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Concerned governments should also use the United Nations Human Rights Council to initiate and support strong resolutions to promote compliance with international law by the government and the LTTE. Most importantly, the international community should work at the Human Rights Council and with the government to establish a United Nations human rights monitoring mission in Sri Lanka to monitor, investigate, and report on human rights abuses and laws of war violations by all sides—the government, the LTTE, and Karuna forces. 13 Key recommendations Human Rights Watch urges the Sri Lankan government, the LTTE, the Karuna group, and key international actors to respond with urgency to the human rights crisis in Sri Lanka. Specifically, we call on all relevant actors to: • Establish a human rights monitoring mission under United Nations auspices to investigate abuses by all parties, report publicly on abuses to enable prosecutions, and facilitate efforts to improve human rights at the local level. • Improve humanitarian access to populations at risk, including by ending unnecessary restrictions on humanitarian agencies. • Cease all deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians, facilitate rather than prevent civilians leaving areas of active fighting and provide humanitarian agencies safe passage to populations at risk. • End use of Emergency Regulations to clamp down on and threaten media, humanitarian and human rights groups, and other civil society organizations. • Regularly publicize the names of all persons detained by the military and police under Emergency Regulations and other laws, and provide detainees due process rights, including access to their families and legal representation and to challenge the lawfulness of their detention. • Cease the forced recruitment of all persons, end all recruitment of children, and permit those unlawfully recruited to return to their families. Full recommendations can be found in Chapter XI. 13 A UN human rights monitoring mission would entail a field office of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights with a mandate of protection, monitoring, capacity building, and public reporting. 17 Human Rights Watch August 2007
Methodology This report is based primarily on field research in Sri Lanka in February- March 2007. Human Rights Watch visited Colombo and its environs, and the districts of Batticaloa and Jaffna. The names of many interviewees are redacted or removed, usually at the interviewee’s request, to protect that person from potential harm. On June 18, Human Rights Watch wrote to President Mahinda Rajapaksa, requesting replies to 33 questions on a range of issues. The government replied on July 12. Relevant answers are included in the report. On some central issues the government did not provide the requested information, such as the number of people arrested under the Emergency Regulations, the number of people arrested on charges of kidnapping or abductions, and the status of the government’s investigation into alleged state complicity in abductions by the Karuna group. Return to War 18
Page 1 and 2: Sri Lanka Return to War Human Right
Page 3 and 4: Karuna group ......................
Page 5 and 6: I. Summary What I am saying is, if
Page 7 and 8: extrajudicial killings to unlawful
Page 9 and 10: 2002. Since January 2006 more than
Page 11 and 12: against them, and list the location
Page 13 and 14: Emergency Regulations (372 Tamils,
Page 15 and 16: The mother of an abducted boy from
Page 17 and 18: disappearances. The police released
Page 19: commission, highlighting examples o
Page 23 and 24: discriminating against Tamils in th
Page 25 and 26: intimidation to force civilians who
Page 27 and 28: International humanitarian law proh
Page 29 and 30: in which an LTTE cadre shot and kil
Page 31 and 32: the Savukady camp in Batticaloa to
Page 33 and 34: they would no longer be responsible
Page 35 and 36: In mid-May the government began a n
Page 37 and 38: On May 29, UNHCR commented on the g
Page 39 and 40: Grama Niladari Divisions (the small
Page 41 and 42: The salvos landed in and around the
Page 43 and 44: didn’t take him to the hospital b
Page 45 and 46: While describing the loss of civili
Page 47 and 48: saw no weapons, no bunkers or artil
Page 49 and 50: V. Enforced Disappearances and Abdu
Page 51 and 52: months of 2007. 84 A government com
Page 53 and 54: In one illustrative case documented
Page 55 and 56: The Valvettiturai police registered
Page 57 and 58: would send him by bus or train to T
Page 59 and 60: wife tried his cell phone several t
Page 61 and 62: then that his brother had paid, alt
Page 63 and 64: as the disseminators of “LTTE pro
Page 65 and 66: It is evident that many of the [dis
Page 67 and 68: The government’s lack of commitme
Page 69 and 70: A lodge-owner who had 29 out of 36
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arguing that evicting Tamils from C
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VII. Emergency Regulations In Augus
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Given the wide ranging powers provi
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Large-scale arrests of Tamil youth
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held, how many had been charged wit
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Various United Nations principles i
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In addition, the regulations establ
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individuals and groups working to r
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At a public meeting on April 6, 200
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On April 30, 2007, unidentified gun
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“We have blocked it as per a gove
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conference said they had already ca
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astards with the law we need to use
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humanitarian worker with direct kno
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The government dismissed the allega
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With the change of administration i
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IX. Karuna Group and State Complici
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stating that it “has no complicit
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of the government commission lookin
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Over the past 18 months, the govern
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Lack of witness protection A key pr
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president cannot appoint any commis
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Watch asked the Sri Lankan governme
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persons and refugees, and SLMM in r
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7. Death of 51 persons in Naddalamo
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Members of the IIGEP have also expr
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In the current context, in particul
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domestic and international criticis
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To the Liberation Tigers of Tamil E
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• Urge the Sri Lankan government
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H UMAN R I GHTS WATCH 350 Fifth Ave
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