A/HRC/7/3/Add.6
page 2
Summary
The Special Rapporteur undertook a visit to Sri Lanka from 1 to 8 October 2007.
He expresses appreciation to the Government for the full cooperation extended to him. In
addition to visiting detention facilities in Colombo and the south-west of the country, including
in Galle, he also visited police stations and prison facilities between Trincomalee and Kandy, in
the eastern and central parts of the country, respectively.
The Special Rapporteur has full appreciation for the challenges the Government faces from
the violent and long-lasting conflict with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Notwithstanding the difficult security situation with which the Government is faced, Sri Lanka in
principle is still able to uphold its democratic values, to ensure activities of civil society
organizations and the media, and to maintain an independent judiciary.
The Government of Sri Lanka has taken a number of important legal steps in order to
prevent and combat torture as well as to hold perpetrators accountable. Most notably, the
enactment of the Torture Act No. 22 of 1994 and the Corporal Punishment Act No. 23 of 2005
as well as legal safeguards in the Code of Criminal Procedure constitute positive legal measures
in the fight against torture. The Special Rapporteur is further encouraged by the fact that capital
punishment has not been carried out in Sri Lanka for more than three decades. The fact that a
system of Judicial Medical Officers (JMO) is in place in the country is also a positive sign.
However, the system set up by these measures cannot be regarded as fully effective.
The high number of successful fundamental rights cases decided by the Supreme Court of
Sri Lanka, as well as the even higher number of complaints that the National Human Rights
Commission (NHRC) continues to receive on an almost daily basis indicates that torture is still
widely practised in Sri Lanka. Obstacles for victims of torture in accessing Judicial Medical
Officers result in the loss of important medical evidence, which in turn impedes criminal
proceedings against perpetrators. The absence of an ex officio obligation on law enforcement
officials or judges to investigate cases of torture further aggravates the situation for victims.
In general, the lack of effective witness and victim protection prevents the effective application
of the laws in place.
Over the course of his visits to police stations and prisons, the Special Rapporteur
received numerous consistent and credible allegations from detainees who reported that they
were ill-treated by the police during inquiries in order to extract confessions, or to obtain
information in relation to other criminal offences. Similar allegations were received with respect
to the army, particularly by suspected LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) members. The
Special Rapporteur was shocked at the brutality of some of the torture measures applied to
persons suspected of being LTTE members, such as burnings with soldering irons and
suspension by the thumbs. With regard to the situation in prisons, the Special Rapporteur, while
appreciating the recent legal prohibition of corporal punishment in Sri Lanka, is concerned about
the high number of complaints of corporal punishment, corroborated by medical evidence in
some prisons.
In many of Sri Lanka’s prisons the combination of severe overcrowding with antiquated
infrastructure of certain facilities places unbearable strains on services and resources for
detainees. In particular, the lack of space amounts to degrading treatment in some prisons.