No circumstance can justify someone's disappearance.
The United Nations Tweeted that yesterday. Today is the International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearances. In previous years, countries like Argentina came to mind (under the tyrant and criminal Augusto Pinochet) came to mind. Sting wrote and recorded "They Dance Alone" about the disappeared in Argentina on his 1987 album . . . NOTHING LIKE THE SUN.
I've seen their silent faces, they scream so loud
If they were to speak these words
They'd go missing, too
Another woman on the torture table
What else can they do?
Dancing with the missing
They're dancing with the dead
They dance with the invisible ones
Their anguish is unsaid
They're dancing with their fathers
Dancing with their sons
They're dancing with their husbands
They dance alone
They dance alone
One day we'll sing our freedom
One day we'll laugh in our joy
And we'll dance
One day we'll dance on their graves
One day we'll sing our freedom
One day we'll laugh in our joy
And we'll dance
Danzan con los muertos
Danzan con amores invisibles
Con silenciosa angistia
Danzan con sus padres
Con sus hijos
Con sus esposos
Ellas danzan solas
Danzan solas
The Iraq War, ongoing, is the story of the disappeared. Ethnic cleansing has taken place (especially carried out by Shi'ite forces from 2006 through 2008). Nouri al-Maliki's government (2006 through 2014) terrorized the people of Iraq -- everyone was an enemy to Nouri, even Shi'ites. He had secret torture cells and hidden prisons. Hundreds of thousands were disappeared in Iraq. This is part of turning Iraq into a land of widows and children. It's why the median age in Iraq now is 21-years-old. Neighboring Iran? 31.3-years-old. Neighboring Kuwait? 36.8-years-old. Neighboring Turkey? 31.5-years-old. Are you getting it?
Because some days it seems like no one gives a damn except BRussels Tribunal.
The disappeared include the people of Anbar Province, the people of Mosul, the people throughout Iraq.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued the following today:
The crime of enforced disappearance is rife across the world. We see new cases almost daily, including the disappearance of defenders of the environment, who are often indigenous peoples. Meanwhile, the excruciating pain of old cases is still acute, as the fate of thousands of disappeared people remains unknown, making the crime a continuous presence in the lives of the loved ones of the lost.
The United Nations Committee and Working Group on Enforced Disappearances have identified additional worrying trends, including reprisals against relatives of the victims and members of civil society, often in the name of security and counter-terrorism. Enforced disappearance also has gendered consequences particularly affecting women and LGBTI persons.
Impunity compounds the suffering and anguish. Under international human rights law, families and societies have a right to know the truth about what happened. I call on Member States to fulfil this responsibility.
With the support of international human rights mechanisms, States have a duty to strengthen their efforts to prevent enforced disappearances, to search for victims, and to increase assistance to victims and their relatives. It is equally critical to pursue credible and impartial judicial investigations.
On this International Day, let us renew our commitment to end all enforced disappearances. I call on all States to ratify the Convention for the Protection of all Persons against Enforced Disappearances and to accept the competence of the Committee to examine individual complaints. This is a first, but crucial step, towards the elimination of this atrocious crime.
António Guterres
Sadly, the disappeared exist around the world. Our focus is Iraq so that's what we're zooming in on.
Netherlands Embassy in Iraq Tweets:
Each conflict in #Iraq has resulted in a new generation of disappeared, putting Iraq among the countries with the highest number of #MissingPersons. Families of up to a million people are waiting for answers #DayoftheDisappeared #TheSearchMustGoOn
#Iraq: UN report on #EnforcedDisappearances calls for independent/effective investigations to establish the fate of 1,000 civilian men and boys disappeared during military operations against ISIL in #Anbar in 2015-2016 and to hold perpetrators accountable
Human Rights Watch's Belkis Willie Tweets the following thread:
Any "@" whatever in a Tweet is taken out by me because otherwise some browsers will show this page with a big, black box covering words. I've noted before the browsers you can use to avoid that; however, e-mail still come in complaining about those black squares. For that reason, we remove any @ that I notice. We also cannot include the Twitter id because the 'blue check' also creates a black square.
The Committee to Protect Journalists Tweets:
The following sites updated:
