Jurist Sri Lanka anti-drug operation to continue amid human rights concerns

[Dadparvar]

In a press conference Sri Lanka’s Public Security Minister Tiran Alles, one of twelve members of Parliament’s Select Committee to deal with the “drug menace,” vowed to continue the controversial anti drug campaign Yukthiya amid human rights concerns.

The campaign was announced in early December 2023 via press conference. In a message directed to the country’s drug dealers and organized criminals, the minister called for drug operations to cease. The minister further warned that police have been instructed to use maximum force against criminals.

If they don’t put a stop to this today, we will locate them, then a shootout will happen and they will end up getting killed, that cannot be stopped. It would be a better option to quit this and live a good life with your family, instead of getting yourself killed.

On Monday, a joint statement signed by over 30 international organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, expressing deep concern for the “drastic intensification of anti-drug operations in Sri Lanka leading to significant human rights violations.” The statement alleged that the police have conducted arbitrary arrests and illegal search and seizures, at times televising these actions, violating the right to privacy and the presumption of innocence. Those arrested have been primarily charged with a non-bailable offenses, requiring detention in prisons with “inhuman and degrading conditions.” The report also alleged that at minimum 1,600 people “have been sent for compulsory drug rehabilitation” violating the right to consent to or withdraw from medical treatment. As of January 9, there have allegedly been over 29,000 arrests. The joint statement urges Sri Lanka to take a more “holistic and human rights based approach” in accordance with the “2019 Ministerial Declaration on drugs – the current global drug policy document.”

In response to international outcry against Yukthiya, Alles stated, “all established and recognized media outlets, blessed it.” Alles went on to insist that only a “small group surviving via the illegal drug business were making such baseless allegations.”

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