Guinea massacre officer promoted during appeal

Guinean civil society groups have criticised the promotion of police colonel Bienvenu Lamah after his acquittal over alleged involvement in the 2009 stadium massacre was appealed.

Lamah was appointed brigadier general in the national gendarmerie by a decree from President Mamady Doumbouya on August 3, one week after a court in Conakry ordered his release and acquitted him of charges including complicity in abuse of authority, murder, abduction and unlawful detention.

The International Federation for Human Rights, or FIDH, said Thursday that civil parties had appealed the acquittal. Drissa Traore, FIDH secretary-general and a lawyer for the civil parties, called the promotion an affront to those parties.

Alpha Amadou DS Bah, president of the Guinean Organisation for the Defence of Human and Civil Rights, accused Doumbouya of rewarding a person accused of acts classified as crimes against humanity before the judicial process had concluded.

A UN-mandated international commission of inquiry said at least 156 people were killed at an opposition rally at a stadium in the Conakry suburbs on September 28, 2009. It said hundreds more were wounded, at least 109 women were raped and detainees were tortured.

FIDH said Lamah had been stationed at the Kaleyah military training centre at the time of the massacre, which it said reportedly served as the starting point for recruits involved in violations at the stadium.