Editor

Sri Lanka: Criticism of Ongoing Use of Torture

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

(May 13, 2016) In a statement following a nine-day trip to Sri Lanka, Juan E. Méndez, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on torture, claimed that criminal and terrorism investigators in Sri Lanka still use torture against detainees, even though the use has declined since the end of the country’s civil war seven years ago. While in the country, Méndez conducted a series of interviews with individuals who had been detained; their stories were confirmed with forensic tests. (Taylor Isaac, UN Rights Expert: Sri Lanka Investigators Still Using Torture, PAPER CHASE…

UN rights expert warns torture routinely used against Sri Lankan security suspects

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

“The Tamil community has borne the brunt of the State’s well-oiled torture apparatus,” said Ben Emmerson, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, adding that the law is used disproportionately against the minority group. During his visit between 10 and 14 July to assess the progress Sri Lanka has achieved in its law, policies and practice in the fight against terrorism since the end of its internal armed conflict, Mr. Emmerson heard first-hand accounts of brutal torture. “These included beatings with sticks, stress positions, asphyxiation using plastic bags…

Torture in Sri Lanka – ‘Many times I would lose consciousness’

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

Thevan (not his real name) has flashbacks of the impossible days he spent being tortured in a police cell in Sri Lanka’s capital, Colombo. These flashbacks force him to relive a story so harrowing that even he sometimes struggles to believe it happened to him. “I was blindfolded and with my hands tied behind my back. Sometimes our heads were banged against the wall or we would be kicked on our chests. Many times I was half conscious or would lose consciousness. When I would come back I would find…

Ethnic Tamil British citizen tortured in Sri Lanka files complaint with the UN

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

Today, REDRESS has filed a complaint with the UN Human Rights Committee on behalf of Velauthapillai Renukaruban (‘Renu’), a UK citizen who was abducted, detained and tortured by Sri Lankan officials when he visited Sri Lanka in 2016. Renu, an ethnic Tamil, fled Sri Lanka in 2001, when he was 19, during the civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). In 2016, he returned to Sri Lanka to visit his elderly mother and to get married. Within 24 hours of arriving, he was abducted from his mother’s home and…

“Unbearable treatment”: torture continues despite Sri Lankan government’s promise

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

Ten years on from the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war, we have documented evidence of torture of its Tamil citizens in the context of ongoing security operations. This is despite the Sri Lankan government’s stated ‘zero tolerance’ policy on torture, and commitments to promote human rights when it was elected in 2015. In 2015, the new government of President Sirisena pledged to promote accountability and human rights, including to the UN Human Rights Council. Despite this, today we release a briefing based on 16 cases of Sri Lankan nationals who…

Tamil men accuse Sri Lankan army of torture, rape; govt says will probe

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

One of the men tortured in Sri Lanka said he was held for 21 days in a small dank room where he was raped 12 times, burned with cigarettes, beaten with iron rods; a Sri Lankan foreign ministry official said will ensure allegations are ‘investigated and prosecuted’. Sri Lanka says it will investigate allegations by more than 50 ethnic Tamils that they were abducted and tortured by police or army soldiers long after the nation’s civil war ended.

Sri Lanka army admits torture of women recruits

January 20, 2021March 29, 2021 Editor

Sri Lanka’s military admitted on Saturday soldiers had abused and tortured female recruits, a rare admission of guilt after years of allegations over its personnel’s treatment of Tamil rebels during an uprising. A military spokesman said it accepted the authenticity of a video leaked on a dissident website that appeared to show soldiers torturing women soldiers, adding instructors had overstepped their authority for an undisclosed act of violating “military discipline”. “The investigation which is being carried out by the Sri Lanka Army Corps of Military Police has so far revealed…