Amnesty accuses Govt. of crackdown on judges

London-based Human Rights watchdog Amnesty International yesterday accused the Sri Lankan Government of targeting judges and lawyers as part of its crackdown on dissent.

“The crackdown on dissent has extended to lawyers and members of the Judiciary who speak out against abuses of power,” AI said in a statement released on their website. The statement by the rights watchdog comes a day after the ruling UPFA coalition handed a motion of impeachment against Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake to the Speaker of Parliament, setting a Constitutional process in motion for her removal.



AI’s international expert on Sri Lanka Yolanda Foster said in the statement that “three years after the end of the civil war, the Government continues to stifle dissent through threats and harassment, and has failed to take steps to end enforced disappearances and extrajudicial executions”.

The statement also cites the attack on the Judicial Service Commission Secretary and High Court Judge Manjula Tilakaratne on 7 October, “after he had complained of attempts to interfere with the independence of the Judiciary”.

News of the impeachment also coincided with the review of Sri Lanka’s human rights record at the Universal Periodic Review of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva yesterday. During the UPR, the US and Germany expressed their concern about the Sri Lankan Government’s move to remove the Head of the Judiciary.

US Ambassador to the UN in Geneva Eileen Donahue strongly recommended that the Sri Lankan Government end its interference with the Judiciary, “especially in light of today’s news of efforts to impeach the Chief Justice,” she said. (DB)