Anas al-Azzawi, member of the Office of the High Commissioner for
Human Rights (OHCHR), reported July 24 that “7,663 people have been forcibly
disappeared during the last three years. OHCHR confirmed that 652
disappeared persons were in detention and prisons, and the search is still
ongoing to find the others.”
This number of enforced disappearances, which include neither
those forcibly disappeared during the ISIS phase nor those
in the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), is proof of the ongoing
violence and political and sectarian conflict that began after 2014,
following ISIS’ control over a third of Iraq. These forced
disappearances have surpassed those that took place in Iraq during the sectarian
civil war from 2005 to 2008.
Wahida al-Jamili, rapporteur for the parliamentary Human Rights
Committee, said, “Some were forcibly disappeared at the hands of political
parties and others by armed parties, both of which find in such aggressive
behavior a way to get those who oppose them out of the picture.”
However, she noted, "Those who forcibly disappeared for
sectarian reasons are few compared to when ISIS was in control or during the
civil war. All sectarian components have become more aware that it is pointless
to eliminate one another this way. In addition, there have been political
agreements and the political process based on the balance between components
has been a success.”
Jamili added, “There are thousands of forcibly disappeared at the
hands of troops in uniform and by government forces. We have a database of all
those missing and forcibly disappeared, but their whereabouts and fate remain
unknown.”
Human Rights Watch noted
on Sept. 27, 2018, that Iraqi security and military forces have hidden dozens
of people, mostly Sunni Arab males, in the framework of counterterrorism
operations.
OHCHR representative in the
National Commission for Missing Persons Ali al-Bayati said, “Since the last
months of 2017 and until August 2019, OHCHR has received over 7,000 reports or
complaints about missing persons, most of whom went missing after June 2014,
according to their families.”
Speaking about the procedures
to deal with these reports, he said, “According to Law 53 of 2008, OHCHR has
the authority to receive these complaints, investigate them and address the
concerned authorities in order to know the fate of missing persons or to hold
those responsible accountable.”
Bayati said, “We are now in
the process of investigating these complaints in order to submit them to the
Supreme National Committee formed by the Supreme Judicial Council, the General
Secretariat of the Council of Ministers, all the security institutions and the
KRG. OHCHR is represented as an observer, according to Diwani Order 46. It is
the one in charge of looking into missing persons files, malicious claims and
disputes in areas that were once controlled by ISIS and are now liberated.”
He noted, “Iraq is a member
of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced
Disappearance, but there is no law to enforce this convention and hold those
responsible accountable.”
This official failure to
address the issue of enforced disappearance, which Bayati pointed out, was
underlined by the Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights in late 2018. He
added, “There is excessive neglect in how the Iraqi government deals with
the issue of those who went missing during the military operations in October
2016 in Mosul as well as when security forces entered the city, as a
number of these missing persons are in government detention centers, some in
Baghdad.”
Legal expert and former judge
Ali al-Tamimi said, “The parties behind enforced disappearance are
ignoring the constitution and the Criminal Assets Law, which prohibit the
arrest or detention of persons without a judicial order. The fate of the
arrested person must be decided by the court of inquiry within 24 hours and the
prisons must be subject to the control of the prosecution, the parliament and
OHCHR.”
He said, “The constitution
requires the prime minister to open an immediate investigation in cases of
enforced disappearance that international organizations raise, and work to hold
those involved accountable. Every detention of a person without a judicial
order is terrorism.”
Tamimi added, “The families
of the victims have the right to ask the Iraqi government for moral
compensation for the damage inflicted on them by suing the kidnappers.”
It seems there are attempts
to reduce the contradiction between the situation on the ground of the ongoing
enforced disappearance and the constitution that rejects them.
In this context, Jamili
referred to a proposal in parliament "to enact a law to protect all
persons from enforced disappearance under the constitution in its articles on
rights and freedoms. This would also be a commitment to the obligations Iraq
took upon itself when signing the Convention for the Protection of All Persons
from Enforced Disappearance.”
However, Jamili admits that
“enacting the law will take time and it will not be implemented any time soon.”
Iraqis have endured decades
of executions, enforced disappearance and human rights abuses since Saddam
Hussein’s regime, which continues despite the existence of security and justice
authorities that ought to hold those responsible accountable. As a result,
citizens either choose to leave the country or stay and face an
unknown fate. Thus, Iraq urgently needs to renounce its ancient violent
methods, including enforced disappearance.