By A Staff Reporter

Kathmandu, July 1

Amnesty International (AI) has presented a thousand of appeal letters collected from over the world to Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal Wednesday demanding to ratify the International Convention on Enforced Disappearance.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Nepal expressed his commitment in a meeting with AI Nepal to take effective action to end impunity in Nepal.

A delegation, on behalf of the International Coalition against Enforced Disappearances (ICAED), delivered thousands of letters to the PM calling to ratify a human rights treaty to combat enforced disappearances. Defense Minister Bidhya Bhandari was also presented in the meeting.

The ICAED launched ratification campaigns focusing a country for particular time frame between April to July 2009. The ICAED had launched a campaign on Nepal calling Nepalese authorities to ratify international conventions of all people from enforced disappearances. The campaign on Nepal has resulted in 5,366 appeal letters from within Nepal and abroad calling on Nepal to ratify the convention.

More than 3 years after the Supreme Court recommended establishment of an effective commission to investigate enforced disappearances.

As countless persons continue to be "disappeared" throughout the world, a prompt entry into force of the convention and its ratification and effective implementation in all countries must be a priority for the international community and particularly for countries that have a legacy of enforced disappearances, such as Nepal.

The delegation expressed concerns over the rising impunity with the Prime Minister.

The delegation also submitted another memorandum highlighting on the need of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) with no provision of amnesties for cases of violation of international human rights and humanitarian laws, including extrajudicial killings, tortures, abductions, disappearances and rapes.

The memorandum has further stressed that the whereabouts of those disappeared by the government security forces and the communist party of Nepal Maoist should be made public immediately.

The Rome Statute of the international criminal court should ratify recently to end the impunity.

The memorandum has also raised serious concerns about the protection of women human rights defenders.