Yearbook 2010
Equatorial Guinea. In January, seven Nigerians were each
sentenced to twelve years in prison and high fines for
participating in an armed attack on the presidential palace
in 2009. In August, four former high ranking military and
civil servants were sentenced to death for lying behind the
same attack. According to Amnesty International, they were
executed less than an hour after the judges fell, without
being given a chance to appeal. Amnesty also claimed that
the men were fleeing Benin when the attack was carried out
and that they were robbed from there in January by
Equatorial Guinea's security service.
According to
COUNTRYAAH, Equatorial Guinea
has a population of 1.309 million (2018). A large number of human rights groups from around the
world objected to the UN's international cooperation in
education, science, culture and communication (UNESCO)
deciding to award a prize named after Equatorial Guinea's
dictator Teodoro Obiang Nguema for five years. He himself
had financed the price of a total of 1.5 million US dollars
and stated that it would accrue to people who, through
scientific evidence, have contributed to raising people's
quality of life. The human rights groups urged UNESCO to
find out where the money came from. Obiang, one of Africa's
most brutal one-ruler rulers, has for many years been
accused of confiscating most of the country's large oil
revenues.
In a US TV interview, Obiang promised greater
transparency in the oil industry in Equatorial Guinea,
social reform, investigation of suspected human rights
violations and the opportunity for the International Red
Cross Committee to work in the country.
But the promises didn't help. In October, UNESCO decided
to shelve plans for an Obiang Prize. The regime in
Equatorial Guinea protested in vain that the organization
had been led by a "disinformation campaign".
A French court in November decided to approve a lawsuit
filed by Transparency International (TI) against President
Obiang. Prosecutors are investigating whether - as TI claims
- he has used the equivalent of close to SEK 40 million of
state funds to buy cars for himself in France.
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