Dozens killed, thousands maimed by police misuse of rubber bullets

Security forces around the world routinely use rubber and plastic bullets and other law enforcement weapons to suppress peaceful protests and cause horrific injuries and deaths, Amnesty International said today, in a new report calling for tighter controls on their use and global agreements. manage their trade.

Report, Ms Eyes explode, published jointly with the Omega Research Foundation, is based on research in more than 30 countries over the past five years. It notes how thousands of protesters and bystanders have been maimed and dozens killed by law enforcement’s indiscriminate and disproportionate use of weapons, including kinetic impact projectiles (KIP), such as rubber bullets, as well as those fired from rubber, and gas grenades tears aimed and fired directly at the protesters.

“We believe that legitimate global controls on the manufacture and trade of less-lethal weapons, including KIP, together with effective guidelines on the use of force are urgently needed to combat this growing cycle of abuse,” said Patrick Wilcken, Amnesty International Researcher. on Military, Security and Police matters.

Amnesty International and the Omega Research Foundation are among the 30 organizations calling for a The UN-backed Torture Free Trade Agreement to ban the manufacture and trade of heavy-duty KIP and other law enforcement weapons and to introduce human rights-based trade controls on the supply of other law enforcement equipment, including rubber and plastic bullets.

“The Torture Free Trade Agreement will prohibit all production and trade in existing law enforcement weapons and equipment, including dangerous or inaccurate single-point ammunition, rubber-coated metal bullets, rubber bullets and ammunition with multiple projectiles that cause blindness, serious injury and other deaths around the world,” said Dr. Michael Crowley, Research Associate at the Omega Research Foundation.

The misuse of low-impact weapons causes injuries around the world

The weapon has caused permanent disability in hundreds of cases and many deaths. There is an alarming increase in eye injuries, including rupture of the eyeball, retinal detachment and complete loss of sight, as well as bone and skull fractures, brain injuries, rupture of internal organs and bleeding, heart and lung punctures from broken ribs, damage to genitalia , and psychological trauma.

According to an evaluation by the National Institute of Human Rights of Chile, the actions of the police during the protests that started in October 2019 caused more than 440 eye injuries, with more than 30 cases of eye damage, or ocular rupture.

At least 53 people died from projectiles fired by security forces, according to a peer-reviewed study based on medical literature between 1990 and June 2017. It also concluded that 300 of the 1,984 people injured suffered permanent disabilities. The actual figure may be higher.

Since then, the availability, variety and deployment of KIP has increased globally, increasing the militarization of protest police.

The report found that national guidance on the use of KIP rarely meets international standards on the use of force, which state that their deployment should be limited to extreme situations when violent individuals pose a threat of harm to others. Police forces routinely break regulations with impunity.

In April 2021, Leidy Cadena Torres, then 22, was walking to a protest over tax reform in the Colombian capital Bogota, when he was hit in the face by a rubber bullet fired at close range by a riot police officer. He lost an eye.

“I didn’t know what was going on, so I took my phone and took a picture myself, but I couldn’t see it,” she told Amnesty International.

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“They try to hurt you in visible ways, like losing an eye, to scare people, to keep them from coming out. [and protest].”

The blind experience of Leidy Cadena Torres has been repeated with alarming regularity in similar situations in the countries of south and central America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the USA during recent and current protests.

Gustavo Gaticaa 22-year-old psychology student, blinded in both eyes after being hit in the face by rubber-coated metal pellets fired by police during an inequality protest in Chile’s capital, Santiago, on November 8, 2019. So far, no one has been held accountable. .

He recently told Amnesty International: “I felt water coming from my eyes… but it was blood.” He hopes that the injury will inspire a change, so that it does not happen to others, saying: “I give eyes so that people can wake up.”

In the US, the use of rubber bullets to suppress peaceful protests has become commonplace.

One of the protesters hit in the face in Minneapolis, Minnesota on May 31, 2020 told Amnesty International: “My eye exploded from being hit by a rubber bullet and my nose moved from where it should have been under the other eye. The first night I was in the hospital they picked up the pieces my eyes and sew them back together. Then they moved my nose back to where it should be and reshaped it. They put in a prosthetic eye – so I can only see out of my right eye now.

In Spain, the use of large, inaccurate rubber KIPs the size of tennis balls has led to at least one death from head trauma and 24 serious injuries, including 11 cases of severe eye injuries, according to Stop Balas de Goma, a campaign group. . In France, a medical review of 21 patients with facial and eye injuries caused by rubber bullets noted severe injuries including bone fragmentation, fractures and lacerations that resulted in blindness.

Amnesty International has also documented cases of tear gas grenades being aimed and fired directly at individuals or crowds in Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Gaza, Guinea, Hong Kong, Iran, Iraq, Peru, Sudan, Tunisia and Venezuela.

In Iraq, security forces deliberately targeted protesters with specialist grenades that are 10 times heavier than typical tear gas ammunition, causing horrific injuries and at least two dozen deaths in 2019. In Tunisia, 21-year-old Haykal Rachdi died after being hit in the head. by tear gas canisters in January 2021.

In Colombia, the security forces have deployed VENOM, a 30-barrel grenade launcher, originally developed for the US Marine Corps, to launch volleys of tear gas grenades at protesters.