Colombo Appeal Court deliberately delays appeal case of Tamil political prisoners

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 December 2017, 22:57 GMT]
The appeal case filed on behalf of the three Tamil political prisoners, who waged a 38-day long fast unto death in Anuradhapura prison recently, is being deliberately postponed each time as the SL Attorney General Department has been dragging its feet citing delays of locating a witness, who has in fact sought political asylum in a West European country, the families deceived by the Colombo establishment told TamilNet on Tuesday. The Appeal Court in Colombo has postponed the hearing to 02 February, 2018 on Tuesday.

The families of Tamil political prisoners Mathiyarasan Sulaxan, Rasathurai Thiruvarul and Ganesan Tharshan said that they now realised how they have been systematically waylaid by the SL Governor to North Reginald Cooray and the officials of the SL Presidential Secretariat in Colombo.

Northern Provincial Councillor M.K. Shivajilingam of TELO and the chairman of ‘Sivan Foundation’ and the newly appointed ‘Propaganda Secretary’ of TELO were facilitating the families to file the case in the appeal court on the instructions from the Colombo establishment.

The lawyer, who was representing the Tamil political prisoners, had strongly advised against filing an appeal arguing that the SL Judiciary would seize the opportunity to drag on the process even further.

The Tamil political prisoners have been detained for 8 years now and there has been no case filed against them during the initial 4 years.

The prisoners could be released through a principled political decision by the SL President. Despite the momentum created by the fast-unto-death and the mass mobilisation that followed, the Tamil political leadership of the ITAK systematically ignored to take up the matter, the families blamed further.

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