Burkina Faso: Is Human Rights Watch an instrument of destabilisation serving french interests?
This Monday, May 12, Human Rights Watch (HRW) once again made headlines with a report accusing the Burkinabe army and the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP) of carrying out “ethnic massacres.” Yet another grave accusation, lacking verifiable evidence, in a long series of misleading reports aimed at tarnishing the image of a sovereign state engaged in an existential struggle against terrorism.
These repeated attacks increasingly resemble a systematic demonization campaign against Burkina Faso—particularly against the government led by Captain Ibrahim Traoré.
Hiding behind a façade of objectivity, HRW collects testimonies of dubious origin and reliability to push a single narrative: the automatic guilt of African states. These reports deliberately ignore the dire security context in which countries like Burkina Faso operate.
Even worse, they completely disregard the over 13,000 civilian victims who have fallen to terrorist bullets, choosing instead to target those who resist, those who fight back.
This stance is far from neutral. In reality, it reflects an ideological bias, with HRW serving the interests of Western powers—particularly France.
Rather than defending the self-determination of African peoples, this organization positions itself as a moral tribunal, echoing French agendas through slanted reports.
It implicitly promotes the idea that any African government asserting its sovereignty is an authoritarian military regime indifferent to human rights.
This modern colonial caricature is used to justify interference, diplomatic pressure, and smear campaigns.
Yet the facts speak for themselves. Since 2015, Burkina Faso has lost nearly 13,000 of its sons and daughters to terrorism. Where was Human Rights Watch while these populations were being slaughtered?
Did it ever conduct a serious investigation into these atrocities—many of which were committed under the passive, if not complicit, gaze of French soldiers stationed in the region? No. This deafening silence is a grim reminder of other tragedies on the continent, from Rwanda to the Central African Republic to Libya, where false reports paved the way for disastrous interventions.
In the face of such persistent hypocrisy, the Burkinabe people—like many others across Africa—will no longer be fooled. The time has come to firmly denounce this selective and deceitful human rights narrative.
Burkina Faso is fighting a war for its survival. Those who seek to criminalize its resistance under the guise of humanism are betraying their supposed principles, revealing their true role: sabotaging the emancipation of African peoples.
Souley LAMINA
