Mafqud.org
"More than a hundred thousand Iraqi citizens have disappeared at the hands of the state since the late 1970s. Mafqud.org is an on-line database of biographical and other information on victims of these enforced disappearances." [1]
"Mafqud.org was designed and is maintained by Huquqalinsan.org, an organization working to promote human rights for Iraq. In 1995, with the help of Chilean experts, who were the first to develop the methodologies needed to accurately document enforced disappearances, the organization (then known as The Organization for Human Rights in Iraq, or OHRI) established a Center for the Disappeared in northern Iraq. Staff at the Center interviewed relatives and acquaintances of nearly a thousand disappeared persons, collecting biographical and other information, including the circumstances of disappearances and photographs of the disappeared. Because of the changing situation on the ground, the operations of the center were ended in 1996. The information gathered by the human rights workers at the center comprise the kernel for the records included in Mafqud.org." [2]
Funding
"The Center for the Disappeared in Iraq was established with a grant from the National Endowment for Democracy, and the launch of Mafqud.org has been made possible by a grant from the United States Department of State." [3]
"Forced disappearances are one of the most egregious forms of human rights abuse. They affect both the disappeared and his friends and family. The founders of OHRI decided to address this issue by setting up a center that would document, to the extent possible, cases of disappearances. In 1994, thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for Democracy, such a center was set up in Arbil." [4]
Participating organisations
"The following organizations have contributed to Mafqud.org, providing records of disappeared people. Several of these organizations also have other activities, which are described in the corresponding links:
- Huquqalinsan.org (formerly OHRI), is based in Washington, DC, and is the organization that has initiated Mafqud.org, and is responsible for its implementation and maintenance.
- The Documental Center for Human Rights in Iraq (DCHRI) is based in Tehran, Iran, and maintains an impressive amount of documentation on human rights and human rights abuses in Iraq. DCHRI is particularly active internationally and has contributed to the work of the UN Commission on Human Rights.
- The Faylee Kurd Community Foundation (FKCF) is a humanitarian organization based in London, in the United Kingdom, which focuses its efforts on documenting the fate of the Faylee Kurd community in Iraq. In particular, FKCF volunteers have documented large numbers of disappearances, which occurred during the massive deportations of Faylee Kurds of the 1980s.[5]
