WAN urges need to tackle sexual violence
The Women’s Action Network (WAN) has endorsed in full the OISL report
presented to the 30th Session of the UNHRC by the High Commissioner for
Human Rights which has highlgithed the need to tackle sexual violence
and contains a forceful call to end impunity.
Investigate
 The statement read: “For years, WAN and other women’s groups from the
north and the east have asked successive Sri Lankan governments and the
international community to investigate and address sexual violence
against Tamil women during and after the armed conflict. The OISL and
HC’s reports shed light on the gravity of the problem and underscore the
urgent need to fight the culture of impunity.”
The statement noted that the OISL report describes cases in which
security forces stripped Tamil women naked, put chillei powder on their
genitals, burned their breasts, used pliers to squeeze their breasts,
inserted barbed wire and ice cubes into the anus, raped and gang-raped
them (including while unconscious), and forced them to have oral sex.
Perpetrators ranged from low-level guards to senior officers in all
branches of the security forces (TID, CID, SLA, Navy, Military
Intelligence, National Intelligence Bureau).
OISL concluded: Incidents of sexual violence were not isolated acts
but part of a deliberate policy to inflict torture (to obtain
information, intimidate, humiliate, inflict fear). The practices
followed similar patterns, using similar tools ... reinforcing the
conclusion that it was part of an institutional policy within the
security forces.“The 30 testimonies cited in the OISL report are just
the tip of the iceberg. The HC’s report con- cluded that rape and sexual
violence by the security forces were “widespread.” Yet, as OISL noted,
“not one single perpetrator of sexual violence in relation to the armed
conflict is so far known to have been convicted,” and “the Government
has consistently sought to deny or play down the gravity of the
allegations of rape and other forms of sexual violence by the security
forces.”
Blind eye
“We seem to live in a society today that turns a blind eye to the
heinous crimes of sexual violence. We hear of babies as young as 8
months and 5 years old being raped and killed in this country.On a daily
basis we hear of rapes, murder and the mutilation of women’s bodies and
grave forms of violence against children. Such levels of violence are a
testament to the erosion of basic norms and values in our society which
has resulted in immunity for sexual predators. The law enforcement
agencies and judiciary are tardy and gender insensitive,” WAN said,
endorsing the call for the establishment of a hybrid special court, with
robust international involvement.
When he was opposition leader, Prime Minster Ranil Wickremesighe
appointed a commission to look into violence against women. He is now
duty-bound to implement the recommendations of his own commission1,
which made detailed findings on sexual violence against Sri Lankan women
by men in power, it added. |
