CARACAS Latin America's police and armed forces are the continent's biggest violators of civil and individual freedoms, leading Human Rights officials said at a conference here Friday. At a press conference marking the conclusion of a human rights forum here, Robert Goldman, vice president of the Inter-American Human Rights Commission called violations by military and police groups throughout Latin America a serious and widespread problem.

Goldman said there was an impressive level of impunity accorded to police organizations in the Hemisphere, and faulted the region's dictatorial legacy as well as the failings of the judicial branch. Among the violations commonly seen in Latin America include prison conditions, freedom of expression, violations of the rights of migrant laborers and indigenous groups. Commission president Carlos Ayala lamented the absence of organized, professional, well-equipped and well paid armed forces and police officials.

The prison situation in the region is an affront to human dignity, said Ayala, who said that as many as 70 percent of prisoners throughout the region have not been convicted of a crime. In particular, the commission singled out human rights violations in Argentina, the Bahamas, Chile, Mexico, Peru and Trinidad and Tobago. (AFP)