When someone is suddenly made to disappear by government’s security forces, only heaven knows the magnitude of the anxiety that the victim and his or her family has to bear. As mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, sons and daughters begin to search for their missing loved ones, they harness their inner strength even as they desperately beseech God to help them find their missing kin. For twenty-one years, FIND has steadfastly struggled with them in pursuing justice, reparation and redress and an end to impunity. These have been frustratingly elusive.

Today, as we commemorate our National Day of Prayer for the Disappeared, we implore the Almighty to be with us as we strongly urge the Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo government to:

• Officially condemn enforced disappearance and never to condone it under any circumstance including a state of emergency or political instability;
• Suspend persons in authority who are suspected of having committed enforced disappearance from all official duties for the duration of the investigation, from the filing of information to the promulgation of judgment;
• Conduct speedy investigations into reported cases of disappearance and other forms of deprivation of liberty;
• Punish persons in authority who obstruct investigations and habeas corpus proceedings;
• Ensure that those responsible for enforced disappearances are promptly brought to justice and tried in competent civilian courts;
• Protect witnesses of enforced disappearance and lawyers and families of disappeared persons from any intimidation or ill-treatment; and
• Enact a law specifically defining and penalizing enforced disappearance as a crime distinct and separate from murder, kidnapping and illegal detention.

Respect the rights to life and liberty.
Surface all desaparecidos.
Enact an anti-disappearance law now.
Support the adoption by the U.N. General Assembly and subsequently ratify the international Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.