United Nations
Report: Working Group on Enforced Disappearances, E/CN.4/1996/38 (excerpt) [p.101]
Economic and Social Council
E/CN.4/1996/40
15 December 1995
Original: ENGLISH/FRENCH/SPANISH
COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS
Fifty-second session
Item 8 of the provisional agenda
QUESTION OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS OF ALL PERSONS SUBJECTED TO ANY FORM OF DETENTION OR IMPRISONMENT
Report of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention
I. ACTIVITIES OF THE WORKING GROUP
B. Urgent appeals
16. During the period under consideration the Working Group transmitted 62 urgent appeals to 38 Governments (the number of persons concerned by these appeals are given between parentheses). Five appeals were addressed to the Government of China (10).
41. China. As regards the request made by the Working Group to the Chinese authorities for an invitation to visit that country (see E/CN.4/1995/31, para.18), the Chairman of the Working Group took the matter again in a letter dated 22 September 1995. Following contacts that took place in Geneva in November between the Chairman and a senior official for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of China, the Chinese authorities indicated their intention to invite the Group to visit China in 1996.
II. B. Governments�reactions to decisions
75. During the period under consideration, the Working Group received information from a number of Governments pursuant the transmittal of decisions adopted by the Working Group with regard to cases reported to have occured in their countries. The following Governments provided the Group with such information (the decision to which the information refers is given in parentheses): Azerbaijan (31/1993), China (43/1993, 44/1993, 53/1993, 63/1993, 65/1993 and 66/1993),....
76. In some of the cases the Governments informed the Working Group that the person or persons concerned by the decision had been released. This was the case of Azherbaijan ; Indonesia, China (Qi Dafeng, Zu Guoqiang and Mao Wenke, decision 44/1993, Wang Juntao and Chen Ziming, decision 63/1993, Yulu Dawa Tsering, decision 65/1993; Liu Guandong, Wang Yijun, Wie Jingyi, Zhang Youshen, Zhang Weiming, Ngawang Chosum, Ngawang Pema, Lobsang Choedon�, Phuntson Tenzin, Pasag Dolma, Dawa Lhanzum and Hu Hai, decision 66/1993).
112. While some Governments take the suggested steps, for instance by releasing the persons concerned, they all too often fail to take the recommended follow-up action.
113. In order to draw the Commission's attention to the harmful effects this can have, the Working Group would like to submit the list of persons who, although they have been in detention for many years, in fact over six (according to information available to the Working Group on 1 December 1995, and in absence of any report by the Government concerned or by the source concerning their release or any other change in their status), continue to be deprived of their liberty, despite the fact that the Working Group has declared their detention arbitrary under categories I and II of the Principles applicable to the consideration of cases submitted to the Working Group.