FOROYAA Newspaper (Serrekunda)

Gambia: UN Declares 'Chief Manneh's Detention Illegal'

The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has determined that The Gambia's arrest and continued detention of Chief Ebrima Manneh is unlawful under international law. The UN body calls upon The Gambia to release Mr. Manneh immediately.

This is in response to a petition filed by lawyers from Freedom Now and Horgan & Hartson LLP. This information is contained in a press release issued by Freedom Now. Freedom Now Chair Jeremy Zucker is quoted as saying: "We urge the Gambian government to release Mr. Manneh immediately."

Furthermore, the press release also quotes Senator Russ Feingold, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs, as saying: "If the Gambian government does not immediately release Manneh or provide information about his whereabouts, the international community should take action to make clear this is unacceptable."

Although seemingly not unprecedented, the Senate Appropriations Committee took an unusual step to aid a missing Gambian journalist - mentioning him by name in the report accompanying the fiscal 2010 State-Foreign Operations bill. The mention of Manneh's situation was added to the bill at the request of Majority Whip Durbin, who is a member of Senate State-Foreign Operations Appropriations. Senate appropriators said that the treatment of journalists, especially of Ebrima Manneh, "will be considered . . . in assessing continued United States

assistance for The Gambia." The Senate Appropriations Committee also said it noted with "concern the harassment of journalists and deterioration of press freedom in The Gambia," particularly the three-year "detention incommunicado" of Manneh, a reporter for the Daily Observer newspaper.

Ebrima Manneh is a Gambian journalist, who was working for the Daily Observer. Witnesses told the Community Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States that Chief Manneh was arrested on 7 July 2006 by security agents and imprisoned without process or trial. Though the evidence in court is that Mr. Manneh has been seen at detention centres, the Gambian government has not acknowledged his arrest or detention. On June 5, 2008, the community court issued a judgment declaring Mr. Manneh's detention to be in violation of international law issuing a binding order that The Gambia Government must release Chief Manneh and pay $100,000 in damages to his relatives. The Gambian government, which did not defend itself in the CCJ proceedings, has ignored the ruling.

Freedom Now works on behalf of Ebrima Manneh in seeking his release and Hogan & Hartson, an international law firm. Freedom Now is a non-profit, non-partisan organization that works to free prisoners of conscience.