UN expert reports decade-high caseload of enforced disappearances

Grażyna Baranowska told the UN General Assembly’s Third Committee on 20 October that its Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances had sent 1,723 new cases to 36 states in its latest reporting period. She called it the group’s highest annual figure in a decade. [1]

The group’s report covers cases it handled between 3 May 2025 and 8 May 2026. In the preceding reporting period, it sent 1,278 cases to 38 states — 445 fewer. But the figures count cases passed to governments, including allegations concerning earlier disappearances. They do not show how many people disappeared worldwide during either period. [2] [3]

The group says 50,930 cases remain under active consideration without having been clarified, closed or discontinued. Baranowska also warned that another 8,000 cases were awaiting registration, review or processing, saying: “We are being asked to do considerably more with less.” [2] [1]

At the same meeting, Andrea Bolaños Vargas, the UN special rapporteur on human rights defenders, warned that criminalisation was a widespread threat to people exposing abuses. In a survey of 1,122 respondents she presented, 66% of women human rights defenders said they believed their situation had deteriorated; the figure was 78% among LGBTIQ+ women defenders. She also described surveillance, funding restrictions and violence against defenders and their families. [1]