The Hague, 21 December 2021: – The Policy Coordination Group (PCG), a Syrian-led initiative on the missing and disappeared facilitated by the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP), adopted a set of Proposed Constitutional Principles on Syria’s Missing and Disappeared today.
These principles address the legacy of systematic human rights violations in Syria, including the widespread practice of enforced disappearance, and the need to establish rights-based guarantees to protect all persons from going missing or from being disappeared.
The document adopted today by the PCG is divided into two sections and a descriptive annex. The first section includes provisions directly related to the issue of the missing, including the right to life and dignity, safeguards against the deprivation of liberty, and transitional justice measures. The second lists provisions that are indirectly linked to the missing persons issue such as supporting a political transition based on the rule of law and the separation…