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Prevention of Terrorism Act detainees allowed to request release

26 Aug 2021

  • Prez-appointed Advisory Board to consider requests from 30th
BY Pamodi Waravita The detainees under the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act No. 48 of 1979 (PTA) will have the opportunity to make a request for release from the Advisory Board established under the Act and appointed by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on 25 August, The Morning learnt. “This Advisory Board has been appointed in accordance with Section 13 of the PTA. They will consider the requests they receive and then make recommendations to the President about the incarceration of these detainees,” Presidential Secretariat Director General of Legal Affairs Attorney-at-Law Harigupta Rohanadeera told The Morning yesterday (26). Section 13 of the PTA states that an Advisory Board must be appointed at the discretion of the President, to which any person under a detention order may make representations. Chaired by former Chief Justice Asoka de Silva, this panel will consist of retired High Court Judge A.A.R. Heiyanthuduwa and former Solicitor General President’s Counsel Suhada Gamlath, and is due to officially begin work on 30 August. The Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) for the Appraisal of the Findings of Previous Commissions and Committees on Human Rights and the Way Forward, in its interim report to the President earlier this year, proposed that the Advisory Board be represented by the three main ethnic groups in the country. However, all three appointees are Sinhalese. Many detainees under the PTA, prisoners’ rights groups, human rights activists, international human rights watchdogs, the UN, and the European Union (EU), among others, have called for the amendment or repeal of the PTA. The PTA currently allows for the admissibility of confessions given to the Police that are alleged to have been extracted by the Police through the use of torture, and the prolonged arbitrary detention of suspects, which borders on punishment. The EU Parliament, in May, called on the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) to repeal the PTA and the EU Commission to consider the temporary withdrawal of the Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) trade concessions from Sri Lanka if it is not done. In June, the Foreign Affairs Ministry informed the EU of action underway to revisit provisions of the PTA. The Third Cycle of Review of Sri Lanka in the GSP+ Monitoring Process for 2020-2021 is currently underway and a GSP+ Monitoring Mission for the Third Cycle is scheduled to visit Sri Lanka in September or October of this year. The 24th session of the EU-Sri Lanka Joint Commission in the first quarter of 2022 will witness the review of all aspects of bilateral co-operation.


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