On
Disappearances,
UN Doesn't
Address
Nigeria Girls,
Silent on US
& ISIS
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
October 23 --
The case of 43
students
missing in
Guerrero
state in
Mexico was
raised at the
UN by Ariel
Dulitzky,
Chair of the
Working Group
on Enforced or
Involuntary
Disappearances
and Mr.
Emmanuel
Decaux, Chair
of the
Committee on
Enforced
Disappearances
at
a press
conference on
October 23.
But they did
not mention
the more
than 200 girls
kidnapped by
Boko Haram in
Chibok.
Inner
City Press
asked why the
Chibok girls
were not
mentioned by
the
Working Group
or Committee,
and about the
US government
process on
the Americans
kidnapped and
then beheaded
by Islamic
State, ISIS or
Da'esh.
Dulitzky
said
that his
jurisdiction
requires state
involvement in
the
disappearance,
while both
cases Inner
City Press
raised
involved
non-state
actors. Decaux
added that
these
restrictions
are
frustrating,
that to the
victims and
their families
there is no
difference.
Neither
directly
addressed the
US government
telling
families of
the
disappeared to
stay quiet,
for example.
Inner
City Press
followed up by
asking how the
Working Group
knew, early
on, of
government
involvement in
the
disappearances
in Guerrero,
now
attributed by
the Mexican
attorney
general to the
Mayor and his
wife. Dulitzky
said before
his statement,
there was
evidence of
the
involvement of
municipal
authorities.
But what is
the standard,
the
quantum of
such proof,
needed to get
the UN Working
Group
involved?
Decaux
said while
Nigeria is a
state party,
the people
there must not
have
heard of it
because he has
received no
complaints or
appeals.
The
first question
was set-aside
for the old UN
Correspondents
Association,
which asked a
softball
question
merely
repeating what
the panelists
had already
said about Syria
(102
complaints)
and DPRK
/
North Korea --
only 47
complaints,
nearly all
about citizens
of
Japan and
South Korea.
The new Free
UN Coalition
for Access
objects
to set-asides,
especially
when as here
other journalists
had their
questions all
bunched
together, and
to the UN's
Censorship
Alliance.
We'll have
more
on this.
, 
