UN Security Council Arria Formula meeting on Missing Persons in Armed Conflict
Statement delivered by H.E. Rein Tammsaar, Permanent Representative of Estonia
12 June 2024, New York
President,
We thank Switzerland for convening today’s meeting in cooperation with The Global Alliance for the Missing, which Estonia is also a member of. Estonia aligns itself with the statement to be delivered by the European Union.
President,
Today we mark the fifth year since the adoption of Security Council Resolution 2474 on Missing Persons in Armed Conflict. Since the adoption in 2019, we have witnessed an increase in persons registered missing. Last year the ICRC registered 40 000 persons missing in armed conflicts globally, which is the highest number of annual registrations reported. This seems to be in direct correlation with growing cases of deliberate grave violations of the International Humanitarian law, which have become a tool used in warfare.
President,
Estonia welcomes initiatives aimed to help clarify the fate and whereabouts of all missing persons, as well as support all victims, including survivors and families of those missing. Estonia co-sponsored the General Assembly’s resolution setting up The Independent Institution on Missing Persons in the Syrian Arab Republic in June last year, which provides a good blueprint for the way forward.
President,
In Ukraine, 23 000 people have been registered missing since the beginning of Russia’s aggression. Many of the missing persons have been killed, but never identified. Others have been victims to grave human rights violations by being abducted, held captive or have become victims of human trafficking.
The number of persons registered as missing in Ukraine also includes thousands of children, of whom many have been forcibly deported to Russia. For this, arrest warrants have been issued by The International Criminal Court for Russian dictator and his partner in crime Lvova-Belova. We also like to draw attention to Russia’s extensive passportization campaign in Ukraine. Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale war, Russia has issued over 1,5 million Russian passports to persons living in the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories. This violates international law and complicates identifying missing persons, creating legal grounds for mass deportation of children and facilitating the erasure of Ukrainian identity.
President,
My country has initiated national proceedings to accede to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. We also contribute to the ICRC Central Tracing Agency Bureau and take pride of being a Member of the Global Alliance for the Missing.
To conclude, we call for all UN Member States to take appropriate measures to ensure thorough, prompt, impartial and effective investigations and the prosecution of offences linked to missing persons due to armed conflict.
I thank you
