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Deported Tamils face risk of torture on return

15 December 2011 11:38 am - 7     - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

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Up to 50 Tamil passengers on board a UK Border Agency flight face the risk of being tortured on their return to Sri Lanka, human rights organisations have warned.

The flight departure comes in the wake of the new evidence indicating that Sri Lankan security services mistreated passengers, The Guardian reports.

The activist group, Tamils Against Genocide, has earlier lodged a petition in the High Court trying to halt the flight departure claiming the UK government has failed to review its deportation policy amid new torture allegations.

The UK Border Agency has so far carried out two large-scale deportations to Sri Lanka despite Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch concern over passengers' security.

The United Nations' Committee Against Torture had earlier said it was "seriously concerned about the continued and consistent allegations of widespread use of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".

A London-based NGO, Freedom From Torture claimed that it had evidence to indicate that prisoners in Sri Lanka were regularly mistreated even after the end of the civil war.

It had documented a torture case involving a Sri Lankan national, Rohan, who claimed that he was detained at the Colombo airport, beaten and his skin burned with heated metal.

The UK Border Agency however, defended itself by saying that it deports people only "when we are satisfied the individual has no international protection needs", and cites the European Court of Human Rights ruling that only a few Tamil asylum seekers need security.

The agency is also circulating a report, which quotes senior Sri Lankan intelligence officials, as saying, Tamil detainees are inflicting wounds upon themselves to support later asylum claims.

Colombo has also slammed the torture allegations as "unsubstantiated". (Source: newstrackindia)

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  Comments - 7

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  • kondebendapucheena Thursday, 15 December 2011 12:17 PM

    torture prove single case before crying,those are economic asylum seekers don t send them to Sri Lanka keep them there

    Yuri Thursday, 15 December 2011 12:26 PM

    How do they know this vital information ?

    Hareesz Thursday, 15 December 2011 12:39 PM

    Well done UK Border Control. These persons try all excuses to be in the UK illegally.

    samuk Thursday, 15 December 2011 01:34 PM

    Please do not send them to Sri Lanka Keep them in UK
    So their tax payers can pay them

    prabash Thursday, 15 December 2011 01:49 PM

    give it a break guys. Sri Lanka seriously isn't another Rwanda or a Uganda or whatever... Classic case of a country's ethnic issues blown out of proportion.

    Rosh Friday, 16 December 2011 11:38 AM

    True it is still out of propotion for last 53 years . Wonder why it is taking so long to solve it.

    Lanke Banda Friday, 16 December 2011 12:03 PM

    Please take them over HRW we do not want Citizens who think foreign country is better than their Motherland.


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