Iraq: The UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances visits the country as part of its mandate
The United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances is visiting Iraq starting November 12 to determine ways to address cases of enforced disappearance in line with its mandate under Article 33 of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
The Committee is scheduled to visit a number of Iraqi governorates and meet with the victims, their relatives, human rights organizations and international organizations, as well as national and human rights institutions. Committee members will also hold discussions with government officials, including those responsible for investigating and preventing enforced disappearances, those working to locate disappeared persons, and those responsible for developing and implementing relevant public policies.
Experts are scheduled to attend the exhumations by the authorities. In addition, the delegation will visit places of deprivation of liberty, such as prisons and detention centers, to examine how their registration systems work, as registering persons deprived of their liberty is an essential means of preventing enforced disappearance.
"The Committee welcomes Iraq's agreement to this visit," said the head of the Committee's delegation, Carmen Rosa Villa. "This cooperation is vital for all countries to ensure progress in implementing the Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance."
According to available information, the Iraqi authorities estimate that the number of people disappeared during decades of conflict and human rights violations could range from 250,000 to more than a million.
Alkarama’s actions
For years, Alkarama has been following with great concern cases of enforced disappearances in Iraq and has submitted dozens of complaints before the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances and the Committee on Enforced Disappearances which monitors the implementation of the International Convention for the Protection of all Persons against Enforced Disappearance ratified by Iraq in November 2010.
The Director of Alkarama, Attorney Rashid Mesli, explained, during his participation in a human rights symposium on the occasion of the International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearance, that "the government authorities in Iraq are not serious about holding those involved in the crimes of disappearance and enforced disappearance accountable," referring to the responsibility of the Iraqi state and the clear complicity between successive governments and the militias that commit these crimes.
For example, the Al Jabouri family is still awaiting the disclosure of the fate of Mr. Mounir Al Jabouri and his relatives, about whom Alkarama contacted the Committee on Enforced Disappearances. However, all the efforts made by the family to locate the victims over the years were in vain.
On October 17, 2022, Iraq was summoned by the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances to reveal the fate of the Iraqi citizen, Amer Al Kartani, who has been missing since he was kidnapped from his family's home on May 21, 2014.
In October 2009, Alkarama received information from Iraq regarding the reappearance of seven persons who had been arrested and disappeared in connection with the case of Mohammad Al Daini, a well-known human rights activist in Iraq and a member of the Iraqi parliament who had visited Alkarama in Geneva in late October 2008 and later disappeared in Iraq on February 25, 2009, along with a number of his family members and those working with him, following his denunciation of human rights violations in Iraqi prisons.
In January 2022, Alkarama submitted its shadow report to the Human Rights Committee at its sixth session, in which it underlines important points regarding cases of enforced disappearance in Iraq.