AHRC News

By Basil Fernando  Church bells will ring and lights will be lit to remember the 2019 Easter Sunday tragedy. Meanwhile, people have also been putting up a fight against the deadly coronavirus. For so...

By Basil Fernando Father James Hurley, a great man and a humanist, passed away last week. I had the privilege of associating with Father Hurley since 1970. He impressed me as a man who was very deeply...

By Basil Fernando I have borrowed the title of this article from the immortal work of Robert Lewis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. This novel is about a mysterious and tragic tra...

A Joint Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission, Shasthya Andolon, Odhikar, Jonoshasthya Sangram Parishad, Sramabikash, and Anti-Tobacco Women Alliance Bangladesh government’s inadequate meas...

By Avinash Pandey Despite all the claims of them too being “atoot ang” or unbreakable part of the country, news from the North Eastern states of India seldom make it to the national headlines, wit...

Just what do you teach your students?   Vice-Chancellor & Chairperson of the Grants Commission University of Sri Jayewardenepura  Sri Lanka Dear Vice-Chancellor & Chairperson of the Grants C...

30 years ago, Richard de Zoysa was abducted and disappeared. His dead body was later found on a beach. During the same period, literally tens of thousands of persons throughout the country were also d...

By Basil Fernando This article is about the manner in which unscrupulous lawyers could manipulate delays in the law to their personal advantage. This type of behavior is now a permanent feature in Sri...

In many countries in Asia, it has become common for the state to use ultra-violent methods to control or deny the civil rights of people. Several countries used enforced disappearance as such method o...

The South China Morning Post recently published a report quoting Colonel Romeo Caramat stating that the Philippines’ ultra-violent approach in curbing drugs has not been effective. He further went o...

Bangladesh’s incumbent government, headed by Sheikh Hasina, continues curbing civic space and muzzling freedom of expression. The latest target has been Netra News – an investigative news porta...

An incident was reported in December 2019 from India regarding the gang rape of a woman and what happened thereafter. The news of the gang rape stirred up a massive protest from many parts of India. A...

A Joint Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission, Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances, and Odhikar on the occasion of International Human Rights Day Dhaka/Manila/Hong Kong, 10 De...

One month since Professor Muhammad Ismail was arbitrarily detained, he is still languishing in prison on trumped-up charges of ‘hate speech’, ‘spreading false information’ and ‘cyberterroris...

By Basil Fernando The 2019 election has not generated any real enthusiasm among the people. There have been the usual rituals of meetings, distribution of rice parcels, promises of other little santho...

A comment on the memoir of Former Chief Justice Dr Shiranee Bandaranayake entitled “Hold Me in Contempt” Basil Fernando Attorney-At-Law This memoir by former Chief Justice Dr. Shirani Bandaranayak...

By Avinash Pandey Efforts to rescue 2-year-old Sujith Wilson, trapped in a borewell for over 3 days in a village in Tiruchirappalli district of Tamilnadu now have entered fourth day. Rescue teams, inc...

By Basil Fernando In a Thai courthouse on 4th October 2019, Judge Khanakorn Pianchana shot himself in the chest as a protest against interference with the independence of judges in their decision-maki...

By Basil Fernando Legalistically speaking, a nation is a people living together in a particular geographical region. But legal definitions do not create a nation. The meaning of nation is far deeper t...

බැසිල් ප‍්‍රනාන්දු පාලකයෙකු පත් කර ගන්නේ රාජ්‍ය තන්ත‍්‍රය ජනතා ස�...