October 23, 2012: Activists and family members of people who have disappeared in
Sri Lanka appealed on Monday for the United Nations to intervene. In a rally outside
the UN office in Colombo, protesters held up pictures of their missing relatives to
mark 1,000 days since the disappearance of Prageeth Ekneligoda, a journalist and cartoonist
critical of the government. Demonstrators submitted a petition to the UN as well
as to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajpaksa and other prominent politicans. “We
urge the government to facilitate a visit to Sri Lanka by the UN Working Group on
Disappearances and to ratify the international Convention for the Protection of all
Persons from Enforced Disappearance,” said Nimalka Fernando, a lawyer and rights activist. Fernando,
one of Sri Lanka’s best known human rights advocates, appealed to UN Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon to intervene and help families find missing relatives. “Ensure accountability
for those subject to enforced disappearances and provide information about all persons
held in government detention and rehabilitation centers,” she said, adding that families
of the disappeared also desperately needed economic support. Ekneligoda disappeared
two days before the presidential election in 2010 in which incumbent Rajapaksa defeated
Sarath Fonseka, the former army chief who was instrumental in defeating the rebel
Tamil Tigers. “I have been on the road for the past 1,000 days with my children
looking for my husband,” said Sandya Ekneligoda, wife of the missing journalist. In
March, she participated in a UN session in Geneva which brought international attention
to the issue of forced disappearances in Sri Lanka. “Sri Lankan representatives
accused me of betraying the country,” said Ekneligoda. Her husband’s case has already
been raised in UN Human Rights Council sessions. In June, former attorney-general
and current legal adviser to the cabinet, Mohan Peiris, gave contradictory evidence
on Ekneligoda in a Colombo court after he had previously said the journalist was living
abroad. The UN Working Group on Disappearances has received information on 12,460
cases of missing people in Sri Lanka. Dozens of journalists have been imprisoned and
12 murdered in the past five years.