Download the full report - Human Rights Watch
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Name: JH (all initials are pseudonyms and bear no relation to <strong>the</strong> person’s actual name)<br />
Gender: Male<br />
Age: 23<br />
Date Detained: September 2012<br />
Date Released: October 2012<br />
Circumstances of detention: JH arrived in <strong>the</strong> UK to pursue higher studies in March 2011 and<br />
returned to Sri Lanka to attend to family matters on August 17, 2012. One evening in September<br />
2012, JH was walking home in Colombo when a white van pulled up near him. Several men jumped<br />
out and told him to join <strong>the</strong>m for an investigation. They blindfolded him and drove him for over an<br />
hour to an unknown site.<br />
Account:<br />
I was taken up some stairs but when <strong>the</strong>y removed my blindfold I found myself in a<br />
room where four o<strong>the</strong>r men were present. I was tied to a chair and questioned<br />
about my links to <strong>the</strong> LTTE and <strong>the</strong> reason for my recent travel abroad. They<br />
stripped me and started beating me. I was beaten with electric wires and burned<br />
with cigarettes. My interrogators tried to asphyxiate me. 100 Later that night, I was<br />
left in a smaller room. I was raped on three consecutive days. The first night, one<br />
man came alone and anally raped me. The second and third night, two men came<br />
to my room. They anally raped me and also forced me to have oral sex with <strong>the</strong>m. I<br />
signed a confession admitting my links with <strong>the</strong> LTTE after <strong>the</strong> rapes. 101<br />
JH’s medico legal <strong>report</strong>, on file with <strong>Human</strong> <strong>Rights</strong> <strong>Watch</strong>, notes that <strong>the</strong> physical evidence of<br />
scars on his body strongly support his account of torture. The <strong>report</strong> fur<strong>the</strong>r adds: “<strong>the</strong> spots of<br />
dark pigmentation on his buttocks and around his anus are consistent with an infective rash which<br />
has now healed, support in my view, a situation in which he was repeatedly subjected to anal<br />
intercourse in which his skin has become lacerated and easily infected.”<br />
JH escaped detention after his family bribed CID officials. He has since received medical care for<br />
severe anal pain.<br />
100<br />
In a number of cases documented in this <strong>report</strong>, perpetrators forcibly covered a victim’s head and face with<br />
a plastic bag soaked in petrol so that <strong>the</strong>y had to brea<strong>the</strong> <strong>the</strong> toxic fumes till <strong>the</strong>y almost asphyxiated.<br />
101 <strong>Human</strong> <strong>Rights</strong> <strong>Watch</strong> interview with JH, October 13, 2012.<br />
51 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | FEBRUARY 2013