The Convention on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance is one of the most recent international human rights instruments and its aims is to affirm an absolute prohibition of all forms of enforced disappearance (see Art. 2 “No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for enforced disappearance“) and to prohibit any kind of secret detention (Art. 17).
The Convention provides for a definition of “enforced disappearance” that reads as follows:
“[E]nforced dissapearance is considered to be the arrest, detention, abduction or any other form of deprivation of liberty by agents of the State or by persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or by concealment of the fate or whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection of the law.”
All States parties to the Convention are called to:
- take appropriate measures to investigate acts, that constitute an enforced dissapearance, committed by persons or groups of persons acting without the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State and to bring those responsible to justice (Art. 3);
- ensure that enforced disappearance constitutes an offence under its criminal law (Art. 4);
- ensure that any individual who alleges that a person has been subjected to enforced disappearance has the right to report the facts to the competent authorities, which shall examine the allegation promptly and impartially and, where necessary, undertake without delay a thorough and impartial investigation (Art. 12);
- ensure that the complainant, witnesses, relatives of the disappeared person and their defence counsel, as well as persons participating in the investigation, are protected against all ill-treatment or intimidation as a consequence of the complaint or any evidence given (Art. 12);
- avoid to expel, return (“refouler”), surrender or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he or she would be in danger of being subjected to enforced disappearance (Art. 16);
- promote training on the Convention among law enforcement personnel, civil or military, medical personnel, public officials and other persons who may be involved in the custody or treatment of any person deprived of liberty (Art. 23);
- grant to the victim of an enforced disappearance his/her right to obtain a reparation such as restitution; rehabilitation; satisfaction, including restoration of dignity and reputation;guarantees of non-repetition (Art. 24).
Some provisions are dedicated to the relatives of the person deprived of liberty. In fact, the Convention obliges the States parties to give them all the information related to detention and all elements relating to the state of health of the person deprived of liberty as well as to admit them to the place of deprivation of liberty (Art. 18).
Finally, it is worth to be noticed that Art. 5 defines the widespread or systematic practice of enforced disappearance constitutes a crime against humanity.