NEWS > 10 December 2007

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Reuters South Africa - Johanne
10 December 2007

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Nigerian police a threat to pu

Nigerian police are a danger to public safety because they consider extra-judicial killings an acceptable policing method and raping women as a fringe benefit, a report by a Nigerian civil rights group said.

The Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN) said it had monitored 400 police stations in 13 states for a year and found that killings, torture, extortion and rape had become routine because the authorities shielded policemen from the law.

The findings, reported in Nigerian newspapers on Monday, come after chief of police Mike Okiro said last month his men had killed 785 armed robbery suspects in his first three months in office. His comments drew criticism from Human Rights Watch.

Okiro was promoted a few days after the announcement. He has defended the killings as an appropriate response to frequent armed robberies. Nigerian police have been killing suspects at a similar pace for several years, its own statistics show.

The police deny that they practice torture, although former president Olusegun Obasanjo once recognised that they did.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, returned to civilian rule in 1999 after three decades of almost continuous military dictatorship. Human rights groups say the security forces have yet to shed the habits they picked up during the years of army rule.

"President Umaru Yar'Adua's commitment to the rule of law rings hollow as long as his administration takes no steps to bring an end to the epidemic of police killings and other abuses," said NOPRIN's co-ordinator Emeka Nwanevu.

"A police force that kills this number of people cannot guarantee public safety."

U.N. experts have said the police often open fire when there is no reason to, get away with murdering innocent people by labelling them "armed robbers" and torture suspects by shooting them in the legs and letting their wounds fester.

NOPRIN said it had found rapes by policemen were on the increase. It quoted a policeman interviewed in Lagos as saying he considered that raping sex workers was "one of the fringe benefits attached to night patrol".

The group said low pay and poverty among junior officers were major contributing factors to such behaviour but did not excuse it. It accused the government of turning a blind eye.

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Article sourced from

Reuters South Africa - Johanne10 December 2007

Nigerian police a threat to pu

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Reuters South Africa - Johanne
10 December 2007