The Sri Lankan Army has rejected a statement from the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) which accuses it of breaking a UN convention on discrimination against women, released last week.
The statement from the ECCHR said that women in the North-East were subject to harassment and abuse from military and police personnel, who have a huge presence in the Tamil homeland.
The human rights group also criticised the country’s Prevention of Terrorism Act which they said,
“makes it easier for police and military members to carry out body inspections and ‘searches’ without having to justify doing so.These searches are often carried out alongside sexual harassment and violence that is specifically of a sexual nature.”
Calling on the UN to conduct investigations into the conditions of the North-East, the ECCHER accused Sri Lanka of breaking the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), stating,
“Sri Lanka ratified this agreement and is thus currently disregarding the obligation it accepted to fight any forms of discrimination and to ensure the effective prosecution of perpetrators of gender-based violence.
According to Colombo Gazette, Army Spokesman Brigadier Ruwan Wanigasuriya responded saying that these allegations had no police reports to back them and were “based on hearsay”.
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