OHCHR Report on Human Rights in Sri Lanka – OHCHR report Sri Lanka 63rd session Sept 2026 Pasumai Thaayagam’s oral statement on HC’s report begins at 1:07:39 –4th Meeting – 63rd Session of Human Rights Council | UN Web TV. PEARL oral statement – https://x.com/PEARL_Action/status/2097363520773869854/video/1 *** High Commissioner Volker Turk’s Remarks to UNHRC’s Interactive Dialogue… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Human Rights
USTAG Booklet for Intl Day of the Disappeared
by US Tamil Action Group, August 30, 2026 This booklet was released at an event organized by the Mothers and Relatives of the Disappeared on August 30, 2026, the International Day of the Victims of Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances held in Thanthai Selva Auditorium, Jaffna. USTAG Chemman Booklet Aug 2026
BTF: List of Names of Disappeared Should Be Released
by British Tamils Forum, London, August 30, 2026 VICTIMS OF ENFORCED DISAPPEARANCES – LIST OF NAMES SHOULD BE RELEASED Based on various sources, the estimated number of victims of enforced disappearances who were arrested or surrendered during the last phase of the war is over 18,000. As exhumed skeletons of the victims continue to pile… Read more »
Adayaalam: The Illusion of Reform
The Continuing Erosion of Civic Space in the North-East by Adayaalam Centre for Policy Research, Jaffna, August 19, 2026 Journalism, activism, political mobilization, and memorialization remain at risk in the Northern and Eastern Provinces (North-East), and civic space continues to be under threat. In 2025, the Adayaalam Centre for Policy Research (ACPR) released a report… Read more »
India Today: 582 Skeletons, Including Children, Discovered in Sri Lanka Mass Grave
The remains are believed to be of civilians who disappeared during Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war, which broke out between government forces and the ethnic Tamil rebels, who sought an independent state. by Abhishek De, India Today, August 20, 2026 Excavation at a mass grave in Sri Lanka has led to the discovery of 582… Read more »
BTF: Chemmani Overview
by British Tamils Forum, London, July 30, 2026 BTF Chemmani Mass Graves – Overview of Forensic findings & International Legal Frameworks Chemmani Mass Graves An Interim Overview of Forensic Findings and International Legal Frameworks The forensic evidence unearthed at the Chemmani mass grave site points to potential violations across several major international legal regimes: •… Read more »
ACF: The Muttur Massacre
Justice Delayed is Justice Denied by Action Contre le Faim, Groundviews, Colombo, August 4, 2026 2026 ACF report: ACF rapport-muttur-2026-en-web-compressed_74178155e0 Photo courtesy of ACF (from 2018) “For Muttur, and for humanitarians everywhere, we will never forget, and we will never give up.” Perrine Benoist, Action Against Hunger Co-Director General. “Just after the murders I went to… Read more »
SLCPJ: 43 Years Since Black July: The Accountability Gap Revisited
by Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice, London, July 20, 2026 Black July remains one of the darkest chapters in Sri Lanka’s post-independence history. Every year, SLC commemorates July 1983, when the Sri Lankan state committed a 7-day anti-Tamil pogrom, killing around 3,000 Tamil civilians and injuring, raping, and forcibly displacing thousands more. In… Read more »
About Black July
by BlackJuly.com, USA, November 27, 2023 About Forty years after July 1983, Black July is often described as “riots” which were a “spontaneous reaction” to the ambush of 13 soldiers. This description is patently false. It does not take long, when going through the original facts, to see that the truth is quite the opposite…. Read more »
Whose Self-Determination?
Tamil Guardian editorial, July 17, 2026 When Argentina’s players unfurled a banner reading “Las Malvinas son Argentinas” after their World Cup semifinal victory over England this week, the British state required no time for reflection. Within a day, Downing Street had urged FIFA to investigate, ministers had denounced the gesture, and the Prime Minister’s spokesperson… Read more »
ITJP: Sri Lanka’s Office of Missing Persons (OMP)
Architecture of Denial by International Truth & Justice Project, Sri Lanka, South Africa, July 16, 2026 ITJP ENG_ARCHITECTURE-OF-DENIAL-SRI-LANKA-S-OFFICE-ON-MISSING-PERSONS Summary Sri Lanka’s first permanent disappearance commission, the Office on Missing Persons (OMP), mandated in August 2016,1 has spectacularly failed to deliver truth, accountability or meaningful redress over the last decade. The OMP in Sri Lanka has… Read more »
TG: Transitional Justice Cannot Exist Without Truth
Sri Lanka and the continuing erasure of the Eelam Tamil genocide by Simhanjana Gopikrishna Sumathi, Tamil Guardian, London, June 29, 2026 “It happened; therefore, it can happen again…it can happen everywhere.” — Primo Michele Levi, Jewish Holocaust survivor Seventeen years after Mullivaikkal, Sri Lanka continues to stand as one of the starkest examples of… Read more »
TG: Prison Rules
Tamil Guardian editorial, London, July 13, 2026 Last week saw the second deadliest episode of prison violence in Sri Lanka’s history. Over two days at Negombo Prison, at least 28 people were killed, among them seven prison officers, and more than a hundred were wounded. By the time the violence which began on Sunday evening… Read more »
ITJP: Chemmani Mass Grave
‘We are still searching” by International Truth & Justice Project, Sri Lanka, South Africa, July 13, 2026 ITJP CHEMMANI-MASS-GRAVE-WE-ARE-STILL-SEARCHING-JULY-2026 Executive Summary ‘We are still searching,’ is how the statements of the families typically end. It has been thirty years of waiting for a body to mourn, let alone justice. Chemmani mass grave in the northern Jaffna… Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Coast Belongs to the Future, Not Foreign Companies
by The Collective for Climate and Economic Justice, Groundviews, Colombo, June 25, 2026 Photo courtesy of Amila Udagedara On June 17, 2026 delegates filed into the Galle Face hotel for the Mineral Sands Technical Conference. Inside, the Chamber of Commerce was doing what it does best: opening doors for capital and closing them on everyone… Read more »
Chemmani Excavation: A Defining Test
for Truth, Justice and Reconciliation by Raj Sivanathan, Groundviews, Colombo, June 21, 2026 The visit by Minister of Justice Harshana Nanayakkara to the ongoing excavation site at Chemmani in Jaffna has once again focused national attention on one of the country’s most sensitive and unresolved human rights issues. His assurance that the government is committed… Read more »
Urgent Concerns Regarding the Imminent Deployment of Sri Lankan Forces to Haiti
by International Peace & Justice Project Sri Lanka & 14 other organizations, June 25, 2026 Final Joint Statement Sri Lanka Haiti Deployment_logos_included NGO STATEMENT URGENT CONCERNS REGARDING THE IMMINENT DEPLOYMENT OF SRI LANKAN FORCES TO HAITI 25 June 2026 International human rights and victims’ groups call on the United Nations, the Government of Haiti, and… Read more »
SLC: New Proposal Calls for Independent National DNA Bank
by Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice, London, February 20, 2026 PRESS RELEASE: New Proposal Calls for Independent National DNA Bank to Identify Sri Lanka’s Disappeared A new concept paper published on 19 February by the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice sets out an independent plan to establish a National DNA Bank… Read more »
SLC & BTF: No Sri Lankan Military Deployment to Haiti
Until there is credible accountability, independent vetting and justice for victims by Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice & British Tamils Forum joint statement, London, May 6, 2026 The Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice (SLC) and the British Tamils Forum (BTF) are deeply alarmed by reports that Sri Lanka may once again… Read more »
Digital Rights Foundation’s Sri Lanka Chapter
Fragments, not architecture: how a Digital Rights Foundation report’s Sri Lanka chapter misreads a pervasive surveillance state …The authors Prihesh Ratnayake and Omar Rajarathnam mention Tamils and Muslims without treating unequal exposure as the central analytical problem, which is where it belongs, since Sri Lanka’s security state has never distributed suspicion evenly and surveillance lands hardest… Read more »