UN Backs Treaty to Ban Abduction of Perceived Enemies

The United Nations General Assembly adopted a treaty that bans the abduction of perceived enemies, prohibits the maintenance of secret detention facilities for them and forbids the killing of them. The treaty will be opened for signing at a Paris ceremony on February 6, 2007 and will enter into force a month after 20 countries ratify the text according to their constitutionally required formulae. The United States is not expected to be among them.

The "International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance" has been under discussion since 1992. Disappearance is best known from the South American “Dirty War” perpetrated by criminals like Leopoldo Galtieri of Argentina. Those who opposed the military regime were “disappeared,” that is, taken into custody while having that detention denied by the state. The concept of habeas corpus exists precisely to prevent this.

The treaty text offers the first definition of disappearance in international law, calling it detention, abduction, or deprivation of liberty by state agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge deprivation and a placing of those who have disappeared outside the protection of the law. It calls enforced disappearance a criminal act that cannot be justified, and says perpetrators must be sought out and brought to justice. It requires governments to outlaw secret detention and undeclared detention facilities, and establishes the right of families to learn the fate and whereabouts of relatives who have been detained. It also creates a committee to monitor the treaty’s implementation and to review individuals' complaints of disappearances that governments have not acknowledged.

The Bush administration is certain to ignore the Paris ceremony. The “rendition” of suspected Al Qaeda operatives and sympathizers to secret facilities for torture is part of the White House plan to look tough against Usama bin Laden’s lackeys. The treaty would criminalize this part of US policy. The current administration is composed of the biggest bunch of bunglers ever to acquire power in America, but not even they would sign a treat that would make them under international law.

As with any treaty, there is no enforcement mechanism other than the power of the states that sign it to pursue the ends of the treaty under their own laws. There was a time when the US would have sponsored this kind of agreement. Now, there will just be embarrassing silence.

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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