29 year old Tamil youth is under detention for 15 years in Welikada

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 October 2009, 17:42 GMT]
A team from a Human Rights Organization called Peoples Forum for Independence that visited the Welikada prison made a startling disclosure that they found a Tamil youth who was arrested at the age of fourteen has been under detention for fifteen years under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Now the youth is 29 years old. He is among several Tamil political prisoners who have been detained under the PTA and Emergency Regulations (ER) without any inquiry and without recourse in courts, said an official of the organization to the Colombo media.

The HR team visited Welikada prison last week and talked to several Tamil political prisons including senior journalist Mr. Tissanayagam who was sentenced to jail for twenty years. The team came to know the particular Tamil youth during that visit, sources said.