Human Rights Watch urged the Lao government to implement key recommendations on enforced disappearances and the denial of basic civil and political rights on Friday.
The recommendations include ratifying effective legal measures to prevent enforced disappearances, eliminating all forms of discrimination against women in education, and using international human rights instruments.
After criticizing the lack of progress on Laos’ human rights record in May, HRW welcomed Laos’ support for several Universal Periodic Review (UPR) recommendations. However, it expressed concern about the government’s rejection of several proposed measures to conduct credible investigations into cases of enforced disappearances.
HRW also expressed alarm at Laos’ rejection of recommendations on basic civil and political rights, such as freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly. It also highlighted particular concern about recommendations calling for the government to protect citizens from unjust law enforcement. These include harassment, arbitrary arrest and detention, torture, and enforced disappearance.
The case of Lao activist Somphone Somphone remains unresolved 12 years after his disappearance. Somphone was last seen in 2012 at a police checkpoint on a busy street in the Lao capital. CCTV footage captured him being stopped and forced into another vehicle by police. His wife said, “Lao government officials have ignored my appeals for 12 years, and they continue to tell people who ask about what happened to Somphone that the investigation is ongoing.”
HRW described Somphone’s disappearance as emblematic of Laos’ widespread impunity for rights violations against critics, calling on Laos to conduct a full and impartial investigation into Somphone’s enforced disappearance and reveal his fate.
During this UPR cycle, Laos supported 189 of the 257 recommendations received. HRW urges UN member states to pressure Laos to further implement the UPR recommendations, including a full and impartial investigation into reported attacks on dissidents and an end to arbitrary arrests and detention.
