SOLIDE calls for forming national committee to deal with enforced disappearance

The committee of relatives of detainees in Syrian jails and the nongovernmental organization for Support of Lebanese in Detention and Exile (SOLIDE), said on Thursday that the release of Yaacoub Chamoun contradicts with the common excuse voiced by authorities over the years which stipulates that “no Lebanese detainees remain in Syrian prisons”.            

The committees called on the Lebanese government to form a national body in charge of dealing with enforced disappearance cases, according to the decree of the Minister of Justice, emerging from a previous one presented by several organizations to the former Justice Minister in April 2009.            

During a press conference held outside the ESCWA building in Beirut, the aforementioned committees demanded that, during the upcoming legislative session, Lebanon ratifies the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and send a direct invitation to the UN Working Group on Enforced Disappearances Unit to visit Lebanon, so that local organizations can benefit from their expertise in this regard.          

SOLIDE stressed its commitment to this cause regardless of regional and political changes.