Rights group Human Rights Watch on Tuesday urged Mali’s junta to free 10 people jailed for demanding a return to civilian rule, denouncing the “latest assault on the political opposition”.
The detained, which includes leading figures who signed a March declaration calling for the restoration of democracy, were arrested while holding a private meeting in the capital Bamako.
The junta has banned political party meetings as part of its ever-harder line on dissent since seizing power in 2020.
“Since the military coup, Mali’s junta has increasingly cracked down on peaceful dissent, political opposition, civil society, and the media,” HRW said in a statement.
“Instead of prosecuting political opponents, Malian authorities should protect everyone’s rights to freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly,” it added.
The rights group urged the junta to “immediately release and drop charges against all those wrongfully arrested.”
Lawyers for the 10 said they were accused of illegal gatherings and plotting against the “legal authorities.”
The opposition, known as the March 31 Declaration’s Opposition Platform, had denounced the arrests as “yet another violation of fundamental freedoms”.
Mali, which is battling insurgency as well as a separatist struggle in the north, has been ruled by military leaders since a double coup in 2020 and 2021.
The junta decreed in June 2022 that the military would cede power to civilians at the end of last March, after a presidential election scheduled for February, only to renege on the promise.