The creator fled to Germany earlier this 12 months, the second authorities critic to depart Uganda in lower than six months.
A Ugandan court docket has issued an arrest warrant for a world award-winning creator who fled to Germany final month to hunt therapy for accidents he stated had been inflicted on him throughout torture by safety personnel, his lawyer stated.
The warrant was issued on Wednesday.
In December, Kakwenza Rukirabashaija was arrested and held for nearly a month, then charged with communications offences associated to tweets that criticised President Yoweri Museveni and his son.
“It’s true the court docket has issued an arrest warrant for him,” his lawyer Eron Kiiza advised Reuters. “It’s only a continuation of his harassment as a result of the court docket might have chosen to strive him in his absentia, which is allowed, however they determined to disregard that possibility.”
After his launch in January, Rukirabashaija stated he had been tortured by safety personnel whereas in detention. Photographs of his physique confirmed torture marks, which provoked public outrage.
He advised native broadcaster NTV that he was punched within the abdomen, kicked, hit with gun butts and made to bounce endlessly, and that his torturers used pliers to tear items of flesh from elements of his physique.
Police have stated they can not touch upon the torture allegations since they had been a part of Rukirabashaija’s court docket case.
In February, he introduced he had fled the nation, ultimately arriving in Germany the place he stated he would search therapy.
Rukirabashaija is a satirist who discovered fame along with his novel Grasping Barbarian, which criticises corruption and political oppression in a fictional nation. In Uganda, the e-book was extensively interpreted to be a shot at Museveni’s authorities.
Final 12 months he gained the PEN Pinter Prize for Worldwide Writers of Braveness. He’s the second Museveni critic to flee Uganda this 12 months after Stella Nyanzi, a college lecturer, additionally introduced in January she had fled to Germany.