May 14, 2009 - The Daily Star - Protestors Demand Right to Know Fate of Missing Relatives

BEIRUT: The committee for the Families of the Kidnapped and Disappeared in Lebanon on Wednesday made a public complaint against the government for the withholding of information about persons classified as missing since the Civil War. The Committee (CFKDL), together with the group Support of Lebanese in Detention and Exile (SOLIDE), assembled at Horsh Beirut, a mass grave site for people still classified as missing, demanding the release of documents concerning those still unaccounted for and the location of other grave sites.
"It is our right to know,"said Wahad Halawani, President of CFKDL. "It is first and foremost a legal right - the right not to be mentally tormented.
"The relatives of victims of enforced disappearances have the right to demand the disclosure of any piece of information that can help in shedding light on the facts, including the protection of mass grave sites and their exhumation," she continued.
On July 25, 2000, an official report was released by a national commission appointed by the state for investigating the fates of the disappeared. The report identified the existence of mass graves across Lebanon, specifying mass grave sites in Horsh Beirut, Mar Mitr, and Tahwita, and concluded that many bodies were also thrown into the sea.
"Instead of using this information as a basis for uncovering the fate of those who forcibly disappeared it was used to put a lid on the issue," Halawani said in reference to a report that classified anyone missing for longer than four years as dead. "This conclusion comes in total opposition to processes currently going on in several countries around the world to address the issue of disappearances," she said, adding that the commission had disregarded basic human dignity.
The committee's official complaint was filed on April 29 of this year in two motions. The first requested the protection of mass grave sites confirmed by the official 2000 report, so that they can be exhumed at a later stage of the proceedings and the second requested the release of withheld information concerning the missing, including other gravesites, and the establishment of a social service organization that provides health and psychological support to families as compensation for moral damages.

"The legal basis for these demands comes from various international conventions, like the United Nations' Convention Against Torture and International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights," said Nizar Saghieh, the lawyer managing the case. "Next Tuesday is the first hearing for identifying the graves and taking measures to protect the sites," he confirmed.
Working with SOLIDE and CFKDL, the Lebanese Center for Human Rights (LCHR) is also pressing for a national commission of enquiry dedicated to determining what happened to those who disappeared. "We have the tools to determine what happened the only thing we lack is political will," said Wadih al-Asmar, secretary general of LCHR.
The call for the commission was approved by the Interior Ministry and Justice Ministry; it now awaits the verdict of the prime minister.
"Leaders during the war who played a role in these
disappearances are among those who now play a role in a clear decision on this very issue as leaders of peace," Halawani stated. "But they want to bury everything."
There is also the question of what impact exhuming the graves would have on the national psyche. Asmar suggested Lebanon may not be ready yet to examine its past:
"There is a lot of fear but not just among politicians. You can see some people are not ready to discuss this yet, at a time when we still have massacre look at what happened last May. If you look at Lebanese society, you see that the war is still not finished."