A Collective Blind Eye
by International Truth and Justice Project, South Africa, October 20192019
http://www.itjpsl.com/reports/thenavy-a-collective-blind-eye
ITJP_navy_reportfinal-2-SINGLES
This report on the Sri Lankan Navy’s alleged involvement in torture and enforced disappearances compares documents from a decade-long police investigation inside Sri Lanka into the disappearance of 11 men in the Trincomalee naval base, with eyewitness testimony from survivors and insider witnesses. The report identifies serious investigative shortcomings, conflicts of interest and political interference in the Sri Lankan case. And it notes the violations committed by the Navy did not stop with the end of the civil war 2009 and torture was not confined to one naval base alone.
Press Release: Top Sri Lankan Navy Commanders Complicit in Serious
Crimes
23 October 2018
Johannesburg: The International Truth and Justice Project has called
for a review of all naval cooperation with Sri Lanka after it found a
large number of top Sri Lankan navy commanders were complicit in torture,
disappearance and murder that occurred inside naval sites from at least
2008-14.
“The Sri Lankan Navy: Turning a Collective Blind Eye”, published by the
ITJP, compared documents from a decade long police investigation inside
Sri Lanka into the disappearance of 11 men in the Trincomalee naval
base, with eyewitness testimony from survivors and insider witnesses.
It identifies serious investigative shortcomings, conflicts of interest
and political interference in the Sri Lankan case. It also notes the
violations committed by the Navy did not stop with the end of the civil
war 2009 and torture was not confined to one naval base alone.
“The Trincomalee 11 abduction case was supposed to be the great success
story of Sri Lankan justice but tragically it’s become emblematic of
failure. Many senior naval officers in the command structure in charge
of naval intelligence or stationed at Trincomalee haven’t even been
questioned, alleged perpetrators have been protected and promoted, and
the living victims never even interviewed,” said the ITJP’s Executive
Director, Yasmin Sooka.
Senior officers must have known about the activities of the Special
Intelligence Unit – a black ops unit established personally by the then
Commander of the Navy within Naval Intelligence. Members of the Special
Investigation Unit are alleged, among other things, to have operated an
underground torture site in the country’s most secure naval base, where
scores of prisoners were detained in dungeons over many years. It was
impossible for detainees to be brought in and out of this site, for so
many people to have been interrogated, fed and guarded without the naval
command structure being complicit, argues the report.
“Naval officers we have spoken to, say everyone knew they should turn
‘a collective blind eye’ to what was going on. The whole Navy command
structure appears to have been complicit in violations and is seriously
tainted”, says Ms. Sooka. “It is time the Sri Lankan Navy is sanctioned
until, at the very minimum, the institution cooperates fully with the
police investigation and stops rewarding the suspects in this case.
International partners are now on notice and can no longer turn a blind
eye to the Sri Lankan Navy’s criminality”.
“The Sri Lankan Navy: Turning a Collective Blind Eye” describes lurid
details it says would be worthy of a thriller were they not so intensely
painful for the victims and their families who are still waiting for
justice. At one point, Sri Lanka’s most senior military official was
alleged to have hidden a key suspect in naval headquarters while police
issued Interpol notices; then he allegedly attempted to abduct a material
witness. From jail, naval officers have been threatening the life of the
chief investigating police officer. While all but one of the suspects
has been released on bail and several have been promoted despite the
serious allegations outstanding against them.
The ITJP was the first organisation to publish the GPS coordinates of
the Trincomalee underground site in July 2015. Later that year a team
from the United Nations visited the locations and corroborated the
existence of underground cells.
The report can be downloaded at: http://www.itjpsl.com/reports/the
navy-a-collective-blind-eye
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EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR:
YASMIN SOOKA