Action Alert Archive

Police powers granted to SL armed forces portend rights violations

May 24, 2007

Delegation of police powers to the Sri Lankan armed forces is based on emergency regulations implemented by the Sri Lankan government for security reasons. However, in examining the history of emergency regulations of the Sri Lankan government, it is well known that in the name of "security" armed forces have been held responsible for large-scale disappearances of civilians, which may have lead to extra-judicial killings, torture, and illegal disposing of dead bodies.

A sharp rise of detention and imprisonment of civilians took place in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when police powers were granted to the armed forces. A 1992 report of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances informed the international community of this uncontrollable detention and imprisonment of civilians. The Working Group further reported that it was very difficult to trace missing persons due to the large number of persons and institutions authorized to detain, interrogate and transfer detainees.

"Preventive detention" and "arrest without warrant" in Sri Lanka should be considered as warning signs for large-scale human rights abuses. Countries across the globe have experienced such human rights abuses as well. As documented in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, armed forces acted with police powers and were at liberty to arrest, detain and commit horrendous human rights violations against a targeted civilian population.

Amnesty International is calling for international human rights monitors in Sri Lanka due to extra-judicial killing, injury, displacement, and abduction of civilians, denial of humanitarian access to refugee camps, and the number of uninvestigated allegations against Sri Lankan armed forces. The Asian Human Rights Commission warns of the re-emergence of torture chambers and increase in human rights abuses in response to the Sri Lankan President's decision. In light of Sri Lanka's history of human rights abuses, international human rights organizations' calls to action, and past military/police human rights violations around the world, I urge you to take action to restrict military assistance to the Sri Lankan armed forces operating with police powers.