- Category: Statements
Paris, 30 August 2015: ASEAN member states must accelerate the process of ratification of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (ICPPED), FIDH said today on the occasion of the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances.
“By becoming a state party to the ICPPED, states will have a legal obligation to investigate all cases of enforced disappearances and deliver justice to the victims and their families,” said FIDH President Karim Lahidji. “Governments will no longer be able to remain idle and rely on the belief that the passage of time will ultimately render cases of disappearances into obscurity.”
- Category: Statements
AFAD Statement
2015 International Day of the Disappeared
August 30, 2015 – Since the establishment of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) in 1998, it has been commemorating the International Day of the Disappeared every 30th of each year. This was first commemorated by the Latin American Federation of Associations of Relatives of Disappeared-Detainees (FEDEFAM) for many years and adopted by similar formations in other parts of the world. As enforced disappearances reached global proportions, in 2011, the United Nations officially declared this day as the International Day of the Disappeared.
Today, AFAD pays tribute to the thousands of disappeared people in Asia and the world over, who, with their families and relatives, are AFAD’s reason for existence. As a form of tribute to the desaparecidos of the world, the International Day of the Disappeared commemoration, conducted in various forms by AFAD member-organizations, aims to raise the awareness on the phenomenon of enforced disappearance and to obtain concrete results of the struggle to attain the vision of a world without desaparecidos. On this occasion, the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances reiterates its strong solidarity with the families of the disappeared in many different ways. In a special way, AFAD remembers all desaparecidos, some of whom are prominent names, such as those of Sombath Somphone of Laos; Jonas Burgos of the Philippines; Subarna Paudel of Nepal; Mushtaq Ahmad Khan of Jammu and Kashmir; Somchai Neelaphaijit of Thailand; Masood of Pakistan; Nurul Amin of Bangladesh; Wiji Thukul of Indonesia; Hwang Won of South Korea and Prageeth Eknaligoda of Sri Lanka. The names are many. The litany is long. Each disappeared person has a name, a life, a family.
- Category: Statements
A Forum Statement in Commemoration of the 2015 International Day of the Disappeared
27 August 2015, Quezon City, Philippines – All struggles against injustice represent the struggle of memory against forgetting. In commemoration of the International Day of the Disappeared, we, the families of the disappeared, human rights defenders, civil society organizations, members of the diplomatic community, students, acclaimed community leaders, who are gathered in this forum titled “Return Sombath Safely! Surface All the Disappeared,” renew our commitment to never forget the injustices brought upon the victims of enforced disappearances and their families, and intensify our call for truth and justice.
Organized by the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD), the forum aims to raise awareness on the cruel and inhuman practice of enforced disappearances. Enforced disappearances remains to be a global phenomenon; the United Nations Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances (UNWGEID) has received more than 53,000 cases of enforced disappearances from 84 states. Particularly, the forum highlights the case of Sombath Somphone, a Lao PDR citizen, who as of today has been disappeared for 986 days. Notable is that the global magnitude of enforced disappearances compelled the United Nations to adopt the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance with an independent monitoring body to ensure implementation.
- Category: Statements
Statement of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances on the 10th Year of Mr. Masood Janjua’s Enforced Disappearance
Of all the agonizing hardships that a person has to face, it is the excruciating pain of waiting without certainty, which is the worst. A woman’s profound love endures a long wait. The relentless struggle in waiting with uncertainty amidst all odds for the return of a loved one is an important strength Amina Masood, Chairperson of Defence for Human Rights of Pakistan, has as she commemorates today her husband’s 10th anniversary of disappearance.
- Category: Statements
Freedom for Masood Janjua - Ten years too much!!
Here I am in the 10th year of struggle for the release of my secretly detained loving husband Masood Janjua. It suddenly transpired to me that it’s the 10th year and Masood is still detained!! Years and years of tireless efforts, sleepless nights and agonizing grief could not bring him back. It struck me with a newest intensity of pain like never before.
- Category: News
The book "From GRIEF to COURAGE" was launched July 24, 2015 at the Justitia Room, Ateneo Law School, Rockwell Center, Makati, Metro Manila
Video Presentation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXxmEUaQBDM
Photos
- Category: Statements
The Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) In Memory of the Courage of the Chinese People Who Sacrificed Their Lives at Tiananmen Square
June 4, 2015 - In solidarity with all freedom-loving peoples of the world, we are peacefully fighting against repression and impunity. Humanity born to freedom is alert to repel invasion of liberty by power-hungry rulers.
The gruesome massacre, which the Chinese people calls the June Fourth Movement, or the June Fourth Massacre, or Liu-Si Tucheng is a blatant reminder that people cannot be forever prisoners of their own conscience in the struggle for truth, justice and freedom. The Tiananmen Square uprising conjures the image of a lone anonymous person or the Tank Man, who courageously stood before a column of tanks preventing their advance to further annihilate the dissidents.
Twenty-six years after the June 4th gruesome crackdown against protesters mainly led by university students and intellectuals at Tiananmen (literally means, Gate of Heavenly Peace) Square, basic human rights and freedoms are still obscured by state authoritarianism. In China, people caught talking about the macabre dispersal, are thrown into jail to suffer hard labor.
- Category: Statements
May 25-29, 2015
Every last week of May, we commemorate the International Week of the Disappeared (IWD), a painful reminder that thousands of families still await information on the fate of their loved ones who have disappeared and thousands of disappeared persons are waiting to be freed from the unknown prisons where they are kept. The IWD was incepted by the Latin American Federation of Associations for Relatives of Disappeared-Detainees (FEDEFAM), which, in turn, was adopted by families of the disappeared across the world.
The International Coalition Against Enforced Disappearances (ICAED) and its 53 member-organisations campaign for the universal ratification and implementation of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (ICPED), the recognition of the competence of the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances and the enactment of domestic laws criminalizing enforced disappearances. It is the most emblematic way to pay tribute to the disappeared and their families.