Amnesty concerned over world's 'disappeared'

100,000 of Kurds disappeared from Iraq

Hundreds of thousands of people who have disappeared around the world remain unaccounted for, according to the human rights group, Amnesty International.

Disappearances

Iran: hundreds of thousands

Latin America: 90,000

Bosnia: 18,000

Kosovo: 3,000

Chechnya: thousands

Lebanon: thousands, since 1975-90 war

The human rights group uses the term 'disappeared' when it suspects that the authorities have been involved in a person's illegal detention.

On Thursday's International Day of the Disappeared, Amnesty says the worst affected country is Iraq.

Hundreds of thousands of Shia Muslims disappeared there before the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war for allegedly being of Iranian origin.

The group says that another 100,000 Kurds are believed to have gone missing following Operation Anfal in 1988.

'Agony'

In Bosnia, the human rights group says that six years after the war ended, only 2,000 of the 20,000 originally declared missing have been found.

Families of the disappeared were outraged when Pinochet was set free

Amnesty said that the families of the disappeared "endure the agonising suffering of not knowing what happened to their children, parents, spouses, sisters and brothers."

It says that 1,100 people have disappeared in Kashmir in the past 11 years of fighting to end Indian rule.

"While recognising the responsibility of the state to combat armed insurgency, there is no legal or moral justification for the state to continue to cover up disappearances," it said.

Adoption racket

Following the activities of military regimes in Chile and Argentina, protestors in Latin America established the International Day of the Disappeared.

Colombia is becoming Latin America's disappearing centre

But Colombia is now becoming the region's disappearing centre.

Amnesty says that 300 people went missing in 1999 alone amid fighting between armed left-wing groups, the Colombian army and their right-wing paramilitary allies.

The group is also concerned about Guatemala where a womens' rights activist went missing while investigating alleged links between the military and an illegal adoption racket.

Mayra Angelina Gutierrez was last seen in April 2000, and Amnesty says she was listed on a secret military intelligence database.