Former BBC Sri Lanka correspondent Frances Harrison, who was a panelist in an Al Jazeera interview with former Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, has released the Batalanda Commission Report, which Wickremesinghe had denied the existence of.
During the interview, Wickremesinghe rejected allegations made by a government commission that he was aware of illegal detention, torture, and killings at the Batalanda housing complex.
“I deny all those allegations,” he said when confronted with the government inquiry that had named him as a “main architect” in securing the housing complex and alleged that he, “to say the least, knew” about the violations taking place there.
Initially, Wickremesinghe denied the existence of the report, which Al Jazeera had obtained a copy of. Later, he questioned its validity, stating that it had never been discussed in Parliament. “That was not tabled in Parliament, and there is nothing to be found against me,” he claimed.
Tweeting the report, Frances Harrison wrote:
“Ranil Wickremesinghe tries to deny the existence of a government presidential commission of inquiry report on #Batalanda, which was an abandoned housing estate used for illegal detention & #torture in #SriLanka in the late 80s. Do read the #LKA report here.”
https://itjpsl.com/reports/archive
