Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances

TABLE OF CONTENTS

EDITORIAL

COVER STORY

- Realizing A World Without Desaparecidos

COUNTRY SITUATIONS

- The Making of Nepal’s Anti-disappearance Law

- Disappearances & Fake Encounters

NEWS FEATURES

- Claimants 1081

- Tracing Patterns of Disappearances in Latin America

- For the Want of Peace & Justice

- Probing Deeper into Munir’s Death

- Out of the Shadows

- Reclaiming Stolen Lives

PHOTO ESSAY

INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY

- Growing Federation

- At the Heart of Buenos Aires

REPRINT

- Submissions to the Independent Group of Eminent Persons

STATEMENTS

- Exhuming Truth

- Joint Statement of Independent Observers for the GRP - NDF Peace Process

POEM

- Of The Vanished

News Feature

In a world replete of disappearances, a person can be rendered faceless or nameless by the state. As one’s life is stolen and disappeared, his or her existence can be forced to be reduced to figments of the imagination. His or her memories can be thrown outside the borders of reason, leaving his or her life story in the pages of tall tales.

Consequently, families and friends of the disappeared constantly battle with the state in claiming and reclaiming their loved ones from the “vortex of fiction.” Documentation served as a weapon against the strategy of obliteration and absolute dominion. After all, information is power, according to Martin Ennals, founder of the Human Rights Information and Documentation System, International (HURIDOCS)1. He said that “proper documentation increases access to often hidden information on the subject of inhumanity. This information empowers those who are endangered and those who are working on their behalf. On all its aspects, information is vital to the universal safeguard and promotion of human rights.”

Fighting for the thousands of disappeared men and women in Asia, the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances geared up last June 3 to 6 for a more intensive and comprehensive documentation work. Guided by the theme, “Reclaiming Stolen Lives,” invited documentors-participants underwent a workshop-seminar on fact-finding and documentation at the Fort Ilocandia, Ilocos Norte. Participants came from AFAD member-organizations: Advocacy Forum (Nepal); Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (Kashmir, India); Claimants 1081 (Philippines); KontraS (Indonesia), IKOHI (Indonesia); Centre for the Protection Rights, Liberty and Democracy (Sri Lanka); and Working Group on Justice for Peace (Southern Thailand).

AFAD also invited additional participants from the Office of the Presidential Adviser for the Peace Process (OPAPP) and the Government of the Republic of the Philippines Monitoring Committee (GRP-MC) for the Peace Process between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines and the National Democratic Front.

Mr. Manuel Guzman, former executive director of HURIDOCS, and Mr. Pepito Frias, documentation officer of the Philippine Human Rights Information Center (Philrights), facilitated the four-day seminar-workshop.

The first two days focused on the discussion of concepts concerning human rights monitoring, fact-finding, interviewing, report-writing and affidavit-making. The structured processes presented on documenting served as the springboard for the third day’s activities. Through group dynamics, the participants simulated selected cases of human rights violations. Each group was given a particular role to play and a subsequent output to present. Significantly, this activity not only helped group members acquire, or for some, enhance their skills on data-gathering, it also facilitated an experience among the participants to recognize the feeling of empathy in playing the roles of the grieving families as well as vigilance when they switched to the role of human rights documentors.

More, through the role-play, the facilitators successfully concretized the theories and concepts surrounding documentation as the activity allowed the participants to apply them in scenarios they could possibly encounter during fieldwork. Later, the participants, in general, critiqued and assessed the presentations.

After highlighting the significance of systematic documentation, the groups were tasked to share how they treat gathered information in their respective organizations. Forms used to record information were presented, justified, and evaluated. Mr. Guzman took the opportunity to suggest a possibly more applicable format in filing and organizing data as it would help better determine the personal responsibilities of the suspected perpetrators in the reported cases.

As a supplement, Mr. Guzman also discussed the library-type of documentation. In its simplest sense, this type of documentation involves acquiring and organizing relevant published documented materials. The important offshoots of this type are specialized tools (e.g. abstracts and indices) that facilitate faster information retrieval for the general public.

The training served the participants well as it allowed them to realize the gaps in their existing documentation system and find ways to improve on its weaknesses. More importantly, however, it succeeded in making the group understand the power of information as seen through the eyes of Ennals; that if made useful and accessible, information can unite people of different hues to fight inhumanity. Under repression, a functional memory bank of violations can urge a nation to march and reclaim stolen lives.

(Endnotes)

1 Human Rights Information and Documentation System, International (HURIDOCS) is a global capacity-building network of organizations that uses documentation techniques, monitoring methods, information management systems and available technologies in the defense of human rights and the prevention of abuses.

Candy May Nabaunag is the librarian of AFAD’s Resource Center. Before joining the AFAD secretariat, she served as a librarian in a number of universities in Baguio City, Philippines.

VOICE August 2007