AI condemns Presidential pardon for convicted killer

• Says victims have a right to justice and reversal of Court decision by Executive problematic

International human rights organisation Amnesty International (AI) yesterday said the Government’s arbitrary decision to release Sergeant Sunil Ratnayake, who was sentenced to death for the murder of eight Tamil Internally Displaced People (IDPs) in December 2000, sends an extremely worrying message.

Responding to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s decision to release Sergeant Sunil Ratnayake, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for South Asia Biraj Patnaik said: “Using the pandemic as an opportunity to release those convicted for heinous crimes is reprehensible. Victims have a right to justice, and Sri Lanka has an obligation to ensure that justice is done. After many long years, the victims of the Mirusuvil massacre from 2000 finally got a semblance of justice back in 2015. It is despicable to have that justice reversed through an arbitrary Executive decision.”

AI said it was also concerned of any further decisions along the same lines as pledged by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during his election campaign.

Sri Lanka is a party of the International Covenant on Civil Political Rights (ICCPR) and has an obligation to ensure that any person whose rights or freedoms have been violated has an effective remedy (Article 2).

After more than a decade of long delays and case transfers, in June 2015, the Colombo High Court sentenced Army Officer Sergeant Sunil Ratnayake to death for the murder of eight Tamil IDPs in December 2000, after a 13-year trial.

The victims included three children, amongst them was a five-year-old whose body showed signs of torture. Sergeant Ratnayake, along with four other officers, was indicted based on multiple charges, including unlawful assembly with common intention to cause injury and murder.

Although Sergeant Ratnayake was found guilty on 17 counts, the others were cleared of all charges for insufficient evidence to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Sergeant Ratnayake appealed the conviction, and a five-Judge bench of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka unanimously affirmed the conviction in May 2019. In October 2019, then presidential-hopeful Gotabaya Rajapaksa pledged that once in power, he would acquit and release “war heroes” being held on “baseless” charges.