‘No nation is perfect’: Sri Lanka vows to fight torture but critics say it’s just an attempt to ‘hoodwink’ UN rights council
Associated Press investigation reported accounts from more than 50 men who said they were tortured under the current government, some as recently as July
Government envoys from Sri Lanka told the UN’s top human rights body on Wednesday that their country is taking new steps to battle torture, a move that an advocacy group attributed to an Associated Press report documenting allegations from men who said they were brutalised, raped and branded.
The Human Rights Council held a long-planned review of Sri Lanka’s record a week after the AP investigation relayed the accounts of more than 50 men who said they were tortured under the current government, some as recently as July.
The government envoys took some at the council meeting in Geneva by surprise by announcing that Sri Lanka’s cabinet had a day earlier agreed to accede to the Optional Protocol on the Convention Against Torture. The 15-year-old accord allows for greater international scrutiny of countries’ detention facilities.
It certainly gives some solace, at least to the victims and their families, that yes, the international media is watching
Harsha de Silva, a deputy minister for national policies and economic affairs, acknowledged that the government’s commitment to human rights has been questioned.