by International Truth & Justice Sri Lanka, South Africa, March 13, 2026
ITJP Daya-Ratnayake_public Mar 2026
Section 1. Summary
Daya Ratnayake is a retired army general who has allegedly been involved in a wide range of human rights violations and war crimes during his service in the army. Allegations against him range across two phases regarding the following types of abuses: (1) unlawful killings of civilians during the government forces’ operations in the eastern part of Sri Lanka in the country’s civil war, while he was the Commander of the 23 Infantry Division of the Sri Lanka Army; and (2) arbitrary detention, torture (including sexual violence), enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial executions in connection with the government’s post-war “rehabilitation” programme of ex-combatants, where he was the Commission General of Rehabilitation from July 2009 to January 2010. After retirement from military service, he continued to serve public posts, with the most recent being the Secretary to the Ministry of Industry from June 2021 to July 2022.
