There are no Black Marias in Sri Lanka. Not for this island any dark, caged vehicles to transport prisoners. What Lanka has is white vans, and they are many times worse than any police vehicle. Fear is the key on Sri Lanka’s streets, especially in the capital Colombo and the northern part of the island. Like death, a white van can appear anywhere, pull up, pull anyone in, and speed away. The taken don’t return.
The decisive cleanup of the roiled Lankan slate seems to have resurrected these numberless ghosts, appearing in most of the 32 unexplained abductions since October 2011. A few of those abducted were found dead, and some escaped, but of 20 Sri Lankans—Sinhalas, Tamils and Muslims—there is no trace. In a country declared at the turn of the century by the United Nations to have the most missing people in the world after Iraq, the abductions bring back memories of the white van abductions of 1987-89 which had prompted two visits to the island by the UN Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances (UNWGEID) in 1991 and 1992. Thousands of Sri Lankans disappeared in the JVP insurrection of the 1980s and the prolonged civil war that followed. According to one human rights report issued in February 2012, 5,671 cases of involuntary disappearances remain outstanding in Lanka. Tens of thousands are presumed to have been killed.
The latest resurgence includes social activists, businessmen and those identified by the police as criminals and ‘underworld’ characters among its victims. Political activists, sometimes those taking on the government, remain prime pickings for the white vans. Lalith Kumar Weeraraj and ‘Kugan’ Muruganandan, two political activists, were abducted in Jaffna on December 9 last year, while engaged in preparations for celebrating Human Rights Day. On February 11, Tamil businessman Ramasamy Prabaharan was abducted in Colombo, two days before a fundamental rights case filed by him against the police was to be heard. Prabaharan, who was released from prison in September 2011 after two years in detention without any charges being filed against him, was challenging this arbitrary detention and torture while in custody.
Kolonnawa Urban Council Chairman Ravindra Udayashantha is one of the very few to have escaped a white van, and the only one in the recent past. Four men who were trying to abduct him were caught by his supporters on March 10. He was quoted by Ceylon Today as saying that the men were from the Sri Lanka army’s special forces. “I am the first citizen of the area and if I cannot protect my own life, how am I going to assure my people that their lives are not at a risk?” said Udayashantha, whose 34-year-old brother was taken in a white van just over a month ago. Why were Udayashantha and his brother targeted? The chairman says it’s because he’s leading a campaign against drugs. The police dismiss the case as a fracas between two groups of men; the army won’t comment.
Lawyers for Democracy, “a representative body of legal practitioners throughout the island”, blames the army for the latest disappearances. On March 13, the opposition UNP accused the government of “once again” displaying clearly to the entire world that a “white van culture” is taking place. The UNP claimed that the government has taken responsibility for these actions.