KAMPALA: A Ugandan activist who was arrested and held “incommunicado” in Tanzania after attempting to attend a treason trial for an opposition leader has been found at the Ugandan border with “indications of torture,” a rights group said Friday.
Ugandan activist and journalist Agather Atuhaire was arrested earlier this week alongside her Kenyan counterpart, Boniface Mwangi, a prominent campaigner against corruption and police brutality in Kenya.
Atuhaire and Mwangi were among activists who went to Tanzania to show solidarity with opposition leader Tundu Lissu at the latest hearing of his treason trial on Monday.
Ugandan rights group Agora Discourse posted on X on Friday that Atuhaire had been found.
“She was abandoned at the border by Tanzanian authorities,” it said.
Its co-founder Spire Ssentongo said that “Agather is under the care of family and friends.”
“She was dumped at the border at night by the authorities and there are indications of torture,” Ssentongo added.
Police in Tanzania initially told a Tanzanian rights group that Mwangi and Atuhaire would be deported by air.
But Mwangi was also found abandoned on a roadside in northern Tanzania near the Kenyan border, according to the local newspaper Daily Nation.
“We were both treated worse than dogs, chained, blindfolded and underwent a very gruesome torture,” Mwangi told reporters on his return to Nairobi.
Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan said earlier this week that foreign activists would not be allowed to interfere in the country’s affairs.
She urged security services “not to allow ill-mannered individuals from other countries to cross the line here.”
Ugandan activist arrested in Tanzania found ‘tortured’ at border: rights group
Ugandan activist arrested in Tanzania found ‘tortured’ at border: rights group
- Ugandan activist and journalist Agather Atuhaire was arrested earlier this week alongside her Kenyan counterpart, Boniface Mwangi
- Atuhaire and Mwangi were among activists who went to Tanzania to show solidarity with opposition leader Tundu Lissu
Trump doesn’t want Americans hurt but blames Democrats: White House
- The White House described the shooting death of Alex Pretti by federal agents on Saturday as a “tragedy”
WASHINGTON: The White House said Monday that President Donald Trump did not want to see anyone hurt on US streets but quickly blamed Democrats again after anti-immigrant agents killed a second person in Minneapolis.
“Nobody in the White House, including President Trump, wants to see people getting hurt or killed in America’s streets,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.
She described the shooting death of Alex Pretti — whom a Trump aide had quickly and without evidence branded a “domestic terrorist” — by federal agents on Saturday as a “tragedy.”
“We mourn for the parents. As a mother myself, of course, I cannot imagine the loss of life,” she said.
But the conciliatory tone was short-lived. Leavitt quickly blamed the rival Democratic Party for unrest that has broken out since Trump ordered a surge in Minneapolis by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), masked and armed agents deployed in force against local wishes.
“This tragedy occurred as a result of a deliberate and hostile resistance by Democrat leaders in Minnesota,” Leavitt said, blaming Governor Tim Walz and Mayor Jacob Frey, both Democrats.
She accused elected Democrats of “spreading lies about federal law enforcement officers who are risking their lives daily to remove the worst criminal illegal aliens from our streets.”
She demanded that Walz, to whom Trump spoke by telephone on Monday, and Frey fully cooperate with federal agents and “turn over all illegal aliens” detained by local authorities.
Pretti had a permit to carry a gun, although video footage did not show him taking out his weapon before ICE agents appeared to shoot him multiple times.
Trump’s Republican Party long has defended the right to carry weapons virtually without restriction, and Leavitt said Trump supports the right to bear arms.
But she added: “Any gun owner knows that when you are carrying a weapon, when you are bearing arms and you are confronted by law enforcement, you are raising the assumption of risk, and the risk of force being used against you.”
“That’s unfortunately what took place on Saturday,” she said.
