Rights groups focus on forced 'disappearance'

Rights groups focus on forced 'disappearance'

Grant Peck, Associated Press, Bangkok

Asian human rights activists on Tuesday called for making
kidnappings and killings by government agencies a specific crime,
distinct from kidnapping and murder covered by criminal laws.

The call came at a meeting of the Asian Federation Against
Involuntary Disappearances, or AFAD, to review progress since
their group was established in May 2000.

Member organizations come from Indonesia, the Philippines, Sri
Lanka, Thailand and the Indian-controlled Kashmir.

"Priority number one is enactment of laws criminalizing
involuntary disappearance as a separate offense," Philippine
labor lawyer and AFAD chairman Edcel Lagman told a news
conference.

He said the objectives of the group were to secure justice for
the disappeared, to put an end to the system of impunity that
generally keeps perpetrators from being punished, and to prevent
future abuses.

AFAD is pushing for the issue to be tackled by both national
laws and international agreements, he said. Lagman said treating
involuntary disappearances as a special, distinct offense would
make them easier to prosecute.

"Let's call a spade a spade," he said. "In cases of
involuntary disappearances there are political implications not
attendant in cases of common crimes."

He said that involuntary disappearances are by definition
crimes committed by the authorities, because rebel groups can be
prosecuted under existing laws.

The number of disappeared in the countries where AFAD groups
are active is hard to pin down because different criteria are
used to count them.

KDC Kumarage of Sri Lanka's Organizations of Parents and
Family Members of the Disappeared said that 60,000 people were
estimated to have disappeared at the height of that island's
civil conflict in 1988-90, while one official commission put the
total at about 28,000.

Usman Hamid of Indonesia's Commission for the Disappeared
Victims of Violence said his group had documented 1,039 cases
since 1965, a surprisingly low figure for the world's fourth most
populous nation with a population of 228 million and a history of
repression.

He explained that the total did not include cases from such
trouble spots as Irian Jaya, East Timor or Aceh. Other reasons
for the low count included the difficulties of doing
investigations under the regime of former president Soeharto, and
a reluctance to speak out on the part of the fearful families of
the victims.

The Philippines logged 1,767 cases since the regime of the
late Ferdinand Marcos, and Kashmir about 2,000 cases.

One of Lagman's own brothers, Hermon, also a labor lawyer,
remains unaccounted for after disappearing in 1977. Another,
prominent left-wing activist Filemon "Popoy" Lagman, was victim
in February last year of what Lagman claimed the first political
killing to take place under the presidency of Gloria Macapagal-
Arroyo.

AFAD members said they can claim some small victories so far.

Lagman said the number of disappearances in the Philippines
was declining, and a congresswoman is expected to submit a bill
establishing a truth commission to ascertain the fate of the
disappeared.

In a Sri Lankan case involving the disappearance of 27
schoolchildren, several army officers and a school principal were
tried and seven of 11 were found guilty and jailed.