Alimata Coulibaly, Côte d'Ivoire

I didn’t plan to be a human rights defender.

I have a Master of Sciences in Accounting from Oklahoma University and the Certified Public Accountant Certificates. I worked for ten years with the Ralston Purina filial in Abidjan and for four years for the World Wildlife Funds.

In December 1999, my society was destroyed during the military coup, including all of our documents and equipment. During the military transition I was a financial consultant of banking groups.

My life changed drastically in October 2000, I looked around me and took conscience as a result of the fact that we have to face with dramatic situations which concluded with numerous mass-graves and other serious problems. Almost all, 98%, of the victims were foreigners or people from the north of our country.

“ Dioulas hunting” started.

‘Dioulas’ is a, pejorative term for a foreigner and also people from the north of Côte d’Ivoire.

Again, in January 2001 many military and civilian peoples were put in jail because of their names.

It was unsustainable to live with exclusion, injustice, impunity and terror. This inspired me to band together with other victims and the families of victims to fight for equal rights, denounce crimes and impunity everywhere in Côte d’Ivoire. That is why in June 18th 2001 we created the “Collective of Victims in Côte d’Ivoire ” ( CVCI ).

Now thousands of victims are members of CVCI:

* We organized dozens of conferences to denounce violations of human rights existing in Côte d’Ivoire. * We wrote dozens of declarations to denounce precarious judgements which lead to executions, wide spread torture, systematic rape by governmental forces, and other crimes and arbitrary acts of violence, also committed by government forces. * We organised the spouses of the political prisoners to fight against, arbitrary arrests and conditions of detention. * We had a sit-in protest in front of the gendarmerie camp “ Agban “, asking for justice, during the trial of the gendarmes who had caused and created the mass-graves of Yopougon. * We published: -“ Activités et Projets du CVCI “ on June2002

-“ Guerre en Côte d’Ivoire “ on December2002

-“ Marcoussis au secours de l’impunité en Côte d’Ivoire “ 2003 * We formalised our complaints in Belgium, against the highest authority of Côte d’Ivoire, for the first 150 victims of CVCI, who suffered tortures and crimes against humanity, since year 2000.

These complaints where declared “irreceivable” but today new opportunity appears to give us some guarantees. We plan to continue making these complaints again. Also, due to the current war situation in Côte d’Ivoire, I was interviewed by many international organisations and press agencies.

Now each day I am persecuted:

• CVCI offices have been destroyed.

• My family is in great danger. I would like my kids to be in a safer place

• Two of the CVCI members disappeared, during December 2002. We never saw them again. The police are the last place to go

• Men in uniforms, describing me and looking after me, have questioned small resellers in my neighbourhood recently; they feigned surprise as to my whereabouts and the questions.

I refused to let any death threats affect me. We have assisted these last 2 years, even before the start of the war, with many cases; numerous mass-graves in Côte d’Ivoire, preventing the extermination of youths being kidnapped on the basis of their names, people tortured to death or executed at the police stations by men in uniforms.

Now the biggest threat to victims are the “death squads” we are living with. They have the support of the authorities to kill with impunity.

Now, because of the “agreement of Marcousis” we are talking about sharing power between most the popular political parties, New Forces and Authority. I am now a Councillor at the Ministry of War Victims, called : “ Mnistère des Victimes, des Déplacés et Exilés de Guerre”.

I want to thank the Ministry for permitting me to accept your invitation to be at the conference for the sake of the work of human rights.

In Côte d’Ivoire : there are still major humanitarian problems, especially in the West, with potential for increased instability from Liberia. There has been progress in the North - however lack of basic social services remains a major problem.

Some other difficulties include:

Inadequate international attention to the crises, Low and inconsistent rates of funding response, Improving Donor Coordination to provide rapid support to operations, Improving humanitarian leadership and promoting a structured dialogue with political actors to reinforce conflict prevention in the respect of human rights.

We meet in the shadow of the death of Sergio Vieira de Mello, the other 21 UN staff, and the deaths of other human rights defenders. The death of Sergio Vieira de Mello was a grim reminder that even the official charged by the UN and representing 191 nations could be targeted and murdered for his work as a human rights defender.

I thank you for the opportunity you gave me to take part in the conference - for the incredible few days so thoughtfully arranged, so memorable because of the faces, stories, insights, so inspiring because of the shared passion for the sake of Human Rights. This wonderful republic of conscience is the most special place on Earth and these days have opened up a new area.

Coulibaly, Alimata

V. President of CVCI