SRI LANKA: Another abduction case by a white van without a number plate 

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information regarding yet another enforced disappearance from Sri Lanka in which a white coloured van without a number plate is involved. The victim is P.K. Don Dilan Pushpakumara (26), an army soldier currently under interdiction who is a resident of Ihala Kandawatte, Meegahatenna, Sri Lanka. The Kalutara police initially showed their eagerness to find the victim but soon became indifferent in the case when they learned of the involvement of the white van. A senior officer at the police headquarters in Colombo also allegedly refused to record the victim’s father’s complaint. Meanwhile, the victim’s family believes that the victim is being held in police custody and being brutally tortured.

On the morning of 20 September 2006, Mr. P.K. Don Dilan Pushpakumara attended his case at the Kalutara High Court and then left with his father Mr. P.K. Leslie Wijegoonewardena.  They went into a nearby boutique at about 11:00am. According to the victim’s father, when they were about to leave the boutique, a white coloured van without number plate – now gaining notoriety around Sri Lanka in its association with abductions and enforced disappearances- suddenly appeared nearby. One man inside the van gestured towards the victim while another man alighted from the vehicle, grabbed Mr. Pushpakumara by his shirt collar and pushed him inside the van. His father had to watch all this helplessly.

After the van went away with his son, Mr. Wijegoonewardena rushed to the Kalutara police station, which was only a few hundred metres away, and reported his son’s abduction. Initially, the police sprung into action and about 4 policemen including the chief inspector got into a police jeep together with Mr. Wijegoonewardena and sped in the direction the van had gone in an apparent attempt to apprehend it. Meanwhile, the policemen questioned Mr. Wijegoonewardena about the details of the abduction. Mr. Wijegoonewardena says that he gradually felt their interest in pursuing his son’s abductors lessening, as if they knew something about the incident and did not want to get involved. When the police jeep reached near the Nagoda junction, one policeman remarked to the others knowingly, “This must be ‘that’ van”. Then the police van abruptly stopped and turned back to the Kalutara police station.

At the police station, the police, who not so long ago seemed eager to find his son, strangely showed no interest about the incident. They also refused to record the father’s complaint about the incident. The father was simply told by the police to return to the police station with his son’s mobile phone number; but only if and when he receive a message from the police. Hence the father went home but returned to the police station with a relative who worked in the Police-Special Task Force (STF). It was only on this person’s insistence that Mr. Wijegoonewardena’s complaint was reluctantly recorded.

On September 22, dissatisfied with the inaction of the Kalutara police, Mr. Wijegoonewardena visited the police headquarters in Colombo to lodge a complaint regarding his son’s abduction. According to him, a senior police officer listened to all the details of the case but when he was requested to record his complaint, the police officer told him, “The point is, you do not know who abducted your son”. Rather than recording the father’s complaint, as was his duty, the police officer suggested the father that he would send his son’s photo to the newspapers and asked him to bring eight photographs of his son.

According to Mr. Wijegoonewardena, he received information from a source that his son had been taken towards Colombo in the van and that he was blindfolded and incarcerated in a dark room, where he was being mercilessly tortured by his abductors. Based on his information, the father now strongly believes that the police are responsible for his son’s abduction and that he is being held in the police custody. He insists that this is the reason for the police inaction into his son’s case. The father also reported that several eyewitnesses including several three-wheeler drivers, who saw his son’s abduction, are reluctant to come forward in fear of being subjected to retaliation by the police.

The inaction of the police is in direct contrast to the recent comments by the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mr. Chandra Fernando, who said on the state media that there is little the police could do if people do not complain about disappearances and abductions. However, as has been seen in this case, the police in general including senior police officers themselves discourage people from complaining about these cases.

The number of the enforced disappearances is now sharply increasing in Sri Lanka. The AHRC has already reported disappearances of 6 persons for the last 2 months (To see further details of those cases, visit: UA-310-2006, UA-305-2006 and UA-280-2006). In particular, the AHRC is gravely concerned about reappearance of the white vans without number plates, which were a symbol of terror and the disappearances in the last few years of the 1980s. If the Sri Lankan government does not effectively investigate the abduction cases in which the white vans are involved, it will never be free from the suspicion that the government itself is directly responsible for those disappearances.

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please write to the relevant authorities listed below and urge them to immediately inquire into the abduction of the victim and locate his whereabouts. Please also urge them to inquire into the Kalutara police’s inaction into this case and take action against the responsible officers.

 

 

 

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