CANARD ON DISAPPEARANCES IN REPORTS OF INTERNATIONAL AGENCIES

Explanations repeated by way of propaganda are often treated as truth even after close inquiries have proved them to be untrue. The view that the disappearances of Sri Lanka (about 26,935 cases according to official records) were resulted in a necessary and unavoidable measure taken by the ruling regime at the time for counter-insurgency is such a view. This view is repeated constantly not only in local records but also in international ones. It is a notwithstanding fact that the three Sri Lankan Presidential Commissions of Inquiry into the Involuntary Removal or Disappearance of Persons, which inquired into 16,800 cases, have come to conclusions to shatter such view.

In brief, the findings of the commissions are:

* That most of the disappearances were killings that happened after arrests (abductions by State agents and their collaborators);

* That before being killed those persons abducted were kept in detention centres, interrogated and tortured;

* That in such arrests and interrogations those persons were killed;

* That in most cases the bodies were destroyed in order to erase all traces;

* That some were buried in unmasked mass graves, others disposed of in rivers or burnt at roadsides with tyres in their necks;

* That legal provisions were made to avoid any form of keeping of records;

* That the jurisdiction of courts to inquire into the matter was limited by legal provisions;

* That the highest level of political leaders and decisio›n-makers were involved in making and carrying out the system which caused to these disappearances;

* That the whole process was systematic and planned; and

* That about 15 per cent of the total number of disappearances were of persons below 19 years of age.

Once it becomes possible for a State to arrest any person, the State loses any right to kill that person except by due process of law. Once disappearances are shown as killings after abduction (preferred way of arrest by the State to avoid records of arrests) as the commissions' reports has done, any form of legitimisation of the State's activity comes to an end. It destroys the claim that the State was in such a danger that it could not have itself except by causing such disappearances.

While the regime at the time coulhave controlled the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP, or People's Liberation Front) without causing the mass disappearances, it has also become clear that there were other plausible reasons to causing such mass killings. The legitimate period of the regime's rule had come to an end in 1982. However, the regime did not hold elections as due. Instead, it held a referendum asking the people to allow the same parliament to continue another term of six months. The referendum, according to the elections commission's own report, had not been held in a fair manner. If similar things happened in Britain, the United States, India or any country where the electoral process is well established, what might be the results? Surely a mass upsurge is unavoidable in such circumstances. Sri Lanka is a country where electoral process is well established. To remain in power after pursuing such a course of action the regime needed to carry out mass intimidation. This it did by way of mass killings. Mass disappearances were thus not a necessary action of a legitimate government, but a survival tactic of the government which had ended its democratic legitimacy.

Whatever the actual reasons were, the commissions' findings have confirmed what every person in Sri Lanka knows: That after a cruel massacre a false explanation has been spread.

It is time to re-examine all reports including those of international agencies on this matter. Otherwise it will be the perpetrators' view that will prevail as the explanation of these large-scale killings. Such a re-examination can make a significant difference to the outcome at the 55th session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights that is due to meet soon on this issue.