Sri Lanka has the second-highest number of enforced disappearances in the world, with an alleged backlog of between 60,000 to 100000 disappearances since the late 1980s. Between 2005 and 2015, thousands of people, mostly ethnic Tamils were forcibly disappeared in state custody. This took place at a time when the current president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, was defence secretary and his brother, current Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, was president.

According to article 2 of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, “enforced disappearance” is the arrest, detention, abduction, or any other form of deprivation of liberty by the State, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection of the law.

 “On New Year’s Day 2020, families of the disappeared marked 1414 days of protest, demanding an international investigation into the whereabouts of their loved ones. 78 parents of the disappeared have died since the protests began without knowing the fate of their loved ones. Numerous activist and rights organisations have appealed to the international community to refer Sri Lanka to the International Criminal Court (ICC) ahead of the upcoming 46th UNHRC session in Geneva from 22 February to 23 March 2021.

All these reports, instruments and actions are well intended, but to mete out justice waiting for how long, this is why we need to win the most critical struggle of Sri Lanka is the only way to mete out justice for enforced disappearances