Women in protective custody, transferred to SLA detention centre, fear for safety

[TamilNet, Monday, 08 December 2008, 00:40 GMT]
The women and children who faced death threats in Jaffna from the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and its paramilitary and placed under protective custody through the Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission in Jaffna at Kurunakar Rehabilitation Centre have been suddenly moved to the detention camp run by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) inside its High Security Zone in Thellippazhai. The women and children are being denied the opportunity of meeting their family members besides fear for their safety, according to legal sources in Jaffna. They have appealed to the team of Magistrates who visited the camp to relocate them to a protection facility in Jaffna city.

Kurunakar Rehabilitation Centre was vacated in order to house persons fleeing from war in Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) held territories to Jaffna peninsula.

Meanwhile, the husbands of the above women, placed in Jaffna Prison had protested against the sudden transfer of their wives by observing a token protest fast.

Their fast, however, was given up due to pressure exerted by powerful parties in the government, the sources further said.

The women who appealed to the team of magistrates pointed out that the opportunity of meeting their family members and relatives, which they had been allowed to in Kurunakar Rehabilitation Centre, is denied in the SLA detention centre where they are now housed.

The husbands of these women in Jaffna Prison suffer from mental depression and fear for their wives and children, the officials of Jaffna Prison said.

The inmates at the detention camp of the SLA, located inside the HSZ in Thellippazhai, have been treated as 'suspects' under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), as they were forced to sign a document which stated that they were ex-members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE) in the past.

Although, the new inmates were not subjected to sign a such document, they were being treated as potential 'terror suspects' by the SLA men guarding the detention centre, legal sources that were in contact with the families said.