Sub-Commission resolution 1999/24

Draft international convention on the protection of all

persons from enforced disappearance

The Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights,

Recalling General Assembly resolution 47/133 of 18 December 1992, by which the Assembly proclaimed the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance as a body of principles for all States and urged that all efforts be made so that the Declaration became generally known and implemented,

Recalling also General Assembly resolution 41/120 of 4 December 1986, in which the Assembly recognized the value of continuing efforts to identify specific areas where further international action was required to develop the existing legal framework in the field of human rights,

Recalling further Commission on Human Rights resolution 1997/26 in which the Commission, deeply concerned, in particular, by the intensification of enforced or involuntary disappearances, took note of the report of the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (E/CN.4/1997/34) in paragraph 31 of which the Working Group welcomed the efforts of the Sub-Commission's sessional working group on the administration of justice to prepare a draft international convention on the prevention and punishment of enforced disappearances,

Considering that enforced disappearance undermines the deepest values of any society committed to respect for the rule of law, human rights and fundamental freedoms, and that the systematic practice of enforced disappearance is of the nature of a crime against humanity,

Recalling its resolution 1998/25 of 26 August 1998, in which it decided to transmit the draft international convention on the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance (E/CN.4/Sub.2/1998/19, annex) to the Commission on Human Rights for its consideration, together with the comments of the Sub-Commission thereon as well as those of the sessional working group on the administration of justice (E/CN.4/Sub.2/1998/19, paras. 9-64),

Noting Commission resolution 1999/38 of 26 April 1999 dealing with government responses to the general problem of enforced disappearances, in which the Commission took note of the draft international convention on the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance and requested the Secretary-General to renew the invitation to States, international organizations and non-governmental organizations to submit their views and comments on the matter,

1. Urges the Commission on Human Rights to give priority consideration to the draft international convention on the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance on account of the nature and degree of the suffering of the disappeared and of their families and friends;

2. Decides to consider the question of the draft international convention on the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance under the same agenda item at its fifty-second session.

33rd meeting

26 August 1999

[Adopted without a vote. See chap. XI.]