1/8/2025–|Last update: 02:37 (Mecca time)
Human Rights Watch noted the release of Burkina Faso authorities from 5 human rights activists and a human rights activist who had been forcibly sold in the army after criticizing the ruling military council in the country, and held them at the same time responsible for the continued disappearance of colleagues.
The organization said that although this development is “positive, their release highlights a tragic reality of the continued disappearance of others, some of them since 2024, without any information about their fate.”
On March 24, 2024, the Burkina Faso authorities were detained in the capital, Agagadougou, from “Gizoma Sanogo, Boukari and Oppa, and Phil Roland Zongo, who are members of the country’s journalists Association, alongside Los Baggilgim, a journalist working at BF1 private television station, after being convicted of the restrictions of the military council imposed on freedom of expression.
On April 2, the organization indicated that a video clip was circulated on social media showing Sanogo, Oppa and Baggilgim wearing “military uniform, which raised fears that they were forcibly recruited, while the recruitment of Zongo was not announced until after his release.”
On June 18, 2024, he also reported the disappearance of Califara Siri, a television commentator on BF1 channel, after his meeting with members of the Supreme Media Council, the organizing body of the media in Burkina Faso.
The organization reported that it was interrogated regarding a comment in which he expressed doubts about the validity of photos published to the President of the State, and in October last year, the authorities admitted that he was “recruited for military service, along with two other journalists, Serge Olun and Adama Bayala, whose fate is still unknown.”
On November 29, 2023, Lamine Wattara, a member of the Burkinabe Human Rights and Rights of Peoples’ Rights, was kidnapped from his home by civilian clothing who said they were from the National Intelligence Service, and those close to Wattara confirmed that he was forcibly sold.
Human Rights Watch says it has documented the use of the Military Council the broad emergency law to recruit critics, journalists, human rights activists and judges with the aim of silence them.
And considered that governments have the right to recruit adult civilians for national defense purposes, but this must be done according to a way to provide potential recruits “a previous notice of the military service period and a sufficient opportunity to challenge the recruitment order.”
The organization called on Burkina Faso authorities to release “immediately from all detainees illegally, and to stop using recruitment as a tool to suppress the media and critics.”