Right to fair trial

AHRC declares a week of concern for threats against the independence of the judiciary in Sri Lanka The Asian Human Rights Commission alerts all concerned persons in and outside of Sri Lanka to the possibility that a five days from now there may not be a judiciary that can exercise judicial power with independence in […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is greatly aggrieved to learn of the tragic death of Phyo Wai Aung in Rangoon, Burma during the early morning hours of 4 January 2013. Phyo Wai Aung was an aspiring young electrical engineer with a loving family when in April 2010 police arrested him at home late one […]

Tamils living in the North and East have a complained of the loss of all their rights. Most people in the South ignored these complaints. Some even said that such deprivations are punishments for what the LTTE was. The assumption was that such treatment would not be extended to the South. However this has proved […]

When the impeachment proposal was announced, the immediate reaction of many was that the outcome was pre-determined as the government has a two thirds majority in Parliament (acquired as this was even by foul means). It was therefore predicted that this would be the end of the matter. There will be rituals, like the PSC […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission expressed grave concern over the present situation in the University of Jaffna. Most students are unable to attend lectures as the whole university is in a state of stalemate. The government has added a “national security” mood to the crisis, rather than taking it as a part of the problem […]

Yesterday (6th December) Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake and her legal team walked away from the PSC inquiry after clearly stating that she had no faith in it. Subsequently, she has written to the Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa through her lawyers and clearly set out that the PSC does not qualify in terms of the constitutional requirements […]

We call upon the people, in particular the judges and lawyers, to grasp the historic significance of this moment It is news now that the Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake and her legal team, led by Romesh De Silva PC, walked away from the Parliamentary Select Committee proceedings, expressing no confidence in the manner in which […]

The Speaker’s ruling relating to the Supreme Court’s notice to the Speaker and the members of the Parliamentary Select Committee does not in any way prohibits the constitutional right of the Court to entertain and to determine the Reference made by the Court of Appeal for a specific question relating to the scope of Article […]

This week, a committed New Delhi based civil rights advocate and incidentally a good friend, observed in a dispassionate aside to an otherwise entirely different conversation in that country that ‘this situation that Sri Lankans are facing regarding the political impeachment of the Chief Justice is quite alien for us to grasp here, even in […]

SDPI’s study on poverty shows that every third Pakistani is living his life below the poverty line. This is very shocking revelation for all of us. About 58.7 million out of 180 million Pakistanis are living below the poverty line. This below the poverty line population is living 52% in Balochistan, 33% in Sindh, 32% […]

Dear friends, Ms. Muddara Pedilage Suneetha Sandamali (16) succumbed to severe burn injuries at the Puttalam Base Hospital. She had been admitted by her partner, a soldier attached to the Civil Defence Force, and the Saliya Wewa Police Station. Shortly before the victim’s death she made a statement to the police that her partner had […]

NEW REPORT: Special Report: The Philippines’ hollow human rights system http://www.article2.org/pdf/v11n0203.pdf Dear friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has been informed that the trial of Temogen “Cocoy” Tulawie, an indigenous activist who is prosecuted on evidence of forced confession, would now be heard in Manila. Temogen would be moved from a prison in Davao […]

Dear friends, We wish to share with you the following article written by Tisaranee Gunasekara who is a Sri Lankan columnist based in Colombo Asian Human Rights Commission Hong Kong ————- An article written by Tisaranee Gunasekara, forwarded by the Asian Human Rights Commission SRI LANKA: Make the Impeachment Boomerang on the Rajapaksas Tisaranee Gunasekara […]

Basil Fernando Humankind has at least a few millenniums of experience in keeping prisons. It is part of the unfortunate predicament of humanity that there is this need to have prisons. However, over these long years, through bitter experiences, humanity has learned to lessen the suffering involved for the inmates of prisons and to make […]

Yesterday (9th of October), at least 11 prisoners were gunned down and around 35 were injured by the STF. The shooting was carried out when the STF entered the Welikada prison for some inspections. (Photo Courtesy: Sunday Times, Sri Lanka) According to an eye witness, interviewed by the BBC Sinhala service, when some prisoners who […]

Dear friends, We wish to share with you the following article written by Tisaranee Gunasekara who is a Sri Lankan columnist based in Colombo Asian Human Rights Commission Hong Kong ————- An article written by Tisaranee Gunasekara, forwarded by the Asian Human Rights Commission SRI LANKA: Hell Hath No Fury…. Tisaranee Gunasekara “Tyrant, why swell’st thou thus, of […]

For the United Nations Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on Pakistan, the country presented a four-year working report of how the government improved the state of human rights in Pakistan. Ms. Hina Rabbani Khar, the foreign minister leading the Pakistan delegation, presented the report to the UN. The UPR is a process in which the UN […]

Dear friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that two young women have been raped and one girl narrowly has avoided an attempted rape due to her neighbours’ assistance in three separate jurisdictions of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh. The police have allegedly been biased against the non-ethnic settlers instead of […]

Dear friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received the information regarding the arbitrary arrest of five Papuan activists in Jayapura, Papua on 12 October 2012. The five activists were arrested on the allegation of involvement in importing or distributing explosive materials. The police did not have any evidence to arrest and detain them […]

Dear friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has been alerted to the case of an air force officer currently serving a 20-year jail sentence for posting articles online critical of the armed forces. Ne Lynn Dwe was taken by military intelligence from his barracks in December 2011 and held incommunicado before being sentenced in […]