State Violence in Sri Lanka - World Organisation Against Torture
State Violence in Sri Lanka - World Organisation Against Torture
State Violence in Sri Lanka - World Organisation Against Torture
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<strong>State</strong> <strong>Violence</strong> <strong>in</strong> SRI LANKA<br />
d Proper function<strong>in</strong>g of a corruption-control agency requires different skills<br />
for different functions such as <strong>in</strong>vestigations, prosecutions, public education,<br />
public relations and management. The limited structure that exists under the<br />
present law does not fulfill these requirements.<br />
e. The general public feels that there is no real political resolve to genu<strong>in</strong>ely<br />
establish a powerful corruption-control agency <strong>in</strong> the country. The people also<br />
feel that the exist<strong>in</strong>g structure is but a symbolic <strong>in</strong>stitution, lack<strong>in</strong>g real capacity<br />
and resources to control corruption to any significant degree.<br />
The implementation of Article 2 of the ICCPR is seriously hampered by the<br />
<strong>in</strong>stitutional defects of the three <strong>in</strong>stitutions mentioned above. One of the<br />
results of these has been the failure to implement many of the recommendations<br />
made by United Nations bodies <strong>in</strong> the past.<br />
II. Article 6: right to life and disappearances<br />
Article 6 of the ICCPR guarantees the <strong>in</strong>herent right to life of every human<br />
be<strong>in</strong>g; law shall protect this right; and no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of<br />
his/her life. In violation of this right, large-scale enforced or <strong>in</strong>voluntary disappearances<br />
have taken place <strong>in</strong> southern, northern and eastern <strong>Sri</strong> <strong>Lanka</strong>.<br />
Accord<strong>in</strong>g to recent NHRC publications, around 20,000 people have fallen<br />
victim to enforced and <strong>in</strong>voluntary disappearances s<strong>in</strong>ce 1995. This <strong>in</strong>cludes<br />
some government soldiers too. However, the most of the disappearances relate<br />
to Tamil youth.<br />
As for the south, the Presidential Commissions revealed that disappearances<br />
often began with arrests by state officers, followed by torture, and eventually<br />
the kill<strong>in</strong>g and dump<strong>in</strong>g of bodies. The sheer number of people killed like this<br />
<strong>in</strong> <strong>Sri</strong> <strong>Lanka</strong> exceeds the number of deaths be<strong>in</strong>g dealt with by some of the<br />
<strong>in</strong>ternational tribunals now <strong>in</strong> operation <strong>in</strong> other parts of the world. It is a<br />
matter of public record that <strong>Sri</strong> <strong>Lanka</strong> today has a stagger<strong>in</strong>g number of<br />
enforced or <strong>in</strong>voluntary disappearances. The report on the visit to <strong>Sri</strong> <strong>Lanka</strong><br />
by a member of the Work<strong>in</strong>g Group on Enforced or Involuntary<br />
Disappearances (E/CN.4/2000/64/Add.1) states:<br />
"Three regional Presidential Commissions of Inquiry <strong>in</strong>to Involuntary<br />
Removal of Persons set up <strong>in</strong> 1994 submitted their reports to the President of
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