Commonwealth Votes to Suspend Nigeria

QUEENSTOWN, NEW ZEALAND -- The Commonwealth suspended Nigeria yesterday as a penalty for hanging nine minority-rights activists and threatened its military rulers with outright expulsion unless they restore democracy.

The penalty was unprecedented in the history of the Commonwealth, a 52-member organization grouping Britain and its former colonies, and reflected deep revulsion over Nigeria's human rights record over several years, ministers said.

Only Gambia, itself under military rule, dissented from the decision, which came one day after Nigeria ignored international appeals for clemency and hanged writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight associates after a trial widely regarded as flawed.

A spokesman for Nigeria's military rulers called the suspension "unfair and baseless, and it doesn't seem to approximate events and developments in Nigeria."

British officials said South African President Nelson Mandela was a driving force behind the decision to get tough with Nigeria. They said Mandela recommended suspension after winning support for the step at a caucus of African states.

As world protests grew, the European Union's 15 member states decided to pull their envoys out of Nigeria. Earlier, the governments of the United States and South Africa had announced similar steps.

The Organization of African Unity (OAU), government officials in Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi and Kenyan opposition leaders also lashed out at Nigeria for ignoring domestic and international pleas to spare the condemned men, who were allowed no right of appeal.