ICMP
Definition
International Commission on Missing Persons. Intergovernmental body established 1996; operates the world's largest DNA-based identification programme for missing persons from conflict and disaster contexts.
- Full name
- International Commission on Missing Persons
- Established
- 1996
- Status
- Intergovernmental organisation
- Core method
- Large-scale DNA-based identification
Common questions
What contexts does ICMP typically operate in?+
It works on identifying the missing from armed conflicts, human rights abuses, and disasters, originally set up after the Balkan wars and later extending its DNA-matching methodology to other regions and events worldwide.
How does ICMP's DNA programme scale to very large caseloads?+
It combines family reference blood samples with skeletal DNA extraction and centralised database matching, letting it process identification requests across thousands of missing-person cases rather than one case at a time.
Related terms
- DVI Chain
- Disaster Victim Identification chain: the linked sequence of ante-mortem data collection, post-mortem examination, and reconciliation comparison that produces a verified identification. Originally...
- EAAF
- The Equipo Argentino de Antropologia Forense (Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team), founded in 1984 to investigate disappearances during the military dictatorship. Widely regarded...
- ICTY
- International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Established by UN Security Council Resolution 827 in 1993; the first international tribunal since Nuremberg...
- Minnesota Protocol
- The UN Manual on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-Legal Executions (1991, updated 2016). The normative baseline for forensic investigation of...
- Rule 94Bis
- The ICTY procedural rule governing expert witness evidence. Required that expert reports be disclosed in advance, that the opposing party could challenge...