World torture Day26th of June 2007Gbarlatuah, Zota District CVT Bong County started the celebration for the World Torture Day this year already 4 days before with introducing CVT’s programs in Bong County thru Jingle (tactic for creating awareness around CVT program) announcements on 2 radio stations. A catchy currently very famous Liberian song was underlying the program broadcast. The World Torture Day CVTLiberia Program in Gbarlatuah, Zota District itself started with a parade in front of the market place with our slogan Stand up, Speak out, Stop torture now at 11am!Approximately 80 people joined the parade (20 men, 35 women and the rest teenagers and children) and headed together with CVT staff to the school building up on a little hill on top of the Gbarlatuah Community. Part of the 80 people was community leaders and other authorities (head of community clinic etc).After arriving at the school building the Belefenai site manager opened the indoor program with an introduction of staff and further program points planned and was followed by the CVT clinician who presented the key note. The issues of:· Definition of Torture· Who perpetrates torture, · Purpose of Torture· Types of torture, · As well as torture as an abuse against a persons Human Rightswere shortly addressed during the key note as well as the importance of prevention which starts with everybody’s personal responsibility in not engaging in any kind of Human Rights abuse. A short moment of silence was given to community members who unfortunately did not have a chance to survive the atrocities committed during the civil crisis and were specially remembered. After the key note a 15 min scene of the movie “Seraphina” was shown. The movie was forbidden in Liberia until the new government came into place because of its content. The movie talks about Torture and Human Rights violation in South Africa during apartheid. A scene where “Seraphina” (the main character) was interrogated and psychologically and verbally threatened and tortured was shown, followed by a short scene of physical torture perpetrated against her. After this part of the movie was presented the relevance of the scene in a Liberian context was discussed. It was noticed that after the 15min show the audience was very much emotionally touched and needed some short moment to be able to engage in a discussion. Areas elaborated:An interesting discussion was triggered when one person stated that torture only was developed to find the truth. If people would not lie there would be no need for torture. In addition another person was concerned that programs like CVT’s today could lead to more criminal acts because community members would believe that people who do wrong (stealing, murder etc) would not be immediately punished because NGO’s like CVT advocate for Human Rights and a violent free Liberia. The group acknowledged these concerns raised and tried to peal off the various layers fo fears, concerns of these 2 statements looking into:· purpose of torture and who perpetrated torture in Liberia during the civil war· experiences during war in regard to “less” criminal behavior because of severe punishment/torture of community members· Who were the victims of torture during the civil crisis (criminals or innocent population?)· Why do countries have laws and law enforcement entities?· Make 2 wrongs a right? Can I torture/maltreat somebody who committed a criminal act? What is my responsibility as a community member and community leader?· Were people tortured and false confessions forced due to torture during the crisis? The group engaged in an very active discussion bringing up various examples experienced or observed during the Liberian civil war against the effectiveness of torture to gain truth. However not all participants doubts were eradicated during this activity nonetheless an environment of trust and safety was created by facilitators to make the airing of differing opinions possible. The discussion part was closed with an exercise (white cloths exercise/tactic used for prevention) where all people present vowed with a hand print on a white cloth that this hand is a symbol for them not to commit any kind of Human Right Abuse like torture in the future. The whole audience agreed that an experience like theirs during the cruel years of Civil War should never be repeated. The white cloths with all participants hand prints was passed on officially at the end of the program to the community commissioner to be placed in an public place for people to be reminded of their vow in the future.

Further discussions especially with the community leaders are encouraged to continue the discussion around Human Rights abuses.

(PS: CVT Bong County is in the process to add a comprehensive summary of activities together with pictures, short movies as well as jingle as soon as possible!)