The day the state unleashed terror

Seven years after Guinea soldiers fired at about 50 000 protesters, killed 156 and publicly raped women, the victims are still awaiting justice

ON THIS day in 2009, 156 people were massacred, more than 100 women would be raped and some 1 250 people injured by security forces during a citizens’ protest against their junta government at the Stade du 28 Septembre in Conakry, Guinea.

Witnesses said the elite Presidential Guard, commonly known as the Red Berets, were among the soldiers who arrived in trucks and lobbed tear gas at the 50 000-strong crowd, later opening fire as fear broke loose.

Although the Guinean government would deny giving the order to unleash terror on its citizens, an atmosphere of overwhelming panic rapidly took hold as protesters fled the stadium and tumbled into the streets where they were chased and shot at by troops.

If that was not terrifying enough, soldiers were then seen publicly raping women, executing individuals and going on a looting spree.

Human rights organisations agreed the rapes were a crime against humanity, and so, too, the bodies piled up in the street, the photographic evidence of which was later used to disprove coup leader Captain Moussa Dadis Camara and his government’s claims that only 56 people had died.

Since that bloodshed, dozens upon dozens of victims of the massacre and violence have filed complaints with the Guinean courts.

They are waiting for justice after the FIDH – International Federation for Human Rights, a global coalition of legal minds and activists – filed as plaintiffs in three large-scale national legal proceedings. The organisation stands side by side with about 500 people.

The junta government had come to power after a coup d’état on Christmas Eve 2008, with the military coup being announced just hours after the death of Lansana Conté, who had been in power in Guinea for 24 years of largely authoritarian rule. The protest was fuelled when junta leader Camara broke his pledge not to run in the next presidential vote due in January 2010. The Guinea government had banned any form of protest until October 2, and when thousands of activists and ordinary citizens gathered in the stadium, security forces moved in. Among those violently arrested was Cellou Dalein Diallo, the leader of the opposition Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea.

Seven years after the massacre, FIDH and the Guinean Human Rights Organisation also wanted to pay tribute and give a voice to these people and the thousands more victims of Guinea state violence.

The two organisations invited British photographer Tommy Trenchard to meet the victims to whom the organisations have been providing support since 2009. The final result, some portraits of which you can see here, is deeply powerful.

Trenchard’s exhibition Guinea: Waiting for Justice opened yesterday at the Franco-Guinean Cultural Centre in Conakry, and will run until October 28.

Panic rapidly took hold as they tried to flee the stadium and were chased and shot at by troops

Returning to the national stadium for the first time since she was arrested and abused by security forces on September 28, 2009. PICTURES: TOMMY TRENCHARD/FIDH “I was at the stadium and the soldiers arrested me and sent me to Camp Alpha Yaya Diallo...

At the point in the national stadium where he was trampled trying to flee from the massacre. “When I was at the stadium they started shooting gas. Then the Red Berets militaries came in. I was at the top of the stands when they started shooting. I...

Outside the national stadium where security force members raped her. “I was raped behind the stadium. Since then I can’t understand my life. I was breastfeeding and my husband abandoned me. My children can’t go to school and I can’t pay my rent.” –...

In the national stadium where she was attacked with an iron bar and her hand was broken. “Two policemen beat me with an iron bar and injured my hand. Afterwards I went to a doctor for treatment, but when my husband heard that I was at the stadium he...

At the entrance to the stadium where he was beaten by police. “They beat me on the head and it was five days before I could hear again from my right ear. It frustrates me that we still have no justice and the perpetrators are walking around freely.” –...