Tanzania must stop forced evictions of Maasai: UN watchdog

Filed 46m ago · Via Courthouse News · The Buffoon Desk

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Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

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The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination said Friday that Tanzania must halt forced evictions of Maasai people and address reported abuses, citing arbitrary arrests, intimidation, and racially motivated excessive force by law enforcement.

The committee flagged restrictions on grazing land, water and cultural sites in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, alongside deteriorating health, education and water services, which it said have pressured Maasai to relocate.

Tanzania has described the relocations, which began in 2022, as voluntary, citing a population rise in Ngorongoro from 8,000 in 1959 to more than 100,000 today. The committee's recommendations are nonbinding but carry reputational weight.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

Calling a relocation 'voluntary' while critics document arbitrary arrests of the people declining to relocate is the kind of word choice that does a lot of quiet work. The UN's rebuke has no teeth, which is presumably why it was issued in a statement rather than enforced with anything.

Source: Read the original at Courthouse News → Scored: Trio for Piano, Cello, and Clarinet · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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