FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AHRC-STM-314-2008
December 11, 2008
A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission
SRI LANKA: Further politicisation of the Attorney General’s Department expected
The Attorney General’s Department is to be further politicised with the expected appointment of Mohan Peiris; a close associate of the present regime and in particular, the Ministry of Defence. The department has already been battered in the public eye and only last week the Supreme Court itself blamed the department for filing false charges, on fake laws. Furthermore, in March of this year, the International Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP) denounced the dual role played by the AGs Department in the Presidential Commission of Inquiry. Meanwhile, the department is particularly criticised relating to their failure to fight impunity relating to disappearances as well as in the implementation of the law relating to torture.
Last week the Supreme Court suspended two criminal charges framed in the Colombo High Court by the AG’s Department regarding two persons who were the editor and the publisher of an opposition newspaper. The closing down of the Mawbima newspaper was part of the government strategy to suppress the opposition media supporting a former minister of the government who is now a rival of the regime.
The Supreme Court was quoted in the media as stating that The Attorney General’s Department is attempting to frame charges in some way against Alles to make him suffer and to damage his goodwill, going against the reliefs granted to him covering to false laws.
The issue of filing false charges is a matter of grave concern as filing of fabricated cases by the police, and sometimes also by the Attorney General’s Department, is a serious problem affecting the lives of innocent persons in Sri Lanka. It can also be said that the case filed against J.S. Tissainayagam is also a false charge based on fake laws. The manipulation of the emergency law and the anti terrorism law provides opportunities for the state to fabricate charges against anyone it wishes to persecute through fake prosecutions. Fake or otherwise, persons so charged can be deprived of bail and remain in detention for long periods and within the restricted interpretation of the law, when it comes to these types of cases, they can even be pronounced guilty by a court and spend long years in prison. Many of those persons do not have the wealth required to fight these cases and added to that, witnesses can be intimidated so that even a fake charge can be proven as true.
The Supreme Court making a pronouncement on this matter is of great importance. However, given the widespread nature of this practice and how deeply the practice is entrenched within the criminal justice framework of Sri Lanka, much more needs to be done if the horror that can be caused to individuals through such prosecutions is to be eliminated.
The Penal Code makes the fabrication of charges and making of false accusations, either by civilians or by those who represent state agencies, a crime. The crime carries the punishment that is the same to the perpetrator of the false charge as to the accused if the charges were to be true. For example, if a person accused of a particular crime, if proven can be sentenced to a life sentence, the perpetrator who knowingly filed the false charge can be punished with the same sentence.
One of the relevant provisions of the Penal Code is as follows:
False charge of offence made with intent to injure.
208. Whoever, with intent to cause injury to any person, institutes or causes to be instituted any criminal proceeding against that person, or falsely charges any person with having committed an offence, knowing that there is no just or lawful ground for such proceeding or charge against that person, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both: and if such criminal proceeding be instituted on a false charge of an offence punishable with death.-or imprisonment for seven years or upwards, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to seven years, and shall also be liable to fine.
In this instance it is the Attorney General’s Department itself that has been accused of engaging in filing false charges on fake laws. It is an accusation that is as grave as can be. It should not be allowed to pass purely by way of a comment from the court. The matter of how, why and who was engaged in this violation of the law should be investigated and prosecuted if equality before the law is a doctrine that still operates in Sri Lanka.
The expected appointment of Mr. Peiris, who is now a private practitioner and who has on several occasions been the governments spokesman at international meetings, is perceived by many close observers as a sign of the further politicisation of the institution. Many persons in the department who have refused to have political allegiances will be discriminated against. Further this decision is seen as a step towards the appointment of Mr. Peiris as the next Chief Justice upon the retirement of the present incumbent sometime in the coming year. The independence of the judiciary will continue to suffer by the appointment of persons with close ties to the existing regime and who have even been spokesmen for the regime. It is unfortunate that a once hallowed institution of the Chief Justice will be known in the future as the chief justice of a system of injustice.
