For Immediate Release
January 27, 2006
Contact: Daniel J. Johnson
[email protected]/847.543.0630
www.iffampac.org
IFFAMPAC Offers Condolences to the People of Kosovo
Rockford, Illinois. “To the people of Kosovo, we express our sympathy for the loss of their president Mr. Ibrahim Rugova,” said Jane E. Durgom-Powers, founder and president of the International Federation of Family Associations of Missing Persons from Armed Conflicts (IFFAMPAC). IFFAMPAC works to unite families and family associations in their effort to learn the fate of loved ones who are missing because of armed conflicts.
Recently Ms. Durgom-Powers returned from a trip to the Balkans where she met with family association representatives from UN administered Kosovo. She had accepted an invitation to meet with President Rugova at the request of the families when the announcement of Mr. Rugova’s death was released.
“The deaths of those who have dedicated their lives to peace, especially to finding peaceful solutions to seemingly intractable conflicts, is a great blow to everyone around the world,” Durgom-Powers said. “We hope that the work he started will be continued.”
Durgom-Powers founded IFFAMPAC as an international non-governmental organization to serve as an advocate, link, and information archive for family associations worldwide in their effort to prevent their family members from becoming unaccounted for and to resolve cases of missing persons.
IFFAMPAC is working in a joint effort with the International Humanitarian Law Subcommittee of the International Human Rights Committee of the International Section of the American Bar Association to develop a new model international law and to develop best practices guidelines to address the issue of the missing.