By Estrella Gutiérrez
CARACAS, Dec 8 1997 (IPS)

The Venezuelan government accused Human Rights Watch (HRW) of a “lack of rigour,” in response to denunciations of police abuse, extrajudicial executions and a “medieval” prison system in its latest report.

The president’s chief of staff, Asdrubal Aguiar, conceded that Venezuela had human rights problems. But he asserted that there were not enough concrete cases to enable an “X-ray” of Venezuela’s situation to be taken from “an office in Washington.”

Aguiar, the chairman of the National Human Rights Commission, defended studies by other human rights watchdogs like Amnesty International, which he said cited specific violations and put forth precise recommendations.

Released Dec. 4, HRW’s annual World Report, which covers human rights conditions in 65 countries, mentions “systematic abuses,” including torture, extrajudicial executions and a “disproportionate use of lethal force” by security bodies in Venezuela.

According to the report, at least 90 extrajudicial executions were carried out from January to August, while 300 cases of torture at the hands of police were reported – a situation accompanied by “impunity” for the majority of the perpetrators of such abuses with the help of an antiquated legal system which hinders timely, impartial investigations.

“On one hand it says several abuses were discovered, and on the other it cites reports of systematic abuse by police,” said Aguiar, who added that the few cases mentioned by the report “are being processed by the Commission.”

Police excesses – including summary executions – the impunity enjoyed by security agents who commit abuses and the appalling prison conditions in Venezuela are invariably mentioned in reports by both local and foreign-based human rights groups.

But Aguiar’s criticism of the HRW report was centred on the fact that such problems were described as part of a “systematic policy.”

He also took issue with the report’s assertion that Venezuela had taken a “disturbing” position with respect to the anti- landmine pact, and that it was one of the countries reluctant to sign.

“Venezuela not only signed the treaty” last week in Ottawa, but Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Burelli did so in order to enhance its significance, said Aguiar, a jurist who was involved with the Inter-American Human Rights Commission before joining the government of President Rafael Caldera.

HRW describes the country’s prisons as “overcrowded, understaffed, physically deteriorated, plagued with official corruption and rife with gangs and weapons,” and languishing in a state of continual crisis.

In one prison alone – of a total of 33 – 29 inmates were murdered, most of them shot, in the first nine months of the year, while a similar number were killed in an August massacre by a group of inmates in another penitentiary.

The human rights watchdog praised the creation of the Commission chaired by Aguiar, as well as the revocation of an outdated law on “vagrants and wrongdoers”, which allowed authorities to arrest anyone considered “undesirable” even though they had not committed any crime.

But HRW criticised the National Human Rights Commission’s lack of executive authority, and that it served simply as a link between government ministries and humanitarian organisations. Furthermore, it said, the Commission had only met seven times at the most.

Aguiar replied that the Commission met weekly, and explained that its lack of investigative authority arose from Venezuela’s constitution, under which the attorney-general’s office was solely responsible for investigating and processing reports of abuses.

He added, however, that the Commission studied the reports submitted by humanitarian groups on a daily basis, and that a special subcommission to that end had been created.

But HRW chairman Jose Miguel Vivanco “does not mention that, because his office is in Washington, and not Caracas,” said Aguiar, who maintained that the Chilean lawyer “coldly issued from his desk” generalisations based on a couple of reports of abuses.

Vivanco visited Venezuela twice this year: to present a special report on the prison system in February and to attend an Iberian American forum on human rights in July, which was coordinated by Aguiar.

HRW makes use of data provided by human rights organisations in Venezuela, particularly the Support Network, which puts special emphasis on police activity and the prisons.

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