2023-07-01 13:38:47
An independent institution for the detection of Syrian detainees and missing persons: from idea to vote
Surprisingly, and without media preparation, the United Nations General Assembly adopted, on Thursday night, a resolution establishing an independent institution under the auspices of the United Nations concerned with missing and forcibly disappeared persons in Syria.
This step is considered an important step to know the fate of the missing and forcibly disappeared, in light of the inaction with the Syrian issue with all its files, as well as the state of Arab normalization with the regime and its return to the Arab League, which inspired some of the beginning of the death of the Syrian issue with its multiple and complex files.
The draft resolution, drafted by Luxembourg, won the support of 83 countries, 11 once morest and 62 abstentions out of the 193 member states of the General Assembly. With the exception of Qatar and Kuwait, it was remarkable that a number of Arab countries abstained from voting, including Egypt, Bahrain, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the UAE.
While The New Arab detailed, in previous reports, the nature of the resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly following it was submitted by Luxembourg, here it goes back to the beginning of the idea of the resolution, its formulation, and the mobilization for it before its adoption.
The beginning of the idea
The director of the Syrian Program at the Atlantic Council (a non-partisan research institution), Qutaiba Idlibi, one of those who sought with the actors in the United States to prepare the draft resolution, and then proceed with it until its issuance, answers the question of “The New Arab” regarding the details of those steps, revealing that the idea It started as a result of some international efforts, explaining that the International Commission of Inquiry on Syria was the first to propose the establishment of a mechanism of this kind in its 2017 report.
Idlibi told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed that “many countries that went through similar situations to Syria had mechanisms like this institution reached by the United Nations, such as Cyprus, Kuwait, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, and others.”
Idlibi adds, “This call by the International Commission of Inquiry was received by the associations of families and groups of victims, and issued the so-called (Charter of Justice and Truth), and through it demanded finding a non-political framework to solve this problem,” noting that “at the same time, the US government worked On this issue, I held consultations with more than fifty Syrian parties representing civil society organizations, and prepared a report that I submitted to the American administration. After that, the United States began moving with European partners to advance the issue within the corridors of the United Nations, and then there was a report by the Secretary-General of the United Nations (Antonio Guterres) regarding the mechanism and its work system in form and content, the nature of the institution’s management and all the details related to it.
Two parallel lines
Idlibi explains, “The US administration was not fully convinced at first, but following securing meetings between the administration and the concerned authorities, such as family associations and victims’ groups, the administration responded to the project, and issued a report recommending its adoption regarding a year from now, then we started working with countries following the issuance of the project.” The report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (Volker Türk), pointing out that “the US administration has taken it upon itself to hold talks with some countries, while we in the Atlantic Council have held talks with other countries through workshops that present a draft resolution, and try to Discuss it with consideration of concerns and possible modifications.
Idlibi notes “the great role of the (Truth and Justice Charter) in issuing the Office of the High Commissioner’s report, which it pushed to the United Nations to clarify the need for this mechanism,” stressing that the United States worked in parallel with the efforts of the United Nations to push for the adoption of the project.
But why did Luxembourg put forward the project and not the United States? Idlibi replies that “the United States did not want to be at the forefront so that the project would not stick to it as an American project, which would affect the voting process.”
Obstacles in persuading states
Idlibi reveals that “the biggest obstacle was finding a developing country to adopt the project alongside Luxembourg, and the countries to which the issue was raised and did not accept are: Kuwait, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Mexico, Cyprus and a number of African countries, and when the approval of a state was not obtained Another to carry the decision was going to be submitted by Luxembourg alone.”
Idlibi points out that “the second obstacle was mobilizing votes to pass the project. There are countries that we believed would automatically agree to the project, but it required a lot of negotiations with them, and the countries that were reserved… Some of them had valid reasons, and others were not.” .
As for the “justified” reasons, Idlibi explains that “its owners proceeded from two things. It is clear to the Syrian opposition, and there is also concern among states regarding the financial aspect and the financing of the mechanism, especially since the report of the High Commissioner on the mechanism mentioned at its end the establishment of a fund to support the victims, and it was not understood whether the support was allocated to the families of the victims or groups, or to compensate the victims themselves. In the first part, the issue can be done with small amounts, while compensating the victims themselves requires billions of dollars, and from here the countries that support the United Nations general budget feared this aspect, before it was clarified and consensus was reached.
As for the “unjustified” reasons for some countries, they were summed up, according to Idlibi, in “the accusation regarding the politicization of the mechanism, especially since the groups and associations of the victims that want to reach it are the same ones that demand accountability from the regime in the Western and international corridors, and this matter was an argument from some countries.” Non-democracy, which mainly has problems with the issue of absenteeism and enforced disappearance.
According to various estimates by the United Nations, the number of missing persons since 2011 alone exceeds 100,000, but there are still missing persons before this date, and the number of detainees and missing persons has doubled since the outbreak of protests once morest Bashar al-Assad’s regime in March 2011, bringing the number to regarding 156,000. According to the Syrian Network for Human Rights, however, these statistics are official and their documentation requires many standards, while the data indicate that the numbers are much higher.
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