Nairobi
(AFP) - Kenya's High Court suspended key parts of a controversial new national
security law Friday that the opposition had warned risked turning the east
African nation into a dictatorship.
High
Court Judge George Odunga announced that eight sections of the new
anti-terrorism law would be suspended because of human rights concerns.
The
move follows a legal challenge by Kenya's opposition, with its leader Raila
Odinga saying the ruling "marks a great day for Kenya".
"Everybody
feared that we were going back to those dark days of torture and
dictatorship," Odinga said. "What has been done today is very
historic. You cannot compromise the security of Kenyans."
The
security bill was passed by parliament last month after a chaotic debate marked
by brawls between governing coalition and opposition MPs, and was signed into law
by President Uhuru Kenyatta.
It
hands Kenyan authorities sweeping powers, including the right to hold terror
suspects for nearly a year without charge, and threatens journalists with up to
three years behind bars if their reports "undermine investigations or
security operations relating to terrorism".
Armed police look out during a
memorial ceremony to mark one year since the Westgate terrorist attac …
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Threat to journalists -
The
eight clauses suspended by the High Court include the threat to imprison
journalists if they publish "insulting, threatening, or inciting material
or images of dead or injured persons which are likely to cause fear and alarm
to the general public", or "any information which undermines
investigations or security operations."
This,
said High Court Justice Odunga, "limits the freedom of expression".
Also
suspended is the right for the prosecution to withhold certain evidence and a
150,000 ceiling on the number of refugees allowed into Kenya -- which would
have led to the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Somalia,
South Sudan, Sudan and other conflict-hit countries in the region.
"In
respect to the limiting the numbers of refugees to a maximum of 150,000... such
amendments contravene international conventions and instruments," Justice
Odunga said.
New
definitions on what constitutes inciting and aiding terrorism, as well as
police surveillance powers, have also been shelved.
The
government argues the measures are necessary to confront a wave of attacks by
Somalia's Al Qaeda-affiliated Shebab insurgents, and that amendments giving the
courts more oversight over the police and intelligence services make it
constitutionally sound.
The
Kenyan government has been under pressure to get tough on terrorism since 67
people were killed in September 2013 in a Shebab attack on the Westgate
shopping mall in Nairobi.
Kenya's
interior minister and police chief were also pushed out of their jobs last
month after the militants carried out two massacres in the northeast of the
country.
The
Shebab say the attacks are retaliation for Kenya's decision to send troops into
Somalia in 2011 to fight the militants. Kenyan troops are part of an African Union
force battling the militants and supporting the war-torn country's
internationally-backed government.
