saying, “look, you’re not going to kill these people.” And the others who outnumbered the ones, who wanted to kill us, agreed and led us back to the minibus. In December, the decision by the government to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross into the police stations and gendarme bases was clearly accompanied by a high level decision to stop these forces torturing the detainees. A Dioula taxi driver who’d been dragged out of his house and later detained within the National Police Academy in December described this apparent change of policy:115 All the ones doing the beating were students. On several occasions when the yells and cries were too loud, an official would come into the room and tell the cadets to take it easy. But they always started in again after the officials had left the room. Early Wednesday morning [December 6], between 7-8:00 a.m., the director of the Academy addressed us in a group and said that we should no longer be beaten. He addressed himself to the police on duty and told them that when the next crew comes they should also be informed not to beat us. Later that day the white Red Cross people talked with all of us and asked for the phone numbers of our family so they could tell them where we were. Then on Thursday the Ivorian Red Cross came to treat our injuries. On Thursday or Friday a big man—I think he was the overall head of police—came and asked the cadets why there were so many wounded. The cadets told them that when we’d arrived at the Academy we were already injured. Two RDR supporters held within the Agban Gendarme Camp; the first in October and the second in December, described what appeared to be attempts to torture or kill them that were only coincidentally thwarted when senior officers happened on the scene. The first described his experience: At around 5:00 a.m. on Friday, October 27, 2000, two gendarmes came, unlocked the doors and told us all to come out of our cells and into the yard. As we were coming out of our cells—I was towards the back of mine and stood behind by the door—they chose five people totally at random and they said they were going to kill them. We started praying among ourselves so that they wouldn’t be killed. Then about ten minutes later we saw the two gendarmes coming back with the men. Later they [the five] told me that as they were walking away one of the officers came out of his office and yelled, ‘where are you going with these people,’ and one of the two gendarmes answered, “I’m going to show them something.” But the officer refused and ordered him to bring the youths back to the cells, which they did, complaining.116 The testimony of the second witness described a similar experience: On Friday, December 8 at around 1:00 p.m., a gendarme with two V’s [a sergeant] called me and nine others and told us to get into a truck. Most of us were bleeding and seriously wounded from the beatings. There were eight gendarmes on the truck, the most senior with two V’s. We headed north and on the way one of them said we were going to be killed and dumped, just like what happened to those found in the Charnier de Yopougon. Around Williamsville we were stopped by a Mercedes, and a gendarme in uniform with four or five bars and a radio got out of the car. He must’ve been a big man because they all saluted him. Then the officer started screaming at the ones who’d taken us saying, ‘Are you crazy? Where are you taking them? Don’t you idiots know 115 116 Human Rights Watch interview, Abidjan, February 7, 2001. Human Rights Watch interview, Abidjan, November 14, 2000. Human Rights Watch 59 August 2001, Vol. 13, No. 6(A)