Iraq: Enforced Disappearance of Brothers Al Mashhadani for Over 9 Years

On 16 October 2014, Alkarama and Al Wissam Humanitarian Assembly sent a communication to the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) to bring its attention to the case of Mohamad and Nouhad al Mashhadani, two brothers who disappeared since their arrest by members of the security forces in 2005.

On the night of 2 June 2005, Mohamad Al Mashhadani, a 37-year old former State official, and his brother, Nouhad, a 28-year old teacher, were at their house in the Hurrya district of Baghdad when a patrol of the security forces broke in. They searched the house and arrested them, without showing any arrest warrant. Over 25 other people were also arrested and taken away in military pickup cars in a mass arrest conducted in the neighbourhood that night.

Worried about their fate, the Al Mashhadani brothers's relatives filed a complaint with the Hurriya district's police office. As no investigation was opened, the family also contacted, amongst others, the Ministry of Human Rights and the Ministry of Defence. However, public authorities have always denied their disappearance.

In view of the facts, Alkarama and Al Wissam Humanitarian Assembly alerted the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID), requesting the UN experts to call upon the Iraqi authorities to investigate the case of Mohamad and Nouhad Al Mashhadani and to release them immediately. Having ratified the 2006 Convention on Enforced Disappearances, Iraq has to put an end to this serious human rights violation and do its utmost to comply with its international human rights obligations.

As recently recalled by Ariel Dulitzky, Chairperson-Rapporteur of the WGEID and Emmanuel Decaux, President of the Committee on Enforced Disappearances (CED), at the UN General Assembly, "States need to take specific and strong measures to prevent and punish these acts and protect all those involved in the search for the disappeared."

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