, which forbids all cruel and inhuman punishment”, said Delius. The ones most affected by the far-reaching Moslem moral precepts are the Christians from South Sudan, who have grown up in a different culture and atmosphere and who feel themselves discriminated by the regulations concerning dress.

At least 1.3 million South Sudanese refugees are living in the area of the capital of Khartoum. Since each federal state interprets the security laws differently there is no legal security for the people. For this reason arbitrariness is widespread. In addition to this those standing before the special courts have no possibility of defending themselves properly.

Ulrich Delius can be reached at u.delius@gfbv.de