{"id":63133,"date":"2019-03-07T01:47:29","date_gmt":"2019-03-07T06:47:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=63133"},"modified":"2019-03-07T01:47:29","modified_gmt":"2019-03-07T06:47:29","slug":"britains-supreme-court-rules-in-favour-of-sri-lankan-tamil-asylum-seeker-in-landmark-judgement-pointing-to-well-established-evidence-of-extensive-torture-by-sri-lankan-state-forces-in-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=63133","title":{"rendered":"Britain’s Supreme Court Rules in Favour of Sri Lankan Tamil Asylum Seeker in Landmark Judgement Pointing to “Well -established Evidence of Extensive Torture by Sri Lankan State Forces in 2009”."},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/p>\n

Vidya Ram <\/strong><\/p>\n

Britain\u2019s Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled in favour of a Sri Lankan Tamil asylum seeker\u2019s claim that the Home Office was wrong to reject his contention that he was tortured back in Sri Lanka, and asked the Upper Tribunal to look at the case afresh, in what is considered a landmark judgment.<\/p>\n

The Supreme Court, in its judgment, also pointed to \u201cwell established evidence\u201d of \u201cextensive torture\u201d by Sri Lankan state forces in 2009.<\/p>\n

The individual \u2014 named as KV \u2014 arrived in the U.K. in 2011 and claimed asylum, alleging that he was tortured by Sri Lankan forces on suspicion of association with the LTTE. He had \u201cfive long scars on his back and two shorter scars on his right arm,\u201d which were the clear \u201cproduct of branding with a hot metal rod.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

However, the tribunal that looked at the case concluded that the wounds were the result of \u201cself-inflicted by proxy\u201d(SIBP) and inflicted on him voluntarily in an attempt to \u201cmanufacture\u201d evidence for an asylum claim, rejecting evidence on behalf of KV from a medical expert who said clinical findings \u2013 based on the Istanbul Protocol (the international guidelines on documenting torture) \u2013 were highly consistent with his account of torture. The Court of Appeal reached a similar conclusion.<\/p>\n

Two possibilities<\/strong><\/p>\n

In its judgment, the Supreme Court weighed two possibilities: that KV had been tortured and that the wounds had been inflicted by SIBP. \u201cThat there was extensive torture by state forces in Sri Lanka in 2009 was well established in the evidence before the tribunal,\u201d the court said. \u201cBy contrast evidence of wounding SIBP on the part of asylum-seekers was almost non-existent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Quoting a dissenting opinion by one of the judges in the initial appeal, the Supreme Court concluded that \u201cvery considerable weight should be given to the fact that injuries which are SIBP are likely to be extremely rare.\u201d<\/p>\n

The court noted that a person would likely need the involvement of a qualified doctor who would have to have acted in breach of \u201cthe most fundamental and ethical standards,\u201d while having access to the necessary medical equipment.<\/p>\n

Judgment welcomed<\/strong><\/p>\n

The judgment was welcomed by human rights campaigners, who said the court had reasserted the value of medical experts in torture claims as well as the \u201cauthoritative\u201d status of the Istanbul Protocol when it came to assessing asylum claims. \u201cDeplorable efforts by decision makers to dismiss this evidence are another symptom of the culture of disbelief that is the hallmark of the hostile environment,\u201d said Sonia Sceats, chief executive of Freedom from Torture, one of three human rights organisations that submitted evidence to the court.<\/p>\n

Courtesy:The Hindu<\/em><\/p>\n

Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Vidya Ram Britain\u2019s Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled in favour of a Sri Lankan Tamil asylum seeker\u2019s claim that the Home Office was wrong to reject his contention that he was tortured back in Sri Lanka, and asked the Upper Tribunal to look at the case afresh, in what is considered a landmark judgment. …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Britain’s Supreme Court Rules in Favour of Sri Lankan Tamil Asylum Seeker in Landmark Judgement Pointing to “Well -established Evidence of Extensive Torture by Sri Lankan State Forces in 2009”.’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63133"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=63133"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63134,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63133\/revisions\/63134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=63133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=63133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=63133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}