Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
08NAIROBI723
2008-03-14 07:43:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Nairobi
Cable title:  

KENYA HUMAN RIGHTS: PRELIMINARY FINDINGS OF UN

Tags:  PGOV PHUM PREL KE 
pdf how-to read a cable
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 NAIROBI 000723 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/12/2018
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL KE
SUBJECT: KENYA HUMAN RIGHTS: PRELIMINARY FINDINGS OF UN
HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS FACT-FINDING MISSION

REF: A. NAIROBI 277


B. NAIROBI 276

Classified By: Ambassador Michael E. Ranneberger for reasons 1.4 (b and
d)

---------
SUMMARY
---------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 NAIROBI 000723

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/12/2018
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL KE
SUBJECT: KENYA HUMAN RIGHTS: PRELIMINARY FINDINGS OF UN
HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS FACT-FINDING MISSION

REF: A. NAIROBI 277


B. NAIROBI 276

Classified By: Ambassador Michael E. Ranneberger for reasons 1.4 (b and
d)

--------------
SUMMARY
--------------


1. (C) Poloff met with representatives of the UN Office for
the High Commissioner Human Rights (OHCHR) investigative
team, which recently ended a three-week fact-finding mission
to investigate post-election violence in Kenya (ref a). The
representatives outlined the team's preliminary conclusions:
Rift Valley violence, in significant part, was organized and
premeditated, while violence in Nyanza and the Nairobi slums
was largely spontaneous. Police response in both cases was
found wanting by the team. These preliminary conclusions
generally comport with our understanding of the violence.
One conclusion worth noting: in spite of other UN-sponsored
investigations with contrary findings, the team found no
significant increase in gender-based violence. The team has
left Kenya and expects to submit its preliminary report to
the High Commissioner for Human Rights next week. The High
Commissioner is expected to make the findings public, and may
use the report as a basis to raise Kenya's case with the UN
Human Rights Council. End Summary.

--------------
Methodology
--------------


2. (C) The five-member OHCHR team spent the last three weeks
of February in Kenya visiting 10 locations in Rift Valley,
Western, Nyanza, and Central provinces. In each location,
team members spoke with local police and civilian
authorities, internally displaced people, and local elders.
They also visited hospitals. Team leader Roberto Ricci
explained his team's "Do No Harm" approach - a conservative
posture adopted as a result of previous experiences in Africa
where outspoken witnesses later turned up dead. The downside
to this approach, Ricci said, is that investigators do leave
some stones unturned.

--------------
Police Responses
--------------


3. (C) The team found contradictory evidence as to whether
police officials issued "shoot to kill" orders. The team

did, however, find preliminary evidence of police shootings
at close range and the use of excessive force on multiple
occasions. The team noted that further investigation would
be needed for each allegation to create a more definitive
conclusion. The team noted that police responses to violence
varied from highly organized and effective (the sealing off
of Nairobi slums was cited) to laissez-faire (in many areas
police did not respond to violence at all). The team also
found that police took little to no action to stop forced
evictions. Overall, the team found that police reactions to
the post-electoral violence have created a perception that
police only act to protect their own ethnic community.


4. (C) Because police officials failed to cooperate, the team
was not able to analyze the intelligence available to police
in planning their initial responses to the violence. The
team was also unsuccessful in attempts to meet with National
Security Intelligence Service (NSIS) officials. (Note: Other
contacts have noted increasingly poor relations between
police and NSIS authorities since the crisis erupted, which
have reduced intelligence flows to police and may have
negatively impacted police capacity to plan operations. End
note.)

--------------
Nature of the Violence: Spontaneous in Slums,
Organized in Rift Valley
--------------


5. (C) The team's general conclusion comports in many ways

NAIROBI 00000723 002 OF 003


with our understanding of the nature of post-election
violence. Violence in Nairobi's slums and Nyanza was largely
a spontaneous reaction to the sense that the presidential
election was stolen, but also to long-simmering issues such
as poverty, unemployment, and inequitable distribution of
resources. The team found that the Nairobi violence was
easier to contain because there were no significant efforts
to organize rioters or to give ideological meaning to the
violence. (Note: We have also heard through credible sources
that local small-fry political leaders organized violence in
these areas for their own purposes and without direction from
national leaders. End note.)


6. (C) The team concluded that a significant amount of
violence in the Rift Valley was planned in advance. The
team's conclusion was based on the coordinated nature of
attacks (26 separate Rift Valley villages were attacked
within 30 minutes of the announcement of presidential
election results),the similarity of tactics used in the
attacks, evidence that attackers were brought in from outside
the location of the attack, and the systematic dismantling of
houses in violence-affected areas. The team also found that
the sustained nature of the attacks in Rift Valley undercut
many or most of the claims by Kalenjin leaders that the
violence was a spontaneous reaction to the election.

--------------
Internally Displaced Persons:
Trends and Recommendations
--------------


7. (C) The OHCHR team visited 15 internally displaced persons
(IDP) camps. They observed that IDPs who left the camps
tended to move to "ancestral homelands" (Kikuyu to Central
Province; Luo and Luhya to Nyanza and Western Provinces,
respectively) rather than return to their recent homes. IDPs
who owned land remained close by, hoping to resettle, while
landless IDPs tended to return to their "ancestral
homelands", often on short notice with little information on
other possible options. The team will recommend that
temporary relocations to "ancestral homelands" should not
cancel the right to return.

-------------- --
Gender-Based Violence: Team Finds No Increase
-------------- --


8. (C) After a series of visits and interviews with survivors
of gender-based violence (GBV),the OHCHR team reached a
preliminary conclusion that GBV did not increase as a result
of the post-election violence. The team further concluded
that sexual violence had not/not been instrumentalized in the
conflict. The team noted a rise in sexual exploitation,
particularly in IDP camps, but differentiated this from GBV.
(Note: GBV in the post-election period has gotten wide media
coverage, mostly with anecdotal evidence implying an increase
in GBV. A recent GBV rapid assessment sponsored by other UN
agencies reached an opposite, preliminary conclusion: GBV had
increased and had become instrumentalized in the conflict.
Further studies will likely provide more definitive
conclusions about the incidence and nature of GBV in the
post-election violence. End note.)

--------------
Next Steps: High Commissioner to Decide
--------------


8. (C) The team expects to submit its preliminary findings to
the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, next
week. The parties to the Annan-led mediation process have
already agreed to the team's recommendations for land reform
and a mixed Truth and Reconciliation Commission with
international and Kenyan commissioners. The High
Commissioner is expected to publish the report, but has wide
discretion on the level of publicity to give it. Arbour
could decide that further investigations are warranted, but
would require Kenyan government approval. Arbour also has
wide discretion on what parts of the report, if any, to refer
to the UN Human Rights Council. If she decides to do so,
Kenya could face heightened international scrutiny and
possible censure.

NAIROBI 00000723 003 OF 003




--------------
Comment
--------------


9. (C) The OHCHR team's preliminary conclusions largely jibe
with our understanding of the post-election violence and
police responses to it. However, the team's finding that GBV
did not increase as a result of the crisis differs from other
UN-sponsored investigations and will certainly raise eyebrows
if included in the final report. While the High Commissioner
has the power to refer Kenya's case to the Human Rights
Council, she may decide against it, as the team's key
recommendations -- the formation of a Truth and Justice
Commission and a commitment to land reform -- have already
been accepted in principle by the parties to the Annan-led
mediation process. End comment.
RANNEBERGER