Burundi's decision to restore legal status to a prominent activist group banned in 2009 is a positive step and should prompt further government actions to engage with civil society, Human Rights Watch has said. On 28 January, Interior Minister Edouard Nduwimana reversed a November 2009 order that had banned the Forum for the Strengthening of Civil Society (Forum pour le Renforcement de la Société Civile, FORSC). FORSC is an umbrella organisation that coordinates initiatives by Burundian civil society groups and has often criticised human rights violations by the government.

After living abroad as refugees for years – in some cases decades – many of the half-million people who have returned to Burundi since 2002 are having to cope with a severe shortage of one of the tiny country’s most precious commodities: land. 'The issue of access and entitlement to arable land on which to undertake subsistence farming and of securing shelter [for the returnees] ... are among the most acute hurdles which continue to confront returnees,' Hugues van Brabandt, associate external affairs officer for the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, told IRIN.

Ten years after the signing of an accord designed to move Burundi from civil war to democratic stability, the country has yet to establish transitional justice mechanisms aimed at enhancing reconciliation and bringing to book those responsible for crimes committed during the country's turbulent years. Human rights activists and political observers say the lack of these mechanisms - a truth and reconciliation commission and some form of criminal tribunal - had perpetuated a culture of impunity, allowing human rights violations to proliferate, especially by state organs such as the police and judiciary.