The Committee for Protecting Rights of Prisoners with the kind attendance of the family members of those arrested under the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act No. 48 of 1979 (PTA), held a protest before the United Nations Office in Thummulla yesterday (3) demanding the repeal of Act. The Act, which was introduced in the late 70’s to suppress the numerous armed struggle groups of Tamil youth materializing across the North and East; stands as a draconian law that is incompatible with the socio-political climate of today’s Sri Lanka.
Over the years each successive UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Special Procedures, UN treaty bodies, including various other local Human Rights grassroots groups and international bodies have decried the draconian nature of the PTA, which legitimizes arbitrary detentions with regard to unspecified reasons of alleged suspicions of committing offences thereunder – for up to 18 months, before State officials are required to produce the arrested before a court.
As the government gazetted a bill to amend the Prevention of Terrorism Act No. 48 of 1979 (PTA) on the 27th January this year, the only apparent change that was introduced to the Act was the reduction of the maximum time-span of detention before being required to be presented before a court, from 18 months to 12 months.
The CPRP had filed a Petition with regards to the bill that was gazetted, which blatantly fails provide any redress and only serves as a desperate attempt made by the Sri Lankan Government to appease various international bodies ahead of the 49th session of talks in Geneva, and in turn salvage its rapport with the EU, during desperate times.
It remains by and large that forced, coerced and torturous attempts known to be legitimized by the PTA will continue to incentivized with impunity under Section 16 of the Act, as it remains without redress – including Sections 6 through 9 of the PTA, which incentivizes arbitrary arrests, with the minimized role of the Magistrate. The aforementioned sections further allow 72 hours of arrest before a detainee may be produced before a magistrate, with the Attorney General alone having the authorization to allow bail for pretrial detainees.
The crowd was joined by Parliamentarian M.A. Sumanthiran.
