Rwanda security officials should stop abuse of street vendors

Marie, a street vendor in the Nyabugogo bus station in Kigali, told Human Rights Watch in April that she had been in Gikondo transit centre many times. She said police took her to Gikondo transit centre, beat her there and only released her after almost two weeks, following a plea from a soldier she knew.

Marie (not her real name) is just one of hundreds of street vendors who have been rounded up, arbitrarily detained and ill-treated in transit centres throughout Rwanda in recent years.