Ninety days…and I won’t break

Yemen

Yamanat

Abdul Wahab Qatran

Ninety days have passed since the enforced disappearance of my brother, Arif Muhammad Qatran, and his son Abdul Salam. Ninety days without indictment, without trial, without visit and without any communication, in flagrant violation of the Constitution, applicable laws and international and humanitarian standards and conventions.

During this period, we did not resort to shouting, but to all legitimate means. We have submitted complaints, petitions and grievances, and communicated with official, judicial and tribal authorities without exception. We did not ask for a favor, but rather for a clear and precise right: knowledge of the place of detention, access to visits and application of the law.

The response was…silence.

A silence which cannot be explained either by a misunderstanding or by the complexity of the procedures, but rather be read as a deliberate position taken. Such silence does not weaken those who hold this right, but it places full responsibility on those who exercise it.

It seems that some believe that enforced disappearance is a sufficient tool to break the will, and that a long wait will exhaust families to the point of enforced silence. This is an erroneous estimate.

The long wait does not break those who know their place in the law, nor does it change the fact that detention and enforced disappearance outside the framework of the law remains a crime, regardless of their duration.

The continued detention of my brother Arif and his son Abdul Salam without revealing their whereabouts and without allowing them to exercise their legal rights constitutes – under international law – a full-fledged crime of enforced disappearance.

Enforced disappearance is a continuous crime that only ends when the fate is revealed, and its description does not change depending on the duration or the nature of the person who committed it. In this incident, all the elements of the crime were present, including:

Deny or conceal the fate or place of detention.

Failure to officially announce the whereabouts of detainees.

Visitor ban.

Block communication.

Failure to hold a lawyer accountable.

Failure to take legal action.

This is the very essence of enforced disappearance, not just extrajudicial detention.

My brother and his son were placed as victims outside the protection of the law:

No charge. No warrant. No judge. No lawyer. No judicial review.

This pillar is the most dangerous and it has been fully implemented.

Enforced disappearance is a serious crime because:

A continuing crime: it does not disappear over time and remains in effect until the spell is revealed.

A complex crime: it involves arbitrary detention, possible acts of torture, harsh treatment and deprivation of judicial guarantees.

Yes, their enforced disappearance is an imprescriptible crime and may constitute a crime against humanity if it is carried out in a widespread or systematic manner, or if it is insisted on continuing.

This is why, today, I choose silence. No withdrawal, no despair, no retreat, but a conscious decision after everything that needed to be said has been said and everything that needed to be documented has been documented.

I will temporarily refrain from posting and commenting, because simple problems cannot be solved with exhausted nerves and because dignity is sometimes protected more by silence than by words.

As for my brother and his son, they are in the custody of the truth. The truth is not lost, history is not forgotten, and what is built on injustice does not last.

It is not a farewell, but a calculated pause, the calm of someone who knows that their rights are established and that time – however long it may be – does not confer legitimacy on injustice.

Yemen