Alkarama appealed to the Human Rights Committee (HRC) on behalf of Mrs Farida Khirani, Ouaghlissi's wife, in the case of a personal communication dated 1 July 2009.

Maamar Ouaghlissi was born on 23 October 1958 in Constantine (Algeria). He is married with two children. He was a quantity surveyor for the Algerian railway service.

According to testimonies reported by his colleagues, his arrest took place at the premises of his workplace on 27 September 1994 at around 13h00 when he was returning from a break. At least three plainclothes officers came to the company's headquarters in a white 4X4 Nissan Patrol. This type of vehicle is used by the police and the Department of Intelligence and Military Security Services (KRA).

They presented themselves as employees Security Forces without specifying exactly to what section they belonged. Having not found Maamar Ouaghlissi at his workplace, they decided to wait while preventing his colleagues from leaving, probably for fear they might inform Mr Ouaghlissi.

Upon his return, they him to follow them and gave no explanation. According to his colleagues, they gave no reason for the arrest and did not submit a judicial warrant.

Eventually they asked him to get in his own blue car, accompanied by two officers. They then left the scene to an unknown destination.

Despite all the steps taken by his family to know Mr Ouaghlissi whereabouts, his wife eventually learned, through a released prisoner, that eight months after his abduction, her husband was detained in Mansourah barracks, under the 5th Military Region and operated by the DRS.

Up until the end of 1995, several witnesses reported to his wife and his family that he was being detained in the barracks of the DRS. A final testimony reported by a soldier in 1996 established that up until that point he was still alive. Since then, no news of him has been received by his family.

It is significant to note that many abductions and arrests made in the city of Constantine, affecting in particular members of councils, MPs or individual activists and supporters of the FIS, took place during the previous days and during entire month.

According to many testimonies of survivors, all persons arrested by the Judicial Police were detained incommunicado for several weeks or months at the police headquarters in Constantine where they were systematically tortured. They were eventually transferred to the Territorial Center for Research and Investigations (CTRI) of the 5th Military Region under the DRS and directed (at that time) by Colonel Kamel Hamoud. Those abducted by the DRS were in turn led directly to the CTRI and many have disappeared.

The arrest of Maamar Ouaghlissi was probably part of the same coordinated and planned police operation carried out by the judicial services of the DRS in Constantine.

Among the many initiatives of his wife, she addressed herself to the Constatine Tribunal to see whether or not Mr Ouaghlissi had appeared in front of the prosecutor general.

His father filed a complaint to the prosecutor with regards to the disappearance and kidnapping of his son. The prosecutor of Constantine has never agreed to investigate or act upon the complaint and the prosecution has refused to disclose the references to the father to register his complaint.

Mr Ouaghlissi's wife also filed a complaint for disappearance and kidnapping of her husband in 1998. Due to her uncompromising insistence, the prosecutor of Constantine was finally received and heard on record.

It does not appear that the prosecutor actually opened an investigation. None of the witnesses in his wife's statement to the prosecutor, especially Mr Ouaghlissi's co-workers, were ever asked to be heard.

Meanwhile, once she learned that a complaints bureau for the families of the disappeared had been established in each prefecture, Ms Ouaghlissi filed a complaint with the administrative authorities on 28 September 1998. It was not until 2000 that it was taken up by the police, who learned that the research concerning the disappearance of her husband remained without results.

All appeals have been exhausted, especially since Ordinance No. 6 / 01 on the "implementation of the Charter for peace and national reconciliation" was promulgated on 27 February 2006. It prohibits any definitive case against the perpetrators of crimes and threat of imprisonment for anyone who might be tempted "to harm their reputation" (Articles 45 and 46).

Ms. Ouaghlissi finally wrote a personal communication to the HRC to the Commission detailing the fact that the disappearance of her husband constitutes a violation of the right to life, to freedom from torture or cruelty, inhuman or degrading to liberty and security of the person in detention to receive treatment respectful of human dignity to be recognized as a matter of law, the right to a remedy (2 § 3 § 6 1, 7, 9 § 1, 2, 3 and 4, 10 and 16 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights).

Ms. Ouaghlissi asked the HRC to request that the Algerian government:

1 - Release Mr Maamar Ouaghlissi, who is still held in incommunicado detention by a nondescript authority and to take any measure to ensure that he does not suffer irreparable injury

2 - Not to enforce upon him or upon any other victim of the stipulations of Articles 45 and 46 of the Ordinance enacting the Charter, nor to worry him in any manner whatsoever, in order to deprive him of his right to plead to the Human Rights Committee.