Presidential Commission on Missing Persons receive 19,000 complaints:

Presence of International advisors increases people's faith

By Manjula Fernando

Chairman of the Presidential Commission on Missing Persons, former High Court Judge Maxwell Parakrama Paranagama in an interview with the Sunday Observer said that over 19,000 complaints received during the past seven months is testimony to the trust people have placed on the Commission, notwithstanding the politically-driven criticism of it being an eyewash.

Q: What was the need to appoint an international advisory panel to the Commission on missing people, Was it due to international pressure?

A: We have had sittings in Kilinochchi, Batticaloa, Jaffna and Mullaitivu. After these sittings we found that we needed an expanded warrant to look into the cases. We have been discussing this. President Mahinda Rajapaksa would have received the information, and thought accordingly and decided to expand the warrant issued.

Since the expanded warrant refers to violation of international humanitarian law, we thought that some expert advice was necessary, because these areas are quite new to us.

The Presidential Commission is appointed in an advisory capacity. The warrant reserves the right for the President to appoint additional members if there is a need. The Commission is also mindful of the fact that there will be no unnecessary international interference.

Q: What are the findings that prompted you to decide on an extended warrant and the appointment of the expert panel?

A: There were areas on submissions made by the complainants which we thought may be instances, by the armed forces and the LTTE as having violated international law. Unless the warrant is expanded, the Commission could not have looked into such cases. On these aspects we needed an expert panel to advise us, because that will be on the basis of international law.

Q: When will you be seeking their advice?

A: Already we have heard submissions by complainants, on that itself we might be able to come to conclusions of violations of international law. Advice of the experts will be sought to come to that conclusion.

Q: The Commission had been sitting for seven months, can you sum up the work completed so far?

A: We have covered about 750 complaints so far. We have had sittings in Kilinochchi, Jaffna, Batticaloa and Mullaitivu.

From the submissions that have been made so far, we are determining if any person, group or Agency is responsible for those missing persons. We are preparing a list where there is substantial evidence about various missing people. The Commission has identified such cases and are in the process of finalising them to make recommendations as to who is responsible for these disappearances.

Q: Can you say if the perpetrators are from the LTTE or the military ?

A: Since my warrant says I should submit a report to the President, I don't want to divulge what will be in the report.

Q: This Commission was appointed by the President. Do you think the Tamil people have faith in it?

A: I believe so. When we issued the print notice via the media and after the announcements through Divisional Secretaries, we received over 19,000 written complaints. When we visit the places for hearings, about 400 fresh complaints are made at each station.

This huge response speaks for itself of the trust people have in the Commission. They have spoken of alleged LTTE abductions and instances where the military too has been responsible.

Q: Have you noticed any reluctance by the people to make complaints against the Security Forces?

A: We have not seen any reluctance. People did make complaints against the Security Forces.

Q: Human rights groups have raised concerns about the protection of witnesses. Has this area been looked into ?

A: The Witness Protection Bill is in the process of being presented in Parliament. Where the Commission is concerned, the Act says that if someone obstructs or creates any problem, he can be reported in the Court of Appeal. He will be dealt under Contempt of Court. That provision is there. But we did not come across such an instance so far.

But there have been complains by journalists who were there. When the Commission scheduled sittings in Kilinochchi, the same day the Government held a mobile camp at a venue close by. There was a bit of confusion in the sense that people who wanted to come to our sittings were seated at the other venue and vice versa. The mishap was later sorted out through public announcements.

Journalists made an issue over this claiming that the other event was organised to sabotage the sittings of the Commission. There have been many such complaints but no complaints of threats and intimidation.

Before the Commission was set up, people complained of missing people to the Terrorism Investigation Unit(TID). The TID had been investigating these cases. In one instance the TID fixed inquiries on the same day of our sittings in Mullaitivu. The media was fast to criticize this. Thereafter I wrote to the IGP asking him to avoid such situations because we needed to avoid unnecessary negative publicity. The media has been allowed to cover the sittings in the North and the East. We want to maintain transparency.

Q: Once the hearings are over, what will be the next step?

A: After the written complaints are received, we schedule sittings in those areas and hear the complainants evidence. We also question them. If we find evidence that merit an investigation against some persons or some organisation, then we will refer the case to the investigators. Later if we are satisfied that there is a clear case, it will be included in the report to the President. The report may be referred to the Attorney General to initiate criminal proceedings.

The earlier mandate requires us to recommend relief to be given to those families, various facilities, financial assistance and living allowance. We will make a list of such people to ensure that they will be assisted in the future.

In addition, missing people's relatives live in grief, they go to various kovils, temples and fortune tellers in the hope of getting some kind of information about their loved ones.

Day in and out they live in grief. I think there needs to be some sort of counselling facilities to comfort them.

When we made inquiries about this need, we found there were various ministries offering counselling services to the war affected. These services have little or no coordination. We have summoned members of these different units and held workshops. There are already about 500-600 counsellors in those units. We formed a steering committee with the aim of streamlining and setting up one counselling unit to address this issue. There will be a monitoring unit to supervise their work.The ICRC had offered to train our counsellors.

Q: When will this unit start operations?

A: Foreign experts are due to come in September. By September we will set it in motion.

Q: Has the Commission received endorsements from International Agencies like the UN and the ICRC?

A: Their representatives come and meet us to discuss the progress of the Commission's proceedings. Now that we have a broadened mandate, they will share with me the material with regard to international law and relevant tribunal decisions. They have expressed satisfaction over the work that we have undertaken and completed so far.

Q: TNA parliamentarian Suresh Premachandran at one point said the Presidential Commission was an eyewash and Tamil people had no faith in this mechanism. Your comments?

A: Even in a cricket match your opponent's aim is to get you out. They are doing politics against the Government. I am not concerned about that. I am not political minded. The President has entrusted us with a job of work. And we are doing it to the best of our ability. We are not bothered about political interpretations.People have trust in the Commission which has been proved by the overwhelming response of 19,000 written complaints. When we visit the areas, we receive 400 to 500 fresh complaints. How can they say this is an eyewash. Certainly we will do something.

I served in the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), at the beginning some said that, that was an eyewash, today what has happened.

Those are politically motivated comments. I am a retired judge, I am not a politician.

Q: The entire 19,000 applications are of missing persons?

A: The majority, but there are cases where parents have found the bodies, such cases do not come under the missing persons category. Parents come with pain of mind and we cannot turn them away. We are compelled to give them a hearing and see if there is a way to help them.

The old mandate was to investigate the case of missing persons. The expanded mandate says to what extent the Forces and the LTTE have violated international humanitarian and Human Rights laws. We will look into child recruitment and the use of a human shield by the LTTE.

Q: Initially the mandate covered the 1990 to 2009 period, but now it has been backdated to 1983 ?

A: This is also due to our requests. Some people come to us with very old incidents, if he is denied of a hearing, they want to know why. They are not worried about technicalities.

They ask ‘why can't you record my child's case?’ There were a few instances where the IPKF was accused. This was the reason to backdate the mandate period.

Q: Are you satisfied with the way the Commission has been facilitated by the Government to carry out its task?

A: On and off I meet President's Secretary Lalith Weeratunga to discuss matters and explain our needs.

There has been no delays in fulfilling our requests. I did not know that I have been appointed to the Commission till the warrant came home. I have never met the President since my appointment.

Q: Will you be having sittings in the southern part of the country as well?

A: Our mandate is for the Northern and Eastern provinces only.

Having said this, if we come across a case where a person going missing outside the North and the East and connected to the conflict, we will be compelled to take a decision.

In such instances I might give a wide interpretation to the Commission's mandate and look into it. But it is premature to take a decision on that now.

Q: How long will it take to conclude the sittings and finalise the report to the President?

A: There are 19,000 complaints and we have been given a very broad mandate, it is not humanely possible to give a particular date. If there are time limits, we may not do a proper job. I will have to cut short hearing a person or I might want to cut down on the complaints. So I am not focusing my mind at the moment on a timeframe.

I will do the best I can do, if someone complains of our speed, and says I am incapable, then I am ready to go. It is not easy to listen to people from 9.00am to 5.00pm for four days with just a 45 minute lunch break. It can be very tiring. We cover 50 – 60 cases each day. In Mullaitivu it took more time to listen to them. It was the last site of the war on terrorism.

People there had lengthy stories about the shelling while crossing the Nandikadal lagoon. In Jaffna the stories were relatively short.

Q: Do you think there may be negative findings and recommendations that may not go down well with the authorities?

A: No war on terrorism can be fought according to the book. You cannot accept everything to be done right. There may be negative findings. We will point these out. If someone says nothing had happened, I do not think he is speaking the truth. But the international law speaks of proportionality, what we need to establish is if this proportionality has been breached.

Q: The Government maintains that Sri Lanka has a professional military. Our service personnel serve in the UN peacekeeping forces world over?

A: Yes. It is a tough job.

Q: You have to cover 19,000 cases altogether. Can't you short-list the most important cases and expedite the process ?

A: We have covered about 750 cases so far. We might want to short-list the cases but the President has advised us to investigate each and every complaint. We will discuss this matter further to reach an agreement.Of the 19,000 cases, 5600 are complaints made by parents of servicemen who have gone missing during the conflict. Their bodies have not been found and some parents believe that their sons are still among the living.