a Urgent action No. 9/2013 refers to two persons. It is therefore counted as two urgent actions.

b As at 30 September 2019.

B.Process after registration of urgent action requests: developments observed since the sixteenth session (to 30 September 2019)

42.The Committee maintains constant contact with States parties through their permanent missions and with the authors of requests for urgent action through notes, letters, meetings and telephone calls.

43.The information provided since the sixteenth session in the context of the urgent action procedure confirms a number of the trends identified in the reports on requests for urgent action adopted at the eleventh to sixteenth sessions (CED/C/11/3, CED/C/12/2, CED/C/13/3, CED/C/14/2, CED/C/15/3 and CED/C/16/2). Again, most of the cases with regard to which urgent action requests have been registered relate to events in Mexico and Iraq. For the period covered by the present report, the Committee wishes to highlight the following trends relating to the States parties concerned.

1.Developments relating to Mexico and Iraq

(a)Mexico

44.The State party has responded to all the recently registered requests for urgent action. With regard to follow-up notes, however, its response times are becoming longer: less and less information is being provided, and the replies often show that the search and investigation processes in relation to the disappeared persons have come to a standstill.

45.The information provided by the State party continues to reflect sporadic, isolated and largely formalistic action that does not seem to be part of a previously defined strategy for search and investigation. Steps taken by family members, close contacts or representatives of the disappeared persons are still crucial to ensuring that searches and investigations move forward.

46.In the vast majority of cases, the authors of requests for urgent action are exasperated by the failure to conduct searches and investigations with due diligence. They find it regrettable that there are no on-site investigations or comprehensive analyses of the available evidence or of the information that they provide to the authorities responsible for searches and investigations.

47.Authors continue to make frequent allegations that those authorities are directly or indirectly involved in the events surrounding the disappearances, and that search and investigation efforts have come to a halt. In such cases, the Committee has emphasized the importance of establishing mechanisms for holding State officials in charge of searches and investigations to account, and has requested the State party to investigate allegations that such officials have hindered proceedings.

48.The Committee wishes to emphasize its concern over reports that relatives of disappeared persons have been targeted by threats and intimidation when they have pressed for the investigation of the facts surrounding the enforced disappearance of their family members. These threats take various forms, including death threats, patrols around the relatives’ homes and procedural decisions that affect the protection afforded to the persons concerned (for example, the lifting of a measure to protect the identity of a key witness in the investigation by transferring the case file to the Guerrero State Prosecutor’s Office). In such cases, the Committee again requests the State party to take the following interim measures: (a) the measures necessary to preserve the life and safety of the persons concerned; and (b) those necessary to ensure that a person can carry out a search for a missing family member without being subjected to violence or harassment. The Committee also requests the State party to take more specific measures whenever necessary (for example, to ensure that the identity of a person is kept confidential despite the transfer of the case file).

(b)Iraq

49.The Committee is deeply concerned by the failure of the State party, despite several reminders, to reply to the majority of the registered requests for urgent action concerning incidents that took place in its territory. Four reminders, which have gone unanswered, were sent for 53 of the registered requests for urgent action. Where replies have been received, the State party has provided no information whatsoever on any action that it has taken to search for the disappeared persons or to investigate their alleged enforced disappearance. Nor have the procedures available to victims been made clear, and the information provided by the relatives of disappeared persons continues to confirm that, in general, they must endure ill-treatment at the hands of State authorities when they ask for information or support in connection with searches for disappeared persons or investigations into their alleged enforced disappearance. The Committee brings to the attention of the General Assembly the State party’s lack of compliance with its obligations under article 30 of the Convention concerning the above-mentioned 53 requests for urgent action.

50.In several of its replies, the State party simply stressed that the alleged victims were affiliated with terrorist groups. In the reporting period, for example, the Committee registered 192 new requests for urgent action with regard to the alleged enforced disappearance of 192 persons at the Al-Razaza checkpoint in Anbar Governorate. The Committee was informed that, on 26 October 2014, against the backdrop of the fight against Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, many families had fled Jurf al-Sakhr in Babil Governorate for safer areas through the checkpoint in question, which at the time was controlled by Hizbullah brigades. According to reports received by the Committee, the 192 persons were arrested while attempting to go through the checkpoint and were forcibly taken by Hizbullah to an unknown location. Despite repeated complaints by family members to the State party’s authorities, their whereabouts remain unknown. The Committee asked the State party to take immediate action to search for and locate the disappeared persons, look into their alleged enforced disappearance, ensure that the disappeared persons were placed under the protection of the law and take the necessary measures to identify those responsible. The State party responded by stating that all the persons referred to in the requests for urgent action had ties to Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant and that seven of them had been killed. This information was shared with the authors of the requests for urgent action for their comments. More generally, the Committee has been informed of, and notes with concern, several cases in which relatives of disappeared persons have been subjected to reprisals after reporting incidents to the competent authorities, and stresses the consequent negative impact on the possibility of individuals requesting the intervention of the authorities in charge of the search for disappeared persons and the investigation of their disappearance.

2.Other States parties

51.There were too few requests for urgent action relating to other States parties for the Committee to identify any trends. Nevertheless, the Committee wishes to highlight certain elements of some of the requests received.

(a)Brazil

52.Another follow-up note was sent to the State party regarding the case of Davi Santos Fiúza (urgent action No. 61/2014). The note acknowledged receipt of the information that the file on the four-year police search and investigation into Mr. Santos Fiúza’s disappearance had been sent to the Bahia State Counsel-General’s Office, that the police authorities had referred to the possible involvement of 17 members of the Bahia state police (military police) and that the Counsel-General was currently reviewing the case file to determine the individual liability of each of the 17 police officers and bring the perpetrators to justice. In view of the information gathered in the context of the urgent action, however, the Committee deplored the delays in the investigations into the case by the Counsel-General’s Office, despite it having been apprised of the results of the police investigations, and the failure to take further steps to search for and locate Mr. Santos Fiúza.

(b)Colombia

53.As stated in the reports from previous sessions, the information provided by the State party on the 21 registered requests for urgent action shows that investigations and searches often come to a standstill a few months after they begin.

54.In connection with urgent action No. 378/2017, No. 379/2017 and No. 380/2017, the Committee was informed that four persons had been arrested and had provided information on the location of the remains of the disappeared children. They had been charged with enforced disappearance. The three children had been found dead in the Cerro Norte neighbourhood of Usaquén in May 2019. This information was passed to the authors of the relevant requests for urgent action for their comments.

(c)Togo

55.With regard to the cases of Atsou Adzi and Messan Koku Adzi (urgent action No. 543/2018 and No. 544/2018), the State party replied on 17 July 2019 that, after investigations into the disappearances in question, its authorities had discovered that Atsou Adzi had died of health problems on 3 January 2014. That claim had reportedly been confirmed by several people, including an uncle, who had organized the funeral, and the head of the community of Gapé. The Togolese authorities claim to have located Messan Koku Adzi on 29 June 2019 in Lomé, where he is apparently living. According to the authorities, he was in contact with his family in Gapé. The authorities investigated the case and concluded that two people had fabricated the story in question. The State party’s observations were relayed to the authors of the requests for urgent action for their comments. The Committee will make a decision on this urgent action in the light of the response provided.

(d)Tunisia

56.A request for urgent action was registered during the reporting period in the case of Mohamed Guefassa (urgent action No. 768/2019), an Algerian national who disappeared in Tunisian territorial waters on the night of 2 October 2016, when, travelling irregularly from Algeria to the Italian island of Sardinia, he was intercepted by Tunisian coastguards. According to the information provided to the Committee, Mr. Guefassa may be in illegal detention in Tunisia on terrorism-related charges. The Committee requested the State party to immediately take all measures necessary to search for, locate and protect Mr. Guefassa. The State party had not replied to the Committee’s note verbale by the date of the present report. A reminder was sent.

3.Innovations

57.Since August 2019, following the adoption and publication of the guiding principles for the search for disappeared persons, the Committee has included specific references to the guiding principles in its follow-up notes in order to make its recommendations to States parties more precise. Whenever appropriate, the guiding principles have also been annexed to the follow-up notes.

C.Urgent actions discontinued, closed or kept open for the protection of persons to whom interim measures have been granted

58.In accordance with the criteria adopted in plenary by the Committee at its eighth session:

(a)An urgent action is discontinued when the disappeared person has been located but is still detained. This is because the person in question is particularly vulnerable to being subjected to a further enforced disappearance and to being placed outside the protection of the law;

(b)An urgent action is closed when the disappeared person has been found at liberty or located and released, or has been found dead, provided that the relatives and/or authors do not contest these facts;

(c)An urgent action is kept open when the disappeared person has been located but the persons to whom interim measures have been granted in the context of the urgent action are still under threat. In such cases, the action taken by the Committee is limited to following up on the interim measures.

59.At the time of writing, the Committee had closed a total of 52 urgent action cases: in 29 of these cases, the disappeared persons had been found alive and released, and in 23 cases the disappeared persons had been found dead.

60.In addition, the Committee has discontinued 13 urgent action cases because the disappeared persons have been located but remain in detention.

61.In two urgent action cases, it has been determined that the disappeared persons have been found dead but the urgent action remains open because the persons who were granted interim measures are still under threat.

62.In one urgent action case, the author reported that some of her husband’s remains had been found. She emphasized, however, that she was not satisfied, as the view of the authorities, in contrast to her own, was that it was unnecessary to continue searching for the rest of his remains. The Committee recalls that, in accordance with principle 7 of the guiding principles for the search for disappeared persons, when only partial remains have been found and identified, any decision to continue the search to locate and identify the missing remains should take into account the actual chances of identifying more remains and the needs expressed by the family members in the context of their cultural norms concerning funerals. Any decision to discontinue the search should be taken in a transparent manner and requires the prior and informed consent of the family members. The Committee has therefore decided to keep the urgent action open.

D.Decisions taken by the Committee at its seventeenth and eighteenth sessions

63.The Committee reiterates that, in view of the increase in the number of requests for urgent action that have been registered, there is an urgent need for an increase in the number of staff members in the OHCHR secretariat who are dedicated to processing those requests.

64.At its seventeenth session, the Committee confirmed the composition of its working group on urgent actions and recalled that the division of labour among members was based on the language of the request for urgent action. The secretariat recalled the Committee’s working methods in relation to urgent action, which were confirmed in plenary.

65.The Committee confirmed that, whenever necessary, reference would be made to the obligation of States parties, without prejudice to the obligation to continue the investigation until the fate of the disappeared person had been clarified, to take the appropriate steps with regard to the legal situation of disappeared persons whose fate had not been clarified and that of their relatives, in fields such as social welfare, financial matters, family law and property rights. In many cases of enforced disappearance, economic and social support was essential to enable the relatives of the disappeared person to participate in the search and investigation processes.

66.The Committee decided to discuss a draft revision of the format for the submission of requests for urgent action, to be prepared by the secretariat in cooperation with the working group on urgent actions, based on the experience gained since the start of the procedure.

67.At its eighteenth session, and given the need to discuss various issues raised in the context of the urgent action procedure over the period covered by the report and the impossibility of doing so via email, the Committee decided to postpone the consideration of its report on requests for urgent action to its nineteenth session.

Chapter XICommunications procedure under article 31 of the Convention

68.No new individual complaints have been registered by the Committee over the period covered by the present report.

69.As regards the Yrusta and Del Valle Yrusta v. Argentina, the Committee received additional follow-up information from the State party and transmitted it for comments to the author. The Committee will analyse the information provided upon receipt of all relevant submissions. The follow-up procedure therefore remains open.

Chapter XIIVisits under article 33 of the Convention

70.Since 2013, the Committee has been requesting a visit to Mexico under article 33 of the Convention. In a press conference held on 30 August 2019, the Under-Secretary for Human Rights of the Ministry of the Interior announced several measures by instruction of the President of Mexico, including recognition of the Committee’s competence to hear individual cases and acceptance of the Committee’s request to visit the country. The Committee sent a reminder to the State party on 25 September 2018.

71.In a note to the State party dated 18 December 2019, the Committee recalled that on 17 October 2019 – in the context of the consideration of the sixth periodic report submitted by Mexico to the Human Rights Committee – the State party’s delegation had reported that the President of Mexico had recently ordered Federal Government institutions to accept the competence of the Committee with respect to receiving individual communications, and to invite the Committee to visit Mexico in August 2020 (CCPR/C/SR.3654, para. 63). In the note, the Committee therefore requested information from the State party on the implementation of those measures, and invited the State party to appoint a focal point to enable the Committee and its secretariat to make the necessary arrangements in terms of the logistics, modalities and agenda of the visit reportedly planned for August 2020. As at the date of the present report, the Committee had received no reply to that note.

Chapter XIIIGuiding principles for the search for disappeared persons

72.In September 2019, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Swiss Peace Foundation organized a two-day workshop in Amman, at which experts and practitioners from different regions discussed the way forward for the dissemination and implementation of the guiding principles for the search for disappeared persons. Two members of the Committee participated in the workshop.

73.At its seventeenth session, the Committee organized a private meeting with the Swiss Peace Foundation on the results of and follow-up to the workshop. In March 2020, a member of the Committee and a member of its secretariat participated in a follow-up event organized by the Swiss Peace Foundation on strategies to promote coordination between the search for disappeared persons and the investigation of their disappearance.

74.The guiding principles have been translated in German and Nepalese. The OHCHR Office in Mexico released an illustrated version of the guiding principles in Spanish. The Committee is pursuing the dissemination of the guiding principles by including references to them in its recommendations in the context of its urgent action procedure.

Annex

States parties to the Convention as at 4 May 2020 and their reporting status

State party (in order of ratification)	Ratification/ accession	Entry into force	Deadline for reporting under art. 2 9 (1)	Report submitted
Albania *	8 Nov. 2007	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	11 Nov. 2015
Argentina *	14 Dec. 2007	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	21 Dec. 2012
Mexico	18 Mar. 2008	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	11 Mar. 2014
Honduras	1 Apr. 2008	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	4 Feb. 2016
France *	23 Sept. 2008	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	21 Dec. 2012
Senegal	11 Dec. 2008	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	28 Apr. 2015
Bolivia (Plurinational State of)	17 Dec. 2008	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	28 Sept. 2018
Cuba	2 Feb. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	24 Apr. 2015
Kazakhstan	27 Feb. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	3 June 2014
Uruguay *	4 Mar. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	4 Sept. 2012
Mali *	1 July 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012
Japan *	23 July 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	22 July 2016
Nigeria	27 July 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012
Spain *	24 Sept. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	26 Dec. 2012
Germany *	24 Sept. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	25 Mar. 2013
Ecuador *	20 Oct. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	5 June 2015
Burkina Faso	3 Dec. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	7 Oct. 2014
Chile *	8 Dec. 2009	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	1 Dec. 2017
Paraguay	3 Aug. 2010	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	28 Aug. 2013
Iraq	23 Nov. 2010	23 Dec. 2010	23 Dec. 2012	26 June 2014
Brazil	29 Nov. 2010	29 Dec. 2010	29 Dec. 2012	30 June 2019
Gabon	19 Jan. 2011	18 Feb. 2011	18 Feb. 2013	10 June 2015
Armenia	24 Jan. 2011	23 Feb. 2011	23 Feb. 2013	14 Oct. 2013
Netherlands *	23 Mar. 2011	22 Apr. 2011	22 Apr. 2013	11 June 2013
Zambia	4 Apr. 2011	4 May 2011	4 May 2013
Serbia *	18 May 2011	17 June 2011	17 June 2013	30 Dec. 2013
Belgium *	2 June 2011	2 July 2011	2 July 2013	8 July 2013
Panama	24 June 2011	24 July 2011	24 July 2013	30 June 2019
Tunisia	29 June 2011	29 July 2011	29 July 2013	25 Sept. 2014
Montenegro *	20 Sept. 2011	20 Oct. 2011	20 Oct. 2013	30 Jan. 2014
Costa Rica	16 Feb. 2012	17 Mar. 2012	17 Mar. 2014	7 May 2020
Bosnia and Herzegovina *	30 Mar. 2012	29 Apr. 2012	29 Apr. 2014	26 Jan. 2015
Austria *	7 June 2012	7 July 2012	7 July 2014	31 May 2016
Colombia	11 July 2012	10 Aug. 2012	10 Aug. 2014	17 Dec. 2014
Peru *	26 Sept. 2012	26 Oct. 2012	26 Oct. 2014	8 Aug. 2016
Mauritania	3 Oct. 2012	2 Nov. 2012	2 Nov. 2014
Samoa	27 Nov. 2012	27 Dec. 2012	27 Dec. 2014
Morocco	14 May 2013	13 June 2013	13 June 2015
Cambodia	27 June 2013	27 July 2013	27 July 2015
Lithuania *	14 Aug. 2013	13 Sept. 2013	13 Sept. 2015	6 Oct. 2015
Lesotho	6 Dec. 2013	5 Jan. 2014	5 Jan. 2016
Portugal *	27 Jan. 2014	26 Feb. 2014	26 Feb. 2016	22 June 2016
Togo	21 July 2014	20 Aug. 2014	20 Aug. 2016
Slovakia *	15 Dec. 2014	14 Jan. 2015	14 Jan. 2017	26 Apr. 2018
Mongolia	12 Feb. 2015	14 Mar. 2015	14 Mar. 2017	27 Dec. 2018
Malta	27 Mar. 2015	26 Apr. 2015	26 Apr. 2017
Greece	9 July 2015	8 Aug. 2015	8 Aug. 2017	1 Feb. 2019
Niger	24 July 2015	23 Aug. 2015	23 Aug. 2017	1 Aug. 2019
Belize	14 Aug. 2015	13 Sept. 2015	13 Sept. 2017
Ukraine *	14 Aug. 2015	13 Sept. 2015	13 Sept. 2017
Italy	8 Oct. 2015	7 Nov. 2015	7 Nov. 2017	22 Dec. 2017
Sri Lanka	25 May 2016	24 June 2016	24 June 2018
Central African Republic	11 Oct. 2016	10 Nov. 2016	10 Nov. 2018
Switzerland *	2 Dec. 2016	1 Jan. 2017	1 Jan. 2019	21 Dec. 2018
Seychelles	18 Jan. 2017	17 Feb. 2017	17 Feb. 2019
Czechia *	8 Feb. 2017	10 Mar. 2017	10 Mar. 2019	22 May 2019
Malawi *	14 July 2017	13 Aug. 2017	13 Aug. 2019
Benin	2 Nov. 2017	2 Dec. 2017	2 Dec. 2019
Gambia	28 Sept. 2018	28 Oct. 2018	28 Oct. 2020
Dominica	13 May 2019	12 June 2019	12 June 2021
Fiji	19 Aug. 2019	18 Sept. 2019	18 Sept. 2021
Norway	22 Aug. 2019	21 Aug. 2019	21 Aug. 2021

Note : States parties marked with an asterisk have made declarations recognizing the competence of the Committee under articles 31 and /or 32 of the Convention. The full text of declarations and reservations made by States Parties is available at http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-16&chapter=4&lang=en .

GE.20-08453 (E)