Protesters against the PSTA Bill outside the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo on 13 October. Photograph: The Leader
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has warned that Sri Lanka’s proposed Protection of the State from Terrorism (PSTA) Bill reproduces and expands many of the failings of the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), the law that has been used for decades to detain and torture Tamils.
In a 19-page legal assessment dated 13 October, the office said the bill, gazetted on 22 September, contains some improvements on earlier drafts, but raised concerns over “broad and insufficiently precise terrorism offences; restrictions affecting protected expression and civic activity; administrative detention and inadequate judicial control; extensive arrest and search powers”.
It said the bill “carries risks of continuation and recurrence of serious human rights violations observed recurrently under the existing PTA regime”.
The bill would allow the armed forces and coast guard to arrest and search suspects and hold them for up to 24 hours before handing them to the police, without express guarantees of access to a lawyer, a private medical examination or recorded questioning. OHCHR said this raised “serious risks for potential abuse, including even of enforced disappearance”.
The circumstances in which the military could use the powers include deployments for public order or counter-terrorism operations, which could extend “well beyond isolated emergencies”, the office said. It called for civilian police primacy and for any military role to be “genuinely exceptional, time-limited, under clear civilian authority”.
Protesters against the proposed law at Gandhi Park in Batticaloa on 9 October. File photograph
Administrative detention “remains central to the proposed framework”, OHCHR said. Detention orders could run for two months at a time up to a total of a year, and a suspect could be brought before a magistrate up to 72 hours after arrest by the armed forces.
The office said the definition of terrorism remained “overly broad and vague”, and that the exclusion of protest, advocacy and dissent was framed only as an evidential caution rather than an express exclusion. It warned that the definition of “confidential information” could criminalise documenting checkpoints, military deployments, raids or arrests, putting journalists and human rights monitors at risk.
It also raised concerns over powers given to the Sri Lankan president to proscribe organisations with no independent review and no time limit, and over provisions that would keep pending PTA cases alive after the PTA is repealed.
Protesters outside the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo in June, demanding the repeal of the PTA. Photograph: Rajkumar Rajeevkanth
The bill has drawn opposition from protesters across the North-East. Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) has called for its withdrawal , and Human Rights Watch said earlier this month that it retains abusive powers .
OHCHR urged the government to carry out a further comprehensive review of the bill, in consultation with independent institutions, civil society and legal experts, before it is enacted.
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