Sri Lanka

TJET Focus Country

This page presents a country report and describes data that TJET has compiled on regime transitions, intrastate conflict episodes, and transitional justice mechanisms. For details on the data included on this page, view the FAQ.

For Sri Lanka, TJET has collected information on: 14 amnesties between 1977 and 2010; 63 domestic trials starting between 1971 and 2020; one foreign trial starting in 2017; two reparations policies created between 1987 and 2018; and 13 truth commissions mandated between 1977 and 2015.

Select any transitional justice mechanism in the table below to view a timeline in the figure.

Conflict Year

Democratic Transition Year

Author of country report: Geoff Dancy

Introduction

Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon, is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious island country known for its cinnamon cultivation, tea plantations, and tourist-filled Southern beaches. Of its 21 million inhabitants, close to 75% are Sinhalese, and approximately 20% are Tamil. The rest of the population consists of Moors and Muslims. Ceylon gained independence from Britain in 1948 through a top-down “communal compact” involving the colonial rulers and Sinhalese and Tamil elites. Upon independence, the country remained a British dominion and operated as a liberal democracy with a parliamentary government modeled on the Westminster system. Owing to its position in the Indian Ocean, its extensive railways, and its well developed and centralized system of administration, many expected Ceylon to emerge as a regional economic juggernaut.

By the mid-1950s, the economy boomed in large part because of increased tea, rubber, and coconut exports, but ordinary class-based political divisions gave way to a wave of linguistic nationalism and Buddhist revivalism on the part of the Sinhalese majority. Tamil leaders pursued federalism, while appealing to pre-independence guarantees for equal representation. Yet Sinhalese politicians found electoral success in promising ever-increasing returns to the majority, who were perceived to be underrepresented in government and civil service in comparison to Tamils under colonial rule. Ruling Sinhalese parties ushered in a period of state development, ethnic patronage, and import substitution, which culminated in a late-decade economic crisis characterized by dire unemployment.

Turbulence arrived in the 1970s. There would be two new constitutions in 1972 and 1978, which together ended the nation’s status as a British dominion, renamed the country from Ceylon to Sri Lanka, consolidated executive power, and entrenched Sinhalese Buddhist rule over other ethnic and religious minorities. Two rebellions also began in this decade. One youth-led insurrection occurred in the South in 1971, led by the People’s Liberation Front (Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, JVP). A second rebellion began to percolate in the North and the East, consisting of Tamil organizations who were aggrieved by Sinhalese favoritism and disenchanted by the stagnant Tamil movement for federalism.

State forces crushed the JVP through the use of emergency rule, counter-insurgency campaigns, mass arrests, rehabilitation camps, and executions. When the JVP resurfaced in 1989, the government again deployed extreme repression, including systematic disappearances. However, in 1983, the Sri Lankan military became embroiled in a much more protracted civil war against the secessionist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) that lasted 26 years, ending with a brutal three-year military campaign that began in 2006. The UN estimates that about 100,000 people died during the civil war, and 40% of those lost their lives in the final five months of the conflict. Between January and March 2009, up to 330,000 Tamil civilians were trapped in a small area within the Vanni Region of Sri Lanka, which became a massive ‘killing field’.

As a ‘conflict democracy,’ Sri Lanka has some prior experience with transitional justice, having established 12 truth commissions and commissions of inquiry. It also held some notable prosecutions of police and security forces in the 1990s. That said, efforts at transitional justice in the country have been characterized as ‘half-measures’ meant to deflect criticism from the international community. Indeed, the post-conflict period starting in 2009 has featured extensive international pressure for accountability from above and below, including resolutions from the U.N. Human Rights Council and widespread protests around cases like the ‘Trinco Five.’ But this pressure has met lack of will or outright resistance from the political establishment. Mostly notably, former presidents Mahinda Rajapaksa (2005-2015) and his brother Gotabaya Rajapaksa (2020-2022) have sought to downplay well-documented allegations of atrocity crimes in the final stages of the war, during which they led state forces.

Regime Context

Based on well-known democracy data, TJET records one democratic transition starting in 2015.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Since its independence in 1948, Sri Lanka has functioned as an electoral democracy. However, its governing institutions have undergone significant transformation over time. After a period of significant erosion of liberal institutions between 2005 and 2014, it experienced a democratic transition in 2015, marked by the electoral loss of Mahinda Rajapaksa.

At independence, the 1948 Soulbury Constitution established a parliamentary system with a bicameral legislature featuring an unelected 30-member Senate and a 101-seat House of Representatives elected by universal adult suffrage. The Head of Government was the Prime Minister, while the Head of State remained the monarch of Britain, who was represented by the Governor General in Ceylon. The branches of government were strictly separated, and the judiciary was respected for its independence. A Judicial Services Commission (JSC) was responsible for assigning and dismissing judges, not including those appointed to the Supreme Court. However, the Constitution did not provide for a bill of rights, and courts had limited judicial review powers.

The ‘Tamil Question’ immediately became a national political issue in the post-independence era. With the Citizenship Act of 1948 and the Parliamentary Elections Act of 1949, D.S. Senanayake’s government disenfranchised foreign-born Tamils from South India, which constituted over half of all Tamils living in the country. The Tamil Federal Party formed in response. However, Tamil leadership could not fight the rising wave of Sinhalese nationalism, which possessed the characteristics of a populist movement. It viewed the old political elite, including many Tamil civil servants and Marxist intellectuals, with distrust. In 1956, S.W.R.D Bandaranaike, founder of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), campaigned on linguistic nationalism and swept into power, unseating the yet-dominant United National Party (UNP). After victory, Bandaranaike passed the Sinhalese Only Act. This law made Sinhalese, rather than English or Tamil, the only official language of Ceylon. Tamils protested peacefully and met communal riots and mob violence in response.

In July 1970, the SLFP’s Sirimavo Bandaranaike, who in 1960 had become the world’s first ever female prime minister following the assassination of her husband, campaigned for election on a promise to enact a new constitution. After winning the election, Bandaranaike formed a Constituent Assembly, but plans for a new constitution were stalled in response to the JVP insurrection of 1971. Nevertheless, in May 1972, the First Republican Constitution became the law of the land, while the country was under a state of emergency. In addition to committing to creating a socialist democracy, the new constitution established absolute independence from Britain and made it the “duty of the State to protect and foster Buddhism.” In so doing, it took away Section 29 of the Soulbury Constitution, which voided any law that conferred “on persons of any community or religion any privilege or advantage.”

The 1972 Constitution explicitly rejected federalism in favor of a unitary state with fewer minority protections and a less independent judiciary. The National State Assembly replaced Parliament as the supreme legislative body and instrument of popular sovereignty, and the executive and judicial branches were effectively subordinated to that body. For instance, where the JSC had previously appointed judges, the new constitution made that the role of the Cabinet of Ministers. Notably, too, where the Constitution contains a list of fundamental rights and freedoms in Chapter VI, Section 18, it also allows for restrictions on those rights in the interest of “national unity and integrity, national security, national economy, public safety” and “public order.” Judicial review of legislation was ended, and a new Constitutional Court was created to provide for previewing bills for constitutionality before they are passed into laws.

In July 1977, J.R. Jayawardene’s UNP returned to power in a landslide, after several years in the opposition. The UNP had promised “to draft a new Constitution in order to achieve the goal of a democratic socialist society.” Upon victory, Jayawardene offered the Second Republican Constitution in 1978, over protestations by the SFLP and Tamil political parties like the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF). The 1978 Constitution, still active today, maintained a commitment to Buddhism and democratic socialism, though it expanded the list of fundamental rights. In addition, it created an executive presidency and replaced the National Assembly with a parliament elected under proportional representation, this an alternative to the first-past-the-post arrangement under Westminster rules. Moreover, it abolished the newly established Constitutional Court and conferred all of its responsibilities to the Supreme Court, whose justices are appointed by the President. Though this system was similar to that of the 1972 Constitution, de facto it created unchecked appointment power for the president. The president was also authorized to select the Prime Minister and Cabinet, which currently consists of 21 members . Under Article 30, the Executive President is empowered to serve as head of state, chief executive, and commander-in-chief of the armed forces. While the 1972 Constitution was created as a flexible system that could be amended or even wholly replaced by a two-thirds majority vote in parliament, its 1978 replacement was designed to be more rigid with the requirement of a referendum introduced for amending certain provisions of the constitution in addition to two-thirds majority support in parliament.

Nonetheless, successive governments found a way to form political alliances to achieve two-thirds majority for passing self-serving constitutional amendments. A series of constitutional amendments over the following four decades concentrated even greater power in the hands of executive. Starting during J.R. Jayawardene’s presidency, justices were repeatedly harassed for ruling against the government, which has become fairly common, damaging the de facto independence of the legal branch of government. Formally, the judiciary could not assess the constitutionality of laws already passed by parliament; instead, it only had one week to review proposed legislation. This is perhaps why the judiciary has done little to challenge numerous states of emergency and act suspending rights protections, like the 1979 Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Further, enacted in response to Tamil militancy, this law allows for detention of alleged terrorists for up to 18 months with no judicial review, and it has remained in effect for over 40 years.

In the 1980s, Jayawardene brought in economic liberalization, while becoming embroiled in a separatist civil war with Sri Lankan Tamils in the Northern and Eastern provinces. A 1987 peace agreement sponsored by India promised to devolve power to provincial governments, but this commitment has never been fully realized. In the 1990s, President Chandrika Kumaratunge introduced a series of reforms meant to roll back some of the UNP’s efforts to weaken the judiciary. However, none of these overturned the near-permanent state of emergency that was legalized through the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

Since the early 2000s, the country has witnessed an oscillating cycle of constitutional amendments that further erode checks on executive power, which are later followed by other amendments that re-establish those checks. President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who was elected in 2005, made an overt bid to subjugate the judiciary through legislation. Prior to his administration, under the presidency of Chandrika Kumaratunga, the 17th Amendment authorized a Constitutional Council to appoint judges to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court. Rajapaksa dismantled this process. His administration pushed through the 18th Amendment, which did three things. First, it returned appointment authority to the sole discretion of the president. Second, it abolished the Constitutional Council and shifted the staffing of independent commissions like the Human Rights Commission to a Parliamentary Council controlled by the president’s party. And third, it removed the Constitution’s two-term presidential limits, allowing Rajapaksa to run for office again in 2015.

During Mahinda Rajapaksa’s rule, the judiciary became more politicized than at any time in Sri Lankan history. In 2012, Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake was impeached by Parliament for ruling unconstitutional the Divi Neguma Bill—which sought to put all state development projects in a new government department under the control of the president’s brother Basil Rajapaksa who was a cabinet minister.

In the January 2015 election that surprised many observers, Mahinda Rajapaksa lost to Maithripala Sirisena, who acted quickly to reinstate Justice Bandaranayake and appointed a Tamil judge, K. Sripavan, to serve as chief justice. In April, Parliament enacted the 19th amendment that repealed Rajapaksa’s 18th Amendment, reinstating the Constitutional Council and assigning it the duty of appointing members to independent commissions. These changes constitute a minor democratic transition, wherein a country backsliding toward autocracy reinforces its liberal institutions.

The Sirisena government also pledged to pursue a multi-pronged post-conflict justice agenda. However, by 2018, little of this materialized, and President Sirisena sparked a political furor when he sacked Prime Minister Ranil Wikremesinghe in a bid to replace him with former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The move created a constitutional crisis, attracted a great deal of criticism, and was ultimately abandoned after the Supreme Court overruled Sirisena’s efforts to dissolve parliament.

In April 2019, the island was shaken by the Easter Bombings when ISIS-affiliated terrorists exploded bombs on Easter Sunday, at multiple locations including three churches and a luxury hotel in Colombo. Promising security and order following the Easter tragedy, Gotabaya Rajapaksa won election in November 2019. Defense Minister during the last stages of the civil war against the LTTE, Gotabaya shared his brother Mahinda’s appreciation for unhindered executive power. In October 2020, his SLPP party passed a 20th Amendment to the constitution, which revoked the 19th Amendment, again providing the President with the sole discretion to appoint all offices. It also allowed the President to dissolve Parliament after one year and weakened the office of the Prime Minister. Under Gotabaya, who has a history of threatening and publicly disputing with journalists, attacks on NGOs and media organizations rose.

A series of missteps—including tax cuts, a top-down decision to shift to organic agriculture and the depletion of foreign reserves—created an economic crisis of severe proportions and challenged the Rajapaksa administration. The country began to run out of fuel, which sparked massive protests. This came to a head in early 2022, leading to Rajapaksa’s resignation and brief exile in July of that year. Lifelong politician Ranil Wikremesinghe was inaugurated as acting president, and later officially elected by parliament in a secret ballot. His administration passed the 21st Amendment that is meant to restore the executive checks embodied by the 19th Amendment, though it is unclear among experts whether the law in fact has this effect. Indeed, there are continued reports of executive tampering in judicial affairs.

Conflict Context

Based on the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, TJET records eight violent intrastate conflict episodes between 1971 and 2009 (during 25 calendar years), involving four distinct armed opposition groups fighting against the government.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions. Source: UCDP Dyadic Dataset version 23.1, https://ucdp.uu.se/downloads/index.html#dyadic.

Over the last fifty years, Sri Lanka faced two distinct and overlapping civil wars, and the government has engaged in severe repression. According to TJET estimates, the country is the 40th most violent country in the world over the last 50 years.

Political violence in the country was unleashed by an intellectual Marxist-Leninist rebellion led by Rohana Wijeweera’s Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) in 1971. The purported aim of this group, which was established in 1965, was to overthrow the Sri Lankan government and replace it with a socialist regime. The JVP was defeated in the first instance, and then again in 1989, when it led an insurrection against Indian interference in the country. The JVP is now an active political party and has formed a broader alliance called the National People’s Power (NPP) and has become a significant competitor for presidential and parliamentary elections in 2024/25.

The second axis of conflict centered on ethnic grievances. Sinhalese politicians enacted several laws over time that denied religious minorities (Hindu, Christian, Muslim) and linguistic minorities (Tamil) equal status. This resulted from a process Neil DeVotta calls “ethnic outbidding,” wherein “politicians create platforms and programmes to ‘outbid’ their opponents on the anti-minority stance adopted.” As the country advanced toward a Sinhalese-Buddhist unitary state, the Tamil political establishment embraced the cause of self-determination, calling for a new secular state called Tamil Eelam. The separatist Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) began contesting elections in 1977. The party at first co-existed with more radical Tamil groups, but it would later be targeted for attacks by co-ethnic secessionists.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), led by Velupillai Prabhakaran, began a 26-year-long, multi-staged rebel war against the Sri Lankan state in 1983. During this time, the LTTE sought to become the only organization representing the Tamil minority, and would mete out violence against any challengers to its dominance. The LTTE infamously tallied over 300 suicide bombings during the course of the conflict, and in later years, it used Tamil civilians as human shields. Their separatist war ended in 2009 with the murder of Prabhakaran and the decimation of the LTTE by Sri Lankan Armed Forces.

The April 1971 Uprising

The 1971 JVP insurrection consisted mostly of marginalized Sinhala youth from rural areas of the country, who were outside the political establishment in the capital of Colombo. Drawing inspiration from other communist revolutions in Asia, Rohana Wijeweera mobilized swaths of disaffected young men to join him on what Colvin de Silva once called a “foredoomed Ultra-leftist adventure.” The April Uprising targeted the United Front government, a coalition formed by the SLFP and two Marxist political parties, the Lanka Sama Samaja Party (LSSP) and the Communist Party (CP), under the leadership of Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandranaike. Wijeweera, a former member of the CP who had studied in Moscow, criticized Ceylon’s Marxist political elite for failing to deliver social change. In education camps located throughout the South, JVP leadership recruited and trained thousands of student-aged fighters, and they received external support from peripheral states in the Communist bloc like Albania and North Korea.

The uprising began with attacks on dozens of police stations around the country. For a brief spell, JVP cells controlled some cities and disrupted road travel. However, it failed in its mission to capture Colombo or to kidnap the Prime Minister. Ultimately, the JVP would be overrun by the superior weapons and training of the Armed Forces. Many insurgents went into hiding, but over 5,000 rebels surrendered. Officially, 53 members of state forces and 1,200 JVP were killed. Others claim that up to 10,000 JVP followers were lost, along with thousands more civilians. No reliable estimates of the final toll exist.

Tamil Wars in the 1980s

The JVP insurrection introduced civil war to Sri Lanka, and armed radicalism soon spread to Tamil youth. In 1975, V. Prabhakaran assassinated Alfred Duraiappah, a Tamil member of the SLFP and mayor in the northern city of Jaffna, and in 1976, his Tamil guerilla forces consolidated into the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The group was skilled in intimidation. It routinely harassed state security forces and attacked moderate Tamil politicians who cooperated with President JR Jayawardene’s government.

In 1977, there was a pogrom of Tamils in Jaffna within a few months of the UNP’s landslide election victory, and in 1981 the Jaffna library was burned to the ground. In 1983, this intercommunal violence escalated into a full-blown civil war. On July 23, the LTTE ambushed a Sri Lankan Army (SLA) Patrol called Four Four Bravo near Thirunelveli, and murdered 13 soldiers. This precipitated Sinhalese mob violence known as Black July. Over a week, somewhere between 400 and 5,500 Tamils were killed, and thousands of Tamil-owned houses, stores, and factories were looted and burned. There is extensive evidence that government officials and soldiers assisted Sinhalese rioters and summarily executed several prisoners who were rounded up under authorization of the Prevention of Terrorism Act. It took days for President Jayawardene to react, which some interpreted as his condoning the violence. The indiscriminate, island-wide pogrom drove many Tamils to flee the country or to join the separatist rebellion.

The next two years would involve battles between the SLA and at least five different rebel organizations: the LTTE, the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO), the Eelam People’s Revolutionary Front (EPRLF), the Eelam Revolutionary Organisation of Students (EROS), and the People’s Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE). Of these, the LTTE was by far the most merciless, responding to SLA anti-Tamil violence with gruesome retaliatory acts, like the massacre of 146 people in Anuradhapura on May 14, 1985.

In 1985, the LTTE took control of the northern city of Jaffna. For a brief moment in the same year, all Tamil militant groups except for PLOTE united under the banner of the Eelam National Liberation Front (ENLF) and negotiated with the government at Thimpu. The talks broke down, and in early 1986, so did the alliance between rebels. Soon thereafter, the LTTE began a full-fledged assault on TELO and the EPRLF, which practically wiped out both groups. The TELO continued on as a small political party, and the EPRLF went on to control parts of the Northeast with protection from the Indian Peacekeeping Force (IPKF) in 1988. However, when the IPKF withdrew in 1990, the EPRLF was demolished by fighting with the LTTE and state forces. Surviving members fled to India.

Indian Intervention and the Second JVP Insurrection

Secessionist rebels were recipients of outside food and military aid from India, in large part because they had the sympathy of co-ethnics in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. In May 1987, the SLA went on the offensive in the North with a conventional campaign called the Vadamarachchi Operation. It succeeded in putting the LTTE on its back heels, but it also led to a humanitarian disaster that worried the Indian government. The Indian government sent its planes to airdrop food supplies in the Jaffna peninsula. Indian intervention scuttled the Vadamarachchi Operation much to the annoyance of Sri Lanka. In July 1987, JR Jayawardene and India’s Rajiv Gandhi signed the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord, the goal of which was to interrupt Indian arms smuggling and funding networks, to arrive at terms of peace Tamils could accept, and to settle the civil war in Sri Lanka. Tamil leaders were offered concessions, including the devolution of state authority to local provincial councils established by the 13th Amendment. The IPKF was invited into the country to monitor and enforce the peace agreement by disarming Tamil rebels.

The IPKF arrived in Jaffna in 1987, and immediately drew the ire of the LTTE, which flatly refused to demobilize. When the IPKF tried to disarm the group by force, the LTTE went to war with the Indian interventionary force. At the same time, Rohana Wijeweera and the JVP began a second insurrection against the Jayawardene government. Wijeweera had been amnestied in 1977, and he went into electoral politics. However, the JVP constituency was riled both by Indian interference and by concessions to the Tamil minority. It responded with a guerilla war involving bombing attacks, ambushes, and assassinations.

In 1988 and 1989, war raged on many fronts, and violence was rampant. The Sri Lankan government expended great energy repressing the JVP rebellion in the South, employing death squads that systematically tortured and disappeared suspected insurgents. Wijeweera was rounded up and executed in 1989, though the rebels fought on. Disappearances, rape, and torture had also been commonplace in the war against the LTTE, but the government’s attention shifted to the JVP until it had eliminated the threat in 1990. The LTTE made use of this distraction to eliminate rival Tamil groups, some of whom supported the Indians.

Strange alliances also emerged. For instance, while the SLA’s Operation Combine sought to put down the ultranationalist Sinhalese JVP rebellion in the South, the LTTE coordinated with the JVP because they shared a common enemy in the Indian peacekeepers. Toward the end of the IPKF intervention, President Jayawardene’s successor Ranasinghe Premadasa covertly sponsored the LTTE in its fight against the IPKF because the tide of public opinion swung against the Indian outsiders. In desperate hope for a peaceful negotiated settlement, President Ranasinghe Premadasa ordered the IPKF to leave in 1990 and opened negotiations with the LTTE. However, violence only increased. Battle deaths surged from a few dozen in 1989 to over 3,000 in 1990. And the LTTE expelled 75,000 Sri Lankan Muslims from the Northern Province in an act of ethnic cleansing.

Reign of Terror

The early 1990s is a period sometimes referred to as Eelam War II. It was truly a reign of terror. The LTTE held sway, conquering all areas in the North that were vacated by the departing IPKF. The LTTE engaged in numerous acts of one-sided violence against civilians, killing nearly 700 people in 1990 alone, and over 500 more in the two years following. It also ramped up its campaign of terrorist attacks and suicide bombings. According to the Global Terrorism Database, the LTTE perpetrated over 130 bombings between 1990 and 1995.

This was also a period of large conventional battles between the SLA and the LTTE. In July 1991, for instance, 5,000 LTTE rebels besieged an army base at Elephant Pass, engaging in weeks of fighting that left around 2,000 dead.

Numerous political leaders were assassinated by the LTTE. In July 1989, the group murdered TULF parliamentarian A. Amirthalingham, and in the summer of 1990, the LTTE killed two EPRLF MPs in separate incidents. This was part of its effort to neutralize moderate Tamil leadership. The LTTE also targeted high-profile state leaders. In March 1991, the LTTE killed Minister of Defense Ranjan Wijeratne in a car bomb. In May 1991, a female suicide bomber killed former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in Tamil Nadu. And in May 1993, a suicide bomber assassinated Sri Lankan President Premadasa and 23 other bystanders as he attended a May Day rally in Colombo. Dingiri Wijetunga assumed the role of transitional president until elections were held again in November 1994. On October 24 of that year, an LTTE suicide bomber killed UNP candidate Gamini Dissanayake and 58 others. The SLFP’s Chandrika Kumaratunga leading a coalition of parties called the People’s Alliance, went onto win election to the presidency, ending 17 years of UNP rule. A few months earlier she had led the Alliance to a parliamentary victory and become the new Prime Minister.

President Kumaratunga introduced a sort of transitional phase to Sri Lanka. She established mechanisms to investigate the legacy of disappearances in the country, and she immediately began suing for peace with the LTTE. The government agreed to a ceasefire in early 1995. However, after a couple of months of stalled negotiations, the LTTE launched new attacks, and the war resumed. In this third phase, known sometimes as Eelam War III, the government focused on trying to recapture Northern territory controlled by the LTTE, including Jaffna. Over the next six years, conventional battles between the Tigers and the SLA exacted a heavy toll, leading to over 20,000 battle deaths, and over 1 million displacements. The LTTE also struck fear with deadly suicide attacks on the Colombo Central Bank in 1996 and the Bandaranaike Airport in 2001, among many others.

Over the 1990s, the LTTE created a parallel state in the North and East of Sri Lanka, holding almost a third of the country’s territory and ruling over more than 2 million Tamils. They also received extensive funding from the Tamil diaspora in Britain, Australia, and Canada. As an increasingly powerful organization, the LTTE sought formal recognition.

However, between 1995 and 2001, Kumaratunga privileged the TULF as a negotiating partner, and the LTTE targeted her for assassination in return. They failed, and she succeeded in a second campaign for president in 1999. However, by 2001, President Kumaratunga was forced to hold parliamentary elections following a vote of no confidence. The UNP swept the election, and Ranil Wikramesinghe became Prime Minister. The now-divided government disagreed over how to end the war, and it was Ranil who favored dealing directly with the LTTE.

In 2002, the LTTE agreed to a ceasefire brokered by Norway, and began negotiations with the government. One implication of the ceasefire was that LTTE areas of control were de facto recognized. Nevertheless, the Norwegian peace talks faltered in mid-2003, though the ceasefire technically stayed in place. The war changed form, involving small-scaled attacks, bombings, and espionage.

On December 26, 2004, a tsunami struck from the southeast, and brought devastation to the island. Over 30,000 people were killed, and the country became the scene of a catastrophic humanitarian disaster. However, rather than inspiring peace, the tsunami only further entrenched the conflict, as rebel and state forces competed for outside aid and resources. Shortly after, election season began. The LTTE declared a Tamil election boycott. Many Tamil votes that would have gone to Ranil Wikremesinghe were lost, and Mahinda Rajapaksa won election to the presidency.

As Norwegian overtures toward peace continued, in August 2005, an LTTE sniper shot and killed revered Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar in his home. The murder of Kadirgamar, who was well known in the international community, earned the LTTE a spot on global terrorist watchlists. By the end of 2005, the Tigers resumed hostilities, and by the middle of 2006, any semblance of a ceasefire and peace talks were practically defunct.

Final Stages

The Sri Lanka government, with Mahinda Rajapaksa as President and Gotabaya Rajapaksa as Defense Minister, announced its plans to retake the Eastern part of the country from the LTTE, and then set its sights on the North. These efforts would become Eelam War IV. Between the end of 2006 and early 2009, this last stage of the separatist civil war saw several waves of SLA offensives against the LTTE. In September 2006, the SLA took Sampur in the East, and began moving North. The government officially vacated the ceasefire in January 2008, and in the summer of 2008, it advanced on Kilinochchi, an LTTE stronghold in the North. The SLA captured Jaffna in January 2009, and the Tigers fled to jungle in the Mullaitivu District. There, they continued to be squeezed by advancing forces, until they were ultimately pushed into a very small area of land in Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK).

The government declared PTK a No Fire Zone to allow for civilians to seek shelter. However, PTK was not safe, and in the last stage of the war, somewhere between 250,000 and 330,000 people were trapped there. Unwilling to surrender, the Tigers dug in, fired on civilians trying to leave, and used children as human shields. The government prevented medicine and other humanitarian supplies from entering PTK, and it indiscriminately shelled civilian targets. According to the UN’s Gordon Weiss, 2009 saw 65 government attacks on hospitals and clinics alone. The ICRC was forced to evacuate in early February as carnage and misery spread. No reliable casualty estimate exists, but it is likely that at least 40,000 Tamils died between January and April. Those who successfully fled were interned, and many were disappeared.

On May 16, 2009, SLA forces took the final piece of land held by the LTTE, and two days later the body of rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran was discovered. He had been killed while trying to escape in an ambulance. The government later murdered or disappeared many LTTE supporters and sent 10,000 LTTE cadres to rehabilitation camps.

At its end in 2009, the separatist war had claimed over 100,000 lives.

Transitional Justice

Transitional justice in Sri Lanka is unique for having the most truth commissions of any country in the world (twelve). The government also made extensive use of amnesties amid its two civil wars. However, criminal accountability for human rights violations committed by the police and military is very rare, with a few notable exceptions. Still, one feature of the justice landscape that is often overlooked is the persistent determination of victims and advocates, who remain committed to documenting abuses and protesting in favor of accountability.

Sri Lankan transitional justice processes unfolded in three main phases broken up by two events, the election of President Chandrika Kumaratunga in late 1994 and the state’s victory over the Tamil Tigers in 2009.

Phase 1: Before 1994

Prior to 1994, there were numerous Commissions of Inquiry established in the country under the COI Act of 1948, a practice that has deeper roots in British political and legal history. For example, the colonial administration passed COI Ordinance No. 9 in 1872, which laid the groundwork for official truth-seeking on matters of public importance.

Not all Commissions of Inquiry in Sri Lanka, of which there are at least a few dozen, should be considered truth commissions (TCs). For instance, the 1963 Commission to Inquire into the death of Prime Minister SWRD Bandaranaike would not meet the typical definition of a TC because it focused on a specific incident, an assassination, rather than a pattern of human rights abuses committed over a period of time. The first COI to qualify as a TC is the 1977 Sansoni Commission established by President JR Jayawardene to investigate anti-Tamil violence that occurred between 13 August and 15 September 1977. This COI, named for its chief commissioner, Judge Miliani Sansoni, produced a report in 1980. That report largely blamed the Tamil United Liberation Front for events which led to inter-ethnic violence, which some point to as evidence the commission lacked independence. Nevertheless, Sansoni should be considered an early truth commission because it was a temporary body meant to examine a pattern of human rights violations over a period of time in the past.

Four other conflict-oriented COIs were formed prior to 1994. Two are not considered TCs because they focused on specific incidents, rather than larger patterns of abuse. The first–the May 1991 Inquiry into an incident alleged to have occurred on the Palampiddi-Iranai Illuppaikulam-Vavuniya Road on 03.05.1991–investigated an attack on Médecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) personnel. It issued a report and aimed to exonerate the government. The second, called the Kokkadicholai COI of June 1991, inquired into the death of two soldiers caused by an explosive device on the road in Kokkadicholai, which was followed by a rampage killing of 67 civilians by soldiers across Batticaloa District. This COI issued a report in March 1992, and it recommended the case be referred to a military court. This happened, and 17 soldiers were acquitted of wrongdoing.

Two other pre-1994 COIs qualify as truth commissions. The January 1991 Commission of Inquiry into Involuntary Removals and/or Disappearances of Persons was established by President Ranasinghe Premadasa, successor to JR Jayawardena. A member of the UNP party that had been in control since 1977, it is likely that Premadasa never really intended for this TC to produce a thorough accounting of systematic disappearances of JVP members from 1988 through 1990. Some estimates hold that during that two-year window, up to 40,000 young men in the South of the island were disappeared. However, the Premadasa COI was mandated only to investigate disappearances that occurred after the beginning of 1991. It never produced a report, and it disbanded upon Premadasa’s death by LTTE assassination. This was the same story for a second Commission of Inquiry into involuntary removal of persons established by interim President Wijetunga in 1993. This TC also avoided the period that featured the most disappearances, focusing exclusively on abuses after 1991, and it also never produced a report.

It should not come as a surprise that two UNP presidents of the early 1990s produced weak transitional justice mechanisms. UNP leader JR Jayawardene presided over the country during the escalation of ethnic and JVP insurgent conflict, and he responded with extreme repression enabled by emergency laws. He also ruled by exception. In 1977, for instance, Jayawardene amnestied Rohana Wijeweera and other JVP leaders who had been convicted by a Criminal Justice Commission in 1972. This decision would come back to haunt the administration when Wijeweera launched another insurrection over a decade later.

In 1982, the UNP Parliament passed Indemnity Act no. 2, which provided immunity for high-ranking and low-ranking state agents for acts they committed to restore order during anti-Tamil riots in August 1977. And in 1988, Indemnity Amendment Act No. 60 extended the time period of this amnesty law to December 1988. Effectively, these laws created impunity for all actions of state agents over an 11-year period.

Phase 2: The Kumaratunga Presidency

In the 1994 parliamentary elections, the UNP lost power to the opposition People’s Alliance (PA). The new PA government, under newly elected President Chandrika Kumaratunga, came to power committed to a platform of peace and human rights. Over the following six years, it would create a total of six truth commissions. Kumaratunga started by establishing three zonal commissions of inquiry–one for the Central, Northwest, North Central and Uva Provinces, one for the Northern and Eastern Provinces, and one for the Western, Southern, and Sabaragamuwa Provinces–to investigate the fate of the tens of thousands of people who had disappeared in Sri Lanka since January 1, 1988. The commissions began operating in 1995. Originally, they were provided only four months to complete their work, but their mandates were extended eight times.

The uncoordinated, sub-regional nature of these commissions resulted in different approaches and different operational challenges. For instance, the ongoing civil war with the LTTE created logistical difficulties for the Northern & Eastern Commission, which not only had to cancel hearings amid situations of insecurity, but also faced complaints of ongoing disappearances committed by state forces against Tamils in Jaffna.

The outputs of each zonal commission were also significantly different. The North & East Commission report did not summarize the number of complaints it received, but it did publicize the names of 48 perpetrators, attributed 90% of disappearances to state forces, and offered 12 recommendations. The Central Commission reported 15,045 complaints and heard testimony about 6,443. It included some names of perpetrators, and offered 11 recommendations. Finally, the Western & Southern Commission recorded 8,739 complaints, it heard 9,744 witness testimonies, and it confirmed 7,239 disappearances. Unlike the others, its report did not name perpetrators, but it offered 145 recommendations. Of the more interesting findings from the zonal commissions was the claim in the Central Commission report that “most of the complainants do not seem to be interested in receiving compensation as much as seeing those responsible being punished.” This desire has been almost entirely ignored by successive governments.

The zonal commissions ultimately found evidence of disappearance in 16,742 cases, though thousands of additional cases remained to be investigated when the commissions finished their work. A fourth All Island Disappearances Commission was established in 1998 and worked for two years, investigating the cases that the first three commissions had not examined. According to its report of March 2001, the fourth commission found evidence of a further 4,473 disappearances, thus bringing the total number to 21,215. The final report of the All Island Commission was published without its Annexes, which effectively prevented the names of perpetrators from being released to the public. However, the TC did recommend that an independent human rights prosecutor be created and that a crime of enforced disappearances be incorporated into Sri Lankan law.

In 1995, yet another truth commission was established by Kumaratunga in parallel to the zonal commissions. It was called the Commission of Inquiry into the establishment and maintenance of Places of Unlawful Detention and Torture chambers at the Batalanda Housing Scheme. As the name suggests, this TC was tasked with uncovering details about a secret torture facility where JVP members were sent in the late 1980s. The government responded to the 1988-90 JVP insurrection with a heavy hand, allegedly using detention camps in several dark locations, including Batalanda. The camps were run by anti-subversive police units who were tasked with destroying rebels, and it is possible that somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 JVP were tortured and killed at Batalanda alone. Implicated in these crimes was leader of the UNP opposition, and rival of Kumaratunga’s, Ranil Wickremensinghe, who as Industries Minister likely possessed knowledge of the Batalanda tortures. In its 20-volume report, the commission recommended the government take legal action against then-opposition leader Ranil and strip him of his civic rights, which would have made him ineligible to run for elections. Wickremesinghe was never prosecuted, and at the time of this writing, is the President of Sri Lanka. The only prosecution to have resulted from this TC was that of superintendent of police Douglas Peiris and four other police officers. In 2009, they were sentenced to five years imprisonment.

Criminal convictions for human rights violations and atrocity crimes have been rare in Sri Lanka. However, a couple of notable exceptions exist. In the 1994 Embilipitiya Case, a school principal was put on trial for coordinating with SLA soldiers at the Sevana Army Camp to kidnap and disappear over 50 students from his school between 1989 and 1990. The students were targeted by the principal because he suspected them of bullying his son. This case, which involved Sinhalese victims, was documented by the inter-zonal 1994 Western, Southern, and Sabaragumuwa Disappearance Commission. In 1999, the High Court convicted the principal and six low-level soldiers for abduction in order to murder. The most senior SLA officer of the Sevana Camp, R.P Liyanage, was acquitted.

Another successful criminal prosecution involved the case of Krishanthi Kumaraswamy, an 18-year-old Tamil girl who was apprehended in Kaithadi by eight SLA soldiers and a police officer on her way back from sitting for high school exams in September 1996. The soldiers detained her at a checkpoint, and then gang raped and murdered her. When her mother, brother, and a family friend later inquired about her at the checkpoint, the soldiers murdered them as well. In 1998, six of the perpetrators were convicted by the High Court. Despite these important convictions, accountability for high-ranking officials or security force members has remained nearly unheard of in Sri Lanka.

Finally, in July 2001, President Kumaratunga initiated her sixth and last truth-telling mechanism, the Presidential Truth Commission on Ethnic Violence (1981-1984). The primary purpose of this body was to investigate key events of anti-Tamil violence that occurred in the lead up to the outbreak of the separatist war. The Commission’s report, which was published in September 2002, covered events like the burning of the Jaffna Public Library in 1981 and the 1983 Black July Riots. While this report named perpetrators and was published, it was criticized for relying too little on testimony and too much on secondary sources. Courts also would not allow Commission evidence to be used in criminal trials.

Phase 3: Since the Eelam Wars

As of the summer of 2009, having won the war outright, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa had carte blanche to dictate the terms of peace and set the agenda for post-conflict justice.

Rajapaksa possessed some prior experience with human rights issues. During his time as an opposition MP in the early 1990s, Mahinda traveled to Geneva to attend meetings of the Commission on Human Rights and called attention to the problem of disappearances in Southern Sri Lanka. In 2006, early in his presidency, he established two truth commissions: the Mahanama Thilakaratne Commission and the Udalagama Commission. The first was helmed by retired high court judge Mahanama Tilakaratne, an ally of Rajapaksa’s, to investigate recent “abductions, disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and unexplained killings.” It concluded its work in May 2007 with a report that argued that many claims of disappearance were in fact false positives.

The Udalagama Commission was appointed in 2006 to examine 16 high‑profile killings from 2005. President Rajapaksa also invited the International Independent Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP) to assist this Commission and monitor its progress. The TC began interviewing witnesses in three cases but did not hold public formal hearings by year’s end. According to IIGEP, the Commission did not earnestly conduct hearings and failed to provide sufficient witness protection. The IIGEP was heavy handed in its criticism, arguing that there was “persistent disregard for its observations and recommendations.” Ultimately, this Commission would submit a final report to the President following the end of the LTTE war in 2009.

Around the same time, Rajapaksa’s government faced significant domestic and international pressure to pursue transitional justice. Shortly after the end of fighting in 2009, Rajapksa and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon signed a Joint Statement, which included the following text: “The Secretary-General underlined the importance of an accountability process for addressing violations of international humanitarian and human rights law. The government will take measures to address those grievances.” A year later, citing government inaction, Ban Ki-Moon established a panel of experts devoted to accountability in Sri Lanka.

The Rajapaksa administration showed no signs of complying with the language of this joint statement. Instead, the government passed the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, which significantly increased executive power, and it deployed the SLA into Tamil areas to establish control over security and development projects. This came with continued repression, including disappearances and attacks on the media. In August 2009, JS Tissanayagam, a Tamil journalist, was prosecuted and sentenced to twenty years for publishing work that spotlighted state abuses. Meanwhile, the Rajapaksas deflected calls for criminal accountability for some of the worst atrocities committed in the last stages of the war. To head off criticism, in May 2010, the government established yet another TC: the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC).

The LLRC mandate was immediately the source of great scrutiny. Proclamation No. 1658/19 asks the LLRC to investigate “the facts and circumstances which led to the failure of the ceasefire agreement … and the sequence of events that followed thereafter.” Nowhere does it specify specifically the scope of the referenced “events,” only alluding to the “sufferings” of the conflict phase. Human rights or war crimes are not mentioned once in the mandate. Further criticism related to its organizational structure. Like the COIs that prefaced it, the LLRC is under the executive and lacked formal independence—it was designed and appointed by the President. It had nine commissioners, of whom seven were Sinhalese. Its Chair, Chitta Ranjan de Silva, faced allegations in 2006 of obstructing justice in relation to two cases of human rights violations, and the rest of the commissioners were largely agents of the state, many of whom publicly defended Sri Lankan security forces’ conduct and argued that they did not commit war crimes. International and national human rights groups alleged that the LLRC was a way to deflect calls for an international criminal tribunal, since the Sri Lankan government consistently “used the LLRC as its trump card in lobbying against an independent international investigation,” according to Amnesty International. Sri Lankan officials painted the LLRC as an alternative mechanism of accountability, but its mandate provided few opportunities for accountability.

The LLRC’s final report, published in 2011, papered over violations committed by Sri Lankan forces. Despite its limited mandate, the LLRC outlines the legal frameworks of international humanitarian law and human rights law and applies them to the Sri Lankan context, emphasizing civilian death and casualty, humanitarian relief like food and medicine, conscription of underage children, summary or arbitrary executions, and violations of freedom of expression, association, and religion in addition to disappearance, displacement, etc. During its investigations, the LLRC received over 6,000 written and oral testimonies. It conducted public hearings in affected areas across the nation. Those testimonies received at public hearings are available as transcripts. Nonetheless, the LLRC downplays violations committed by Sri Lankan forces while overemphasizing the violations committed by the LTTE. The report finds that the Sri Lankan forces did not violate international humanitarian law because they did prioritize civilian safety above all else. It claims that the violations of relief heard in testimony—such as the shelling of hospitals and targeting of civilians—were essentially inescapable (and thus excusable) in the midst of internal war. It also rejects the UN and other international NGOs’ victim estimates while providing no estimate of its own, arguing that “it is not possible to establish a verified figure given the difficult circumstances of the situation… [the lack of military records] has contributed to the unverified sweeping generalizations, of a highly speculative nature as regards casualty figures.” The report makes 189 recommendations, including some welcome remarks on the need for de-militarization and land reform. However, the report largely ignores state-led atrocities and other critical matters like widespread sexual violence or the impact of conflict on women in relation to their missing husbands, fathers, and brothers,

In March 2012, the UN Human Rights Council set its sights on Sri Lanka. By that time, the atrocities committed in 2009 in the Vanni had been documented by several organizations, including the European Commission, the US State Department, the Secretary-General Panel of Experts, Channel Four in the UK, and the International Crisis Group. UNHRC Resolution 19/2 aimed to promote reconciliation and accountability in Sri Lanka. Seeing little progress on the ground, the UNHRC followed up with another more strongly worded resolution in 2013 (22/1), and in 2014, pushed even harder with Resolution 25/1, which called on the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to “undertake a comprehensive investigation into alleged serious violations and abuses of human rights and related crimes by both parties in Sri Lanka during the period covered by the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC).” Ultimately, UNHRC efforts during this period were met with resistance with the government, which complained about Western intervention, shifted its foreign policy toward China, and ramped up its attempts to concentrate power, doubling down with open attacks on the judiciary.

Times changed in 2015, when Sri Lanka’s democracy showed promising signs for greater accountability following presidential elections. In January, Mahinda Rajapaksa sought an unprecedented third election victory, which was only made possible by the 18th Amendment passed in 2010. However, his United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) split apart, as three other parties left the coalition citing concerns about accountability, lack of judicial reforms, and mistreatment of the Muslim minority by Sinhalese. Rajapaksa was defeated in a close election by National Democracy Front (NDF) candidate Maithripala Sirisena, who had served as Rajapaksa’s Minister of Health and general secretary of the SLFP.

In a bid to boost its international reputation, among other things, Sirisena’s government promised a comprehensive transitional justice agenda, which earned him short-lived support from many domestic and international critics. Sirisena acknowledged the HRC’s September 2015 Resolution 30/1 to promote democracy and national reconciliation. He committed to set up four transitional justice mechanisms: a judicial mechanism that would involve foreign judges, lawyers, prosecutors, and investigators; a commission for truth, justice, reconciliation, and nonrecurrence; an office on missing persons; and an office for reparations.

However, the opening for transitional justice created by Sirisena’s victory would prove smaller than many anticipated. The Office on Missing Persons is the only mechanism that was created, though it has been undercut by a small budget and depletion of resources. In January 2016, the government established the Consultation Task Force (CTF) on Reconciliation Mechanisms, but this group accomplished little, and discontinued work in 2022 with little attention.

Perceiving that the Sirisena government was foot-dragging on accountability for war crimes, the Tamil community, supported by the diaspora, pushed for outside accountability. For example, in August 2017, the International Truth and Justice Project filed lawsuits in Brazil and other South American countries against retired General Jagath Jayasuriya, who served as Commander of the SLA in the Vanni region during the period in which atrocities crimes were committed. Jayasuriya was Ambassador to Brazil at the time of the filing. However, he would never face trial. President Sirisena publicly came to his defense, stating “I will not allow anyone in the world to touch Jagath Jayasuriya or any other military chief or any war hero in this country.”

In 2017, mothers and family of the disappeared in the North and East of the country began regular protests calling for information on their loved ones lost at the end of the war, many of whom surrendered to government forces and never heard from again. These protests are notable for their persistence and regularity, despite threats and harassment by state agents. Activists also pushed for criminal justice in signature cases, like that of the Trinco Five. The Trinco Five were a group of Tamil students who were executed by security forces on a beach near Trincomalee during a New Year’s celebration in 2006. The official narrative was that these young men were LTTE bombers planning an attack, but numerous pieces of evidence challenge that account. The Trinco Five was investigated by the Udalagama Commission and referenced repeatedly by the UNHRC. After several procedural delays, twelve state agents who were accused were released in 2019 due to non-availability of sufficient evidence to prosecute.

In 2019, Gotabaya Rajapaksa was elected president. Although popular for his role in ending the civil war, he has been accused of endorsing the use of rape, torture, and disappearances towards his critics. In 2020, President Rajapaksa announced the country’s withdrawal from its commitments to the Human Rights Council, and he announced that all of the Tamil disappeared are in fact dead. This is significant not only because of the President’s role in abuses, but also because his brother was president during the worst of the abuses.

Few nationwide representative surveys have been fielded in Sri Lanka over time. However, in 2021, the Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) conducted interviews with 400 opinion leaders from Sinhalese, Tamil, Up Country Tamil and Muslim groups in all 25 districts of Sri Lanka. It found, among other things, that 48% were dissatisfied with how democracy operates in the country, and 73% thought that the executive presidency either needs to be abolished or continued with fewer powers vested in the president. A majority also expressed dissatisfaction with the way that law and order is maintained in the country, and answered that the judiciary is only somewhat independent.

After the economic crises of 2022, and the election of Ranil Wickremesinghe to the Presidency, the country finds itself facing many of the same problems that have persisted since 2009. Emergency laws still allow for long-term pre-trial detainment of alleged terrorists and other criminals, activists and journalists are still routinely attacked, and little accountability has been on offer for those who push for justice.

In 2023, the Ranil Wickremesinghe cabinet approved a proposal to established a National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC) to make good on commitments to the 2015 UNHRC resolution, but also to confront the legacy of the separatist war. However, as of 2024, it is unclear whether this call for a 13th truth commission in the country will yield anything different than what has come before.

Transitional Justice Data

As of 2020, Sri Lanka ranks 39th out of 174 on TJET’s legacy of violence index. For a full list of country rankings over time, view the index page, and for an explanation of the index, view the Methods & FAQs page.

Amnesties

Sri Lanka had 14 amnesties between 1977 and 2010. Ten were passed during ongoing internal armed conflict. One was passed after internal armed conflict. One was part of a peace agreement. Two amnesties released political prisoners. Four amnesties forgave human rights violations.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Domestic Trials

TJET has compiled data on 63 domestic prosecutions between 1971 and 2020. These include five transitional human rights prosecutions of state agents, in which five persons were convicted; 34 regular human rights prosecutions of state agents, in which 19 persons were convicted; 23 intrastate conflict prosecutions of state agents, in which 13 persons were convicted; one intrastate conflict prosecution of opposition members, in which two persons were convicted; and two opposition prosecutions of state agents or opposition members, in which one person was convicted. In one trial that involved high-ranking state agents, no one was convicted.

Click on accused records for data on convictions. Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Foreign Trials

Nationals of Sri Lanka were defendants in one foreign prosecution in Brazil beginning in 2017.

Click on accused records for data on convictions. Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Reparations Policies

Sri Lanka mandated two reparations policies in 1987 and 2018. According to available information, there was a total of 15212 individual beneficiaries. One reparations policy provided collective benefits. TJET found evidence on implementation only for one reparations policy.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Truth Commissions

Sri Lanka mandated 13 truth commissions in 1977, 1991, 1995, 1998, 2001, 2006, 2010, and 2015. Twelve of these operated between 1977 and 2011. Eleven of the commissions issued final reports, five of which are publicly available. The reports included recommendations for prosecutions, reparations, and institutional reforms.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

UN Investigations

Sri Lanka was subject to two UN investigations between 2010 and 2015. Two investigations aimed to encourage domestic prosecutions.

Data up to 2020. Hover over column labels for definitions.

Download Country Data

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Camilla Orjuela “Mobilising Diasporas for Justice. Opportunity Structures and the Presencing of a Violent Past,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 44, no. 8 (June 11, 2018): 1357–73, https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2017.1354163.

Ankit Panda “Human Rights, Reconciliation, and Peace in Sri Lanka Under Gotabaya Rajapaksa,” The Diplomat, November 27, 2019, https://thediplomat.com/2019/11/human-rights-reconciliation-and-peace-in-sri-lanka-under-gotabaya-rajapaksa/.

Pearl Action “Impunity Reigns in Sri Lanka: The Kumarapuram Massacre and Acquittals,” research report (Pearl Action, 2017), https://pearlaction.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/impunity-reigns-in-sri-lanka.pdf.

Rajan Philips “A Karmic Ruling: President Overruled, Mahinda Resigns & Ranil Returns,” Colombo Telegraph, December 16, 2018, https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/a-karmic-ruling-president-overruled-mahinda-resigns-ranil-returns/.

Rajan Philips “The Tragedy Of 1971 & The Farce Of 2021,” Colombo Telegraph, April 17, 2021, https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/the-tragedy-of-1971-the-farce-of-2021/.

Rajan Philips “75 Years Of Independence: A Tale Of Two Compacts & Two Economies,” Colombo Telegraph, February 4, 2023, https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/75-years-of-independence-a-tale-of-two-compacts-two-economies/.

Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena “The Rule of Law in Decline: Study on Prevalence, Determinants and Causes of Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment in Sri Lanka,” research report (Copenhagan, Denmark: The Rehabilitation and Resource Centre for Torture Victims, May 2009).

Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena “A Legacy to Remember; Sri Lanka’s Commission of Inquiry, 1963-2002,” research report (Colombo, Sri Lanka: The Law & Society Trust, September 2010).

Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena “Sri Lanka’s Justice System and ’the Total Lie’,” The Sunday Times, October 4, 2015, https://www.sundaytimes.lk/151004/columns/sri-lankas-justice-system-166536.html.

Pallavi Pundir and Kumanan Kanapathippillai “Why These Women Aren’t Joining Sri Lanka’s Massive Anti-Government Protests,” Vice, May 25, 2022, https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7n8jx/tamils-sri-lanka-protest-rajapaksa-crisis.

Abdul Ruff “Sri Lanka’s Rajapaksa Headed for War Crimes Tribunal?” (Asia Sentinel, October 26, 2015), http://www.asiasentinel.com/politics/sri-lanka-rajapaksa-war-crimes-tribunal/.

Michael Safi “More Than 100 Human Skeletons Found in Mass Grave in Sri Lanka,” The Guardian: World News, August 28, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/28/more-than-100-human-skeletons-found-mass-grave-sri-lanka.

Michael Safi “Brother of Sri Lanka Ex-President Sued over Alleged Torture and Killings,” The Guardian: World News, April 9, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/09/brother-of-sri-lanka-ex-president-sued-over-alleged-torture-and-killings.

Ranga Sirilal “U.N. Asks Urgent Reforms to End Arbitrary Detention in Sri Lanka,” December 15, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1E91Y9/.

START “Global Terrorism Database 1970 - 2020” (National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, 2022), https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd.

Kristian Stokke and Jayadeva Uyangoda, eds. Liberal Peace in Question: Politics of State and Market Reform in Sri Lanka (London, UK: Anthem Press, 2011).

Jayadeva Uyangoda “Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka: Changing Dynamics,” research report (Washington, D.C.: East-West Center, 2007).

Aloka Wanigasuriya “Justice Delayed, Justice Denied? The Search for Accountability for Alleged Wartime Atrocities Committed in Sri Lanka,” Pace International Law Review 33, no. 2 (May 24, 2021): 219, https://doi.org/10.58948/2331-3536.1409.

W A Wiswa Warnapala “Sri Lanka’s New Constitution,” Asian Survey 20, no. 9 (1980): 914–30.

Gordon Weiss The Cage: The Fight for Sri Lanka and the Last Days of the Tamil Tigers, Reprint edition (New York: Bellevue Literary Press, 2012).

A. Jeyaratnam Wilson The Break-up of Sri Lanka: The Sinhalese-Tamil Conflict (London, UK: C. Hurst & Company, 1988).