Late Tuesday night, a regional magistrate ordered the release of two Sri Lankan human rights activists that had been arrested on suspicion of inciting racial or religious disharmony or violence between ethnic groups. Their cases are part of a troubling trend of arrests, alleged torture and “disappearances” that reflect the state of the Sri Lankan government post-civil war.
Ruki Fernando of the Colombo-based INFORM group and Father Praveen Mahesan, a Catholic priest, were arrested in the former Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam-held town of Kilinochchi on Sunday. At the time of their detention, Fernando and Praveen were documenting the case of Jeyakumari Balendran, a woman who lost two sons and her husband to the war and whose third son has disappeared, allegedly due to government activity. Balendran had campaigned for the families of the missing, but she is currently in detention for allegedly harboring a criminal.
An “enforced disappearance” is defined as an unacknowledged arrest of an individual by state authorities in which the person’s location, condition or treatment is not reported, placing the individual outside of legal protections. While “enforced disappearances” hit their peak during the three decades-long Tamil Tigers insurrection — in which in 2003, the Red Cross reported that it had received 20,000 complaints of disappearances in Sri Lanka, of which only 9,000 were resolved — disappearances are a continuing occurrence in the nation, especially in the former rebel-held north and east.
Additionally, torture perpetrated by the military and the police on the Tamil population continues to be a problem. In 2011, Freedom from Torture, a British non-governmental organization formerly called the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture, received 233 referrals for clinical treatments and documentation of torture for asylum reasons for Sri Lankan nationals.
“Many of us bear the marks of torture on our minds and bodies, but in Sri Lanka you can’t express that you’ve been tortured. If you show your scars to [an official] you risk them telling the authorities and you would likely be detained again,” Saarheerthan, a Sri Lankan torture survivor, told Freedom from Torture.
Suspicions of terror
Fernando and Praveen were arrested on the possibility of charges under two separate acts. One of the acts was the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which allows the government to hold an individual for up to 18 months in prison without a charge and up to 20 years with a conviction. These “anti-terrorism” laws, the “enforced disappearances” and retaliation against those that speak out against the government have created a climate of fear enveloping the island.
When they were arrested, the two men were seeing to the welfare of Vithushaini Balendran, the 13-year-old daughter of Jeyakumari Balendran, who, like her mother, has appeared in international media coverage demonstrating for the families of those that disappeared.
“It has become a cliché to speak of a ‘culture of impunity’ but the phrase is entirely apt in describing the situation in Sri Lanka, where impunity has over the years become institutionalized and systematized,” read the International Commission of Jurists’ “Authority Without Accountability: The Crisis of Impunity in Sri Lanka.” “Blatant disregard for the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary has crippled the justice system, leaving victims with little or no prospect of remedies or reparations for serious human rights violations.”
Escalation and counter-escalation
The Sri Lankan government’s attitude is one of escalation. The Tamil Tigers began in the 1970s, with the drive to create an independent state for the Tamil people. Under colonial rule, the majority Sinhalese people were trivialized by the favored Tamil minority. This created backlash that snapped against the Tamil once Sri Lanka became an independent nation. The now-empowered Sinhalese created exclusivist policies that led the Tamil to seek separation, such as the “Sinhala Only Act,” which made Sinhala the official language of Sri Lanka over English or Tamil.
The Tamil Tigers formed when non-violent attempts to form a Tamil homeland failed. At their peak in 2000, the LTTE controlled 76 percent of the landmass in the Northern and Eastern Provinces. The tactics of the LTTE, which included suicide bombings, attacks on civilians, the use of child soldiers, the execution of prisoners of war, multiple political assassinations and ethnic cleansing, lent the Tamil Tigers the distinction of being seen as a terror group by more than 30 nations.
Sri Lanka fought back with the introduction of “anti-terrorism” laws. The open-ended, draconian nature of these laws allowed the government to quickly detain perceived troublemakers indefinitely. In a tug-of-war that saw four failed attempts at peace talks, the LTTE controlled a virtual state of roughly 15,000 square kilometers. The pushback to regain control of the populace created a state-backed system of extralegal detentions and interrogations that topped out before the 2002 peace talks.
After the LTTE dropped its demand for its own state, instead insisting on regional autonomy, and after the defeat of Dingiri Banda Wijetunga — who believed that a lasting peace with the LTTE cannot be achieved without eradicating the group — as president in 1993, the LTTE offered a permanent ceasefire and agreed to talk with the Sri Lankan government. During this time, the number of “enforced disappearances” bottomed out. However, the election of Mahinda Rajapaksa — another politician that was for LTTE annihilation — to the presidency in 2005, the LTTE pulled out of the peace talks indefinitely, followed by an attempted assassination of Army Commander Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka. The closing of the Mavil Oya reservoir’s sluice gates by the LTTE, however, led to the Fourth Eelam War and the military capitulation of the Tamil Tigers in 2009.
The aftermath
However, the Sri Lankan government believes that LTTE officials outside of the country may be seeking to continue the fighting. Shortly after the 2009 collapse of the LTTE, New York-based international legal advisor for the LTTE Viswanathan Rudrakumaran announced in a press release: “We, the people of Tamil Eelam and its Diaspora … firmly believe that the formation of a Provisional Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam is imperative. It is a well accepted proposition in international law that the legal claim to establish a government in exile arises the more readily when the exclusion of its political leaders is achieved through acts contrary to principles of jus cogens.”
Sri Lanka’s attempts to prevent a re-flaring of hostilities are understandable, but also negligent to the human rights of its citizens. After 26 years of fighting, it may be necessary for the government to take the first step toward unifying its people. The current aura of fear and intimidation is the greatest threat to reigniting the Tamil people’s frustrations and desires for freedom.
“Arresting peaceful activists known for their work with victims of rights violations from all ethnic communities is not a way to build trust and restore relationships damaged by the war,” said Jonathan Prentice, International Crisis Group’s chief policy officer. “If sustainable peace is to be more than an illusion, the rights of Sri Lanka’s victims and human rights defenders to speak freely and safely must be protected.”