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Krishan Francis
Published June 22, 2023 • Read for 2 minutes
FILE – Sri Lankan Defense Minister Gotabaya Rajapaksa attends a conference aimed at reconciliation in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Thursday, November 24, 2011. Former President of Sri Lanka Rajapaksa, in a report released on Thursday, June 22, 2023 released, charged with police tampering to obstruct investigations of mass graves discovered in an area where he was a military officer at the height of a bloody Marxist uprising in 1989. Photo by Gemunu Amarasinghe /THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — Former Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa was accused in a report released Thursday of tampering with police records to hinder investigations into mass graves discovered in an area where he was a military officer at the culmination of a bloody war. Marxist uprising in 1989.
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The report from activist groups, including the International Truth and Justice Project, Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka and Families of the Disappeared, states that hundreds of remains have been unearthed in some 20 mass grave excavations over the past three decades, but that no action has been taken. to identify the victims and return their remains to their families.
Tens of thousands of remains may still be buried in undiscovered mass graves, it said.
None of the numerous Commissions of Inquiry set up by successive governments of Sri Lanka was commissioned to investigate mass graves. Instead, efforts to uncover the truth were hampered, the report said.
When mass graves were discovered and investigations began, judges and forensic experts were abruptly transferred, family lawyers were denied access to sites, no attempt was made to find living witnesses, no post-mortem records were collected and, in the very rare cases in which someone was convicted, they were later pardoned, it said.
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“It is a story of a lack of political will – an inadequate legal framework, a lack of coherent policies and insufficient resources. For the families of the disappeared, it is a story of unsolved tragedy; the bereaved are forced to live and die without ever finding their loved ones,” it said.
Rajapaksa’s alleged role in the excavations of mass graves was an example of political interference, it said.
According to the report, Rajapaksa, a powerful defense official at the time, ordered the destruction of all police records older than five years at police stations in the region after mass graves were discovered in 2013 in the Matale district of central Sri Lanka.
The mass graves were believed to date from the time of a violent Marxist uprising in 1989, when Rajapaksa was involved as a military officer in counter-insurgency efforts in the region.
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The report called for action against Rajapaksa and senior police officials involved in the alleged obstruction of the investigation.
Rajapaksa was elected president in 2019 but was forced to resign last year amid angry public protests over the country’s worst economic crisis in history.
Sri Lanka has faced three major armed insurgencies, including a 25-year separatist civil war, since gaining independence from the British 75 years ago.
An agency set up in 2017 to track down details of those reported missing in the conflicts received 21,374 complaints, including from family members of security forces.
The report recommended that special laws and policies be introduced to manage mass graves and excavations, including their identification, preservation and investigation. It also recommended strengthening forensic capacity in the country, establishing an independent prosecution service to ensure that prosecutions resulting from excavations are carried out in an impartial manner, and the creation of a competent unit to investigate other potential mass graves .
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