This report first examines the role of medico-legal skills in uncovering and exposing human rights violations, through the use of forensic pathology and anthropology; in the development of the UN Manual on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions, and other initiatives; and its role in tracing disappeared children through application of genetic techniques. It also explores the after-effects of such abuses on survivors and families. Two tables give details of 24 cases highlighted in AI’s campaign against political killings and disappearances, and cases of the disappearance and killing of medical personnel. An appendix gives a selected bibliography.
