A/HRC/RES/45/3
United Nations
General Assembly
Distr.: General
8 October 2020
Original: English
Human Rights Council
Forty-fifth session
14 September–7 October 2020
Agenda item 3
Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil,
political, economic, social and cultural rights,
including the right to development
Resolution adopted by the Human Rights Council
on 6 October 2020
45/3.
Enforced or involuntary disappearances
The Human Rights Council,
Guided by the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations,
Reaffirming the relevant articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and
the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that protect the right of life, the right
to liberty and security of person, the right not to be subjected to torture or cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment and the right to recognition as a person before the law,
Recalling Commission on Human Rights resolution 20 (XXXVI) of 29 February
1980, in which the Commission decided to establish a working group of five members to
serve as experts in their individual capacity and to examine questions relevant to enforced or
involuntary disappearances, and also all previous resolutions on this subject, in particular
Human Rights Council resolutions 7/12 of 27 March 2008 and 16/16 of 24 March 2011, in
which the Council renewed by consensus the mandate of the Working Group on Enforced or
Involuntary Disappearances, as well as Council decision 25/116 of 27 March 2014, and
Council resolutions 21/4 of 27 September 2012, 27/1 of 25 September 2014 and 36/6 of 28
September 2017,
Recalling also General Assembly resolution 47/133 of 18 December 1992, by which
the Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced
Disappearance as a body of principles for States, Assembly resolution 61/177 of 20
December 2006, by which it adopted the International Convention for the Protection of All
Persons from Enforced Disappearance, which came into force on 23 December 2010, and
Assembly resolutions 70/160 of 17 December 2015 and 74/161 of 18 December 2019,
Recalling further that no one shall be subjected to enforced disappearance and that no
exceptional circumstance whatsoever may be invoked as justification for enforced
disappearances,
Welcoming the fact that 98 States have signed the Convention and that 63 States have
ratified or acceded to it, and recognizing that its implementation is a significant contribution
to ending impunity and to the promotion and protection of all human rights for all,
GE.20-13206(E)