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UN Working Group Voice Serious Concern About Enforced Disappearances of Lawyers in China

Date: 2011-04-08

The UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (“WGEID”) expressed serious concern about the recent wave of enforced disappearances that have allegedly taken place in China over the last few months.
The WGEID has received multiple reports of a number of persons being subject to enforced disappearances including the lawyers Teng Biao, Tang Jitian, Jiang Tianyong and Tang Jingling.
In a press statement issued in Geneva, the working group stated that “According to the allegations received, there is a pattern of enforced disappearances in China, where persons suspected of dissent are taken to secret detention facilities, and are then often tortured and intimidated, before being released or put into ‘soft detention’ and barred from contacting the outside world.”
“Enforced disappearance is a crime under international law. Even short-term secret detentions can qualify as enforced disappearances,” the UN expert body said. “There can never be an excuse to disappear people, especially when those persons are peacefully expressing their dissent with the Government of their country.”
The working group added it is also concerned by several long-running cases of reported disappearances, including a case from 1995 involving six-year-old Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, also known as the 11th Panchen Lama, and the February 2009 disappearance of human rights lawyer, Gao Zhisheng.
The experts called on China to release all those who have been forcibly disappeared and to provide information on the fate and whereabouts of people who have allegedly disappeared. The WGEID also called on Chinese authorities to ensure that full investigations take place and that there are internal reparations to those who have “suffered this heinous practice.”
Created in 1980, the working group’s members are independent and they report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. The working group’s chair-rapporteur is Jeremy Sarkin of South Africa. Its other members are: Ariel Dulitkzy (Argentina), Jasminka Dzumhur (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Osman El-Hajjé (Lebanon) and Olivier de Frouville (France).

The UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (“WGEID”) expressed serious concern about the recent wave of enforced disappearances that have allegedly taken place in China over the last few months.

The WGEID has received multiple reports of a number of persons being subject to enforced disappearances including the lawyers Teng Biao, Tang Jitian, Jiang Tianyong and Tang Jingling.

In a press statement issued in Geneva, the working group stated that “According to the allegations received, there is a pattern of enforced disappearances in China, where persons suspected of dissent are taken to secret detention facilities, and are then often tortured and intimidated, before being released or put into ‘soft detention’ and barred from contacting the outside world.”

“Enforced disappearance is a crime under international law. Even short-term secret detentions can qualify as enforced disappearances,” the UN expert body said. “There can never be an excuse to disappear people, especially when those persons are peacefully expressing their dissent with the Government of their country.”

The working group added it is also concerned by several long-running cases of reported disappearances, including a case from 1995 involving six-year-old Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, also known as the 11th Panchen Lama, and the February 2009 disappearance of human rights lawyer, Gao Zhisheng.

The experts called on China to release all those who have been forcibly disappeared and to provide information on the fate and whereabouts of people who have allegedly disappeared. The WGEID also called on Chinese authorities to ensure that full investigations take place and that there are internal reparations to those who have “suffered this heinous practice.”

Created in 1980, the working group’s members are independent and they report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. The working group’s chair-rapporteur is Jeremy Sarkin of South Africa. Its other members are: Ariel Dulitkzy (Argentina), Jasminka Dzumhur (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Osman El-Hajjé (Lebanon) and Olivier de Frouville (France).