On 7 September 2026, the Women Peacebuilders Network in Lebanon (WPNL), hosted by UN Women Lebanon, and the Space for Collaboration in Syria, hosted by the Civil Society and Democracy Center (CCSD), jointly organized an online webinar on the issue of missing and forcibly disappeared persons in Lebanon and Syria. The webinar aimed to provide a space for dialogue among families, national and international institutions, and civil society, while exploring opportunities for cooperation between the two countries, with particular emphasis on the role of women and families of missing persons in efforts to uncover the truth and achieve justice.
The webinar brought together more than 70 participants from Lebanon, Syria, and the wider region, including representatives of civil society organizations, human rights and women’s rights organizations, peacebuilders, families of missing persons, researchers, and development partners. It also featured high-level speakers and representatives of families and relevant institutions, including Lebanon’s Deputy Prime Minister, Dr. Tarek Mitri; Head of Syria’s National Commission for Missing Persons, Dr. Mohammad Reda Jalkhi; Ms. Karla Quintana, United Nations Assistant Secretary-General and Head of the Independent Institution on Missing Persons in the Syrian Arab Republic (IIMP); and Ms. Abir Abou Zaki Haidar, member of Lebanon’s National Commission for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared. Other speakers included Ms. Wadad Halawani, founder of the Committee of the Families of Kidnapped and Disappeared in Lebanon, and Ms. Nour Burhan, a Syrian feminist activist and family member of missing persons. The webinar opened with welcoming remarks by Ms. Gielan El-Messiri, UN Women Representative in Lebanon, and Mr. Ajay Madiwale, UN Women Representative in Syria. The discussion was moderated by Ms. Manal Hamdoun, representing the Women Peacebuilders Network in Lebanon, and Ms. Sima Nassar, representing the Space for Collaboration in Syria.
Dr. Tarek Mitri situated the issue of missing persons within the broader context of Lebanese–Syrian relations, emphasizing that the cross-border nature of the issue requires joint efforts based on trust, mutual respect, and shared interests, rather than political bargaining or instrumentalization. He stressed that uncovering the fate of missing persons is a fundamental human right and an essential condition for achieving justice and addressing the legacy of conflict. He also highlighted the importance of cooperation between the national commissions in Lebanon and Syria to translate political and institutional engagement into tangible results for families.
The voices of families of missing persons were central to the discussion. Syrian feminist activist Nour Burhan shared her personal experience of searching for missing family members, emphasizing that women searching for their loved ones bring not only personal experiences but also extensive practical knowledge and expertise in documentation, accessing information, navigating complex procedures, and addressing the risks of exploitation, extortion, and fraud faced by families. She stressed the need to move beyond symbolic recognition of women’s roles towards their meaningful participation in designing procedures, setting priorities, and shaping policies and decisions. She also highlighted the importance of addressing the long-term legal, psychological, social, and economic consequences of disappearance for families.
Drawing on the Lebanese experience, Ms. Wadad Halawani reflected on the decades-long struggle led by families of missing persons, particularly women, to transform their individual suffering into a national cause transcending sectarian and geographic divisions. She described how families built a grassroots movement and established alliances with civil society organizations, legal professionals, and academics, ultimately contributing to the adoption of Law No. 105 of 2018 and the establishment of the National Commission for the Missing and Forcibly Disappeared. She underscored the importance of documentation, preserving collective memory, and continuing to advocate for the implementation of the law and support the work of the National Commission. She emphasized that the establishment of formal mechanisms does not bring the role of families to an end, but rather requires their continued participation and engagement in monitoring the work of the relevant institutions.
At the institutional level, Dr. Mohammad Reda Jalkhi outlined the priorities and guiding principles of Syria’s National Commission for Missing Persons, including meaningful engagement with families and civil society, non-discrimination, professional and scientifically grounded approaches, managing families’ expectations, and ensuring complementarity among actors working on the issue. He also presented ongoing efforts to develop the institutional and legislative framework, establish a national database of missing persons, and strengthen national capacities in forensic medicine, DNA analysis, and the management of mass graves, alongside the provision of legal, psychological, and social support to families.
One of the most significant practical developments announced during the discussion was Dr. Jalkhi’s indication that the national commissions responsible for missing persons in Syria and Lebanon intend to sign a cooperation agreement. This announcement was particularly relevant to the webinar’s objectives, as it directly responds to the need to strengthen Lebanese–Syrian cooperation on the issue of missing persons. It also opens opportunities for more structured institutional collaboration and the exchange of expertise between the two countries in ways that respond to the needs of families.
Ms. Abir Abou Zaki Haidar, speaking both as the daughter of a missing person and as a member of Lebanon’s National Commission, emphasized that the participation of families and women within relevant institutions contributes to building trust, integrating families’ accumulated knowledge into institutional processes, identifying their needs and the obstacles they face, and ensuring that institutional efforts remain responsive to the priorities of those directly affected. She also highlighted the opportunities presented by Lebanese–Syrian cooperation to exchange experiences between Lebanon’s longstanding efforts in organizing, advocacy, and legislative reform, and Syria’s emerging institutional experience in addressing a missing persons file of considerable scale and complexity.
From an international perspective, Ms. Karla Quintana emphasized that the search for missing persons cannot be undertaken by a single institution, but requires a collective effort involving national institutions, families, civil society, and international mechanisms. She highlighted the importance of national ownership and political will, as well as ensuring that information is made available, analyzed, and shared to provide families with faster and more accurate answers. She also emphasized the value of technology, scientific and technical expertise, and lessons learned from international experiences. Furthermore, she stressed that women must be meaningfully involved in search processes rather than being limited to consultative roles, recognizing the knowledge and expertise they have accumulated through years of searching and advocacy at the national and international levels.
The overall discussion reaffirmed that the search for missing persons cannot be treated as an institutional process disconnected from families, and that women who have carried this cause for decades must be recognized as partners in designing, implementing, and monitoring efforts to uncover the truth and achieve justice. This is particularly relevant in light of growing international recognition of the role of women searching for missing persons, including the United Nations General Assembly’s designation of 19 December as an international day recognizing these women.
The speakers’ interventions and the broader discussion highlighted a number of priorities and practical proposals, including:
- Institutionalizing the participation of families and women at all stages of addressing the issue of missing persons, from policy and mechanism design and priority-setting to implementation, monitoring, evaluation, and decision-making, ensuring that their involvement extends beyond consultations or the sharing of personal testimonies.
- Strengthening direct cooperation between the national commissions in Lebanon and Syria, building on the planned cooperation agreement to develop working mechanisms and facilitate the exchange of expertise that responds to families’ needs and supports efforts to address the shared dimensions of the issue across both countries.
- Developing clear and secure mechanisms for information-sharing and coordination among national institutions, international mechanisms, civil society organizations, and families, to reduce duplication of efforts and accelerate access to reliable information concerning the fate of missing persons.
- Establishing clear and transparent channels for families to report cases, follow up on developments, and access information, reducing their reliance on personal connections or informal sources, protecting them from exploitation and fraud, and strengthening trust in relevant institutions.
- Linking the issue of missing persons to transitional justice, legal reform, and guarantees of non-recurrence, while addressing the legal consequences of disappearance for families, including matters related to personal status, documentation, property, inheritance, guardianship, and access to rights and services.
- Providing comprehensive and sustained support to families of missing persons, including psychological, legal, social, and economic assistance, while taking into account the specific needs of women, children, refugees, internally displaced persons, and families living far from service centers.
- Strengthening national and technical capacities in documentation, forensic medicine, DNA analysis, mass grave management, and missing persons databases, drawing on Lebanese, Syrian, and international expertise to support search efforts and provide answers to families.Protecting and documenting the knowledge and collective memory accumulated by families and civil society organizations, drawing on their archives, testimonies, and expertise as essential resources for uncovering the truth, preserving collective memory, supporting justice efforts, and preventing the recurrence of violations.