fifteen years ago people in indonesia have rallied in the capital to carr said a show of solidarity with palestinians there condemning the united states as decision to recognize drusilla as israel's capital that in protest in the philippines after the country's top court expelled chief justice maria mood as so they know she was removed in a vote by fellow judges acting on a government petition seeking her dismissal she's been critical of president reagan to thirty urging people to stand up to what she called his all for terria. straight up and here with the news out a little over twenty five minutes of al-jazeera after one of one east next. business updates brought to you by qatar airways going places to get.

business updates brought to you by qatar airways going places together. lanka has used abduction as a way to instill fear since the days of its civil war. critics are still. to speak at. my last.

mission has one of the numbers of disappearances in the world. will. help victims and their families. on this episode we investigate. inforced disappearance. i look at them suspiciously even when i think about the moment i was kidnapped it scares me i. knew how serious seeing i never thought he would live to tell his story he's one of the few intra lanka to survive an abduction. sixty thousand others have gone missing over the past three decades.

it was a sunny morning in may two thousand and nine niihau was walking near the courthouse in the capital colombo when a white van started following him soon he was surrounded by different men put a weapon to my right hip and he told me to shut up and keep walking i got of them came up from hundred meters away and i was dragged into it. he was thrown into a gallery on a coconut a state that. you're going to give. me how alleges he was tortured by plain clothed men and uniformed officers. with a true me into this corner and started attacking me. the street and me and started

hitting me with metal pipes. that are already here. they're. using bricks niihau plots out a torture chamber twelve feet in length it was an area like this no matter how much i scream no one could hear them and there was you remain and blood all over the place because they were in there that they took my belt and started beating my back . off the dead dragged me by my legs on the rocks. hit me in here and here they also hit my source of my feet. because i'm part of the. past the dead be. fill a plastic bag with petrol and bite my head with it for two minutes until i started suffocating and just when i was about to lose consciousness they wouldn't let go.

during long interrogations the office is accused of aiding the tamil tigers a separatist group who fought a twenty six year civil war against the sri lankan government. how is from the singhalese majority but the trade union publication he worked for promotion the rights of the tamil minority. was there a point where you thought you were going to die that i don't want to do that then again i had no hope of living at that point be belted me so much. now says he was taken to police headquarters where he says he faced more torture to force him into making a confession. but after seven years in custody niihau was eventually released because there wasn't enough evidence to charge him under sure lanka's terrorism laws hundreds of others have also been held in detention for years without charge

or access to a lawyer. with these laws the government is able to use military personnel to get rid of threats and kidnap people and they can get rid of any trip which opposes the government. survival stories like the house provide a faint glimmer of hope for other families of the disappeared. sandra acknowledged goda hasn't seen her husband since twenty two in. her house is filled with cartoons by the political journalist who vanished without a trace legged ever. to get that dora the bus. said to the kinnick assam ever since prague it disappeared there's only been sadness and emptiness in this house. if someone is dead you have their body you can deal with the emotions and get over their death if

a person is abducted it's one of the worst crimes out there. are against cartoons an article was focused on human rights abuses and social inequality in sri lanka his work was published by a left wing news website one of the few media outlets to criticize then president mahinda rajapaksa. where sandy says in two thousand and nine her husband started receiving death threats. to call it saying that if he had received a few calls from people to cut his limbs off that he was never scared however a week before he went missing he was worried by one incident one of prague its friends who worked for the government told him he was on top of the rajapaksa target list. one noisy twenty ten brigade called his wife to say he would be home blanks.

that evening brigade's neighbors sora suspicious white van driving around his house . brigade has never been seen or heard from again. except this out i don't think. i want truth and justice this is not of lies about prague in this country the truth about prague it must to mind thing what happened what did he do who did it. i cheered and ninety court appearances later she's still searching for the truth a former army officer came forward and alleged that pregame was interrogated at a military camp eleven army officers were arrested in connection with his disappearance but would later released but equally would have given it your moder

micro-seconds. former army chief general south. has no doubt about what happened to the cartoonist brigade disappeared just five days before national elections after he publicly backed phone sika over the incumbent president rajapaksa but why do you think he would have doubted. our people had that they will not be in favor of the i didn't. want to go but that's where they really envy the rajapaksa yes. or no would avoid the oil come to be. general fund take a loss that election is now a minister in sri lanka as new government which ousted the rajapaksa regime in twenty fifteen phone sacre alleges that in the past rogue elements in the security forces conducted white van abductions to silence critics like brigade sri lanka past a new lower ny probe which criminalizes in force disappearances. and as

a government minister your quite willing to reprimand people that were under your command behaved inappropriately you have no yeah i made a bad anyone in this latest information a year where i got a. really stern action no man in the suite of us can murderous regimes. yes leave there no need they had to be taken to. task. dave the legal action against them had we would roll over the military where do they are they'll be some in the police i mean the indian yes agencies. who preferred to police this man and negotiate hansie team who by name. did i suppose for the difference it was using white vans. a better chance at a given place will who did that they didn't or do we do in the process of their.

legitimate duties i would say the duties. what i want to approach former president mahinda rajapaksa who declined to comment in a statement former defense secretary go to buy a rajapaksa described from psych as claims as baseless allegations he denies the security forces or government in power at the time carried out in force disappearances it's. a. human rights activist ricky fernando says the try to ignore this issue for decades. has the second largest

number of disappearances report that you went off to iraq. today ricky is going to document some cases in t.v. on the northern tip of sri lanka. in two thousand and nine this district was the front line in the final battles between the separatists tamil targets and the government forces. it was then that some of the country's most notorious disappearances happened at neverland and that that was in the end as i never in the end of my letter and now and every day for the past year ten families in towns across the region have been holding vigils they say many of their relatives were taken by the military and have never been seen again i think the pain and the grief and the tears are the same it is spending this thing really is almost anyone in any other country for that matter. clearly visible in amongst many families of

disappeared people desperation and anger that there has been coming and they feel cheated. the protests began when the government backtracked on a promise to release a list of those still in custody. chelios so bug him son mum to cooma is one of those still missing after surrendering to the army at the end of the war a little let alone and that our children must come back that's what we think whatever we want. she says the women are prepared to protest in till they get answers. with yes what else am i to do where else am i going to go i have no one at home. so but jim has reported his son's disappearance to the un and the red cross but she has limited evidence and can't identify the soldiers who took him. the fact that i surrendered him is the proof

there is no what the proof no proof. this bridge is with so bob young and hundreds of others say they handed over their family members it's a mosque disappearances several hundred at least several buses several hundred people so nothing from the bridge yes they have simply vanished in the in the custody of the army not just vanished but vanished in the custody of the army. when so buggy on returns here the memories flood back. it happened at about nine or ten in the morning very very very very. bad the one told her that i was looking at my son he was sitting by the bus window so i could see him he was looking at me he was crying. one of the soldiers took can

see that they will release him they said they would release him in a month they took him and went. twenty court cases regarding this mass disappearance have dragged on for the last five years no one has ever been brought to justice and the only army officer to testify offered a blanket denial. it's an absurd situation for army country to take its citizens. in front of their family members and then claim that they don't know what happened to them and the former. government minister he was the army commander when these incident happened on that the that would mean that he can't just wash his hands up and say that no i don't know what happened. where a bag on i don't know. a gun.

during the war and the last two weeks off of the war we had a very good system. we had made. everybody coming and friendly and good was. worth a hundred. and they were. both north and the. greatest for. south says under his command two hundred fifteen thousand tamils who surrendered in the war who promptly processed. clear your conscience is clear yes yes because. in fifteen family members comment where their children were taken they have gone missing you got a big death. but this is not just ten this is hundred two hundred you know a very very reason rambling it oh you can do things lay there. and also working

there needs to. work. thanks. to find the truth of what happened to sri lanka's disappeared the government announced three years ago it would set up an office of missing persons sally or paris and six other commissioners were only recently appointed but the office won't be fully operational for months he says one of the most pressing cases will be the mass disappearances on the bridge and surely one would expect that rather someone delegation would be against the sri lankan authorities i do not for one moment see that the task is going to be easy but for the moment i am confident that we have the cooperation of the thought it is. that i'm confident of but the office has no criminal powers and can only refer suspects to the attorney general one must understand the purpose of the us office on missing persons he does not believe it

is to find out what happened to persons it is to trace people so damn lisa disappeared may get answers but not necessarily justice that. would be by now that mechanism. you know but in the past similar commissions to style to solve any disappearance case. he is helping affected families right witness statements to present to the office of missing persons he says many of them don't trust the officials one of the reasons is because one of the commissioners who have been appointed is a former army major general because for many people the army is responsible for vast majority of these disappearances that is true for ten years but that is also true for single use. the security forces have their own concerns saying the office of missing persons who subject war heroes to unfair scrutiny it's completely but when you have people we have been critical of the army as commissioner i don't

think personally i would not like to war there and get related so it's a matter of. having credible neutral people in the commission rather than having activist. people who have been working for n.g.o.s major general diet pereira was the director of operations in the military during and after the war. so you're saying that the army is not complicit at all in their disappearance i can watch and see there was no policy of such nature so you're saying the use of abductions with never used during war and never use during post war never used in war never used in post war by the army by the military this is not about honesty it if someone thinks that they can hide and keep a person. in two days on i think here. and see if i get.

that many sure lankans insists he's still using inforce disappearances to startle dissent some only feel safe talking about it from the other side of the world tamil asylum seekers here in london klein that they were abducted and abused by the authorities in the past two years. most and through some of alleges that he was abducted twice in two thousand and sixteen and more recently in two thousand and seventeen the twenty year old to pass in protests with villages complained that the army was stealing their land to build new bases one night last june he says men in a van snatched him off the streets. and took him to a secret torture size. they had a long stick and said lie me on the ground and beat my back and feet they'd burn my

back and thighs with secrets they used a quarter to sexually abuse me. newton says a local priest broken his release then his parents bought him a one way ticket out of sri lanka he claims his father and other men in his village have also been abducted tortured and then released by the police in the last two years and believes his family is a target because his uncles fought for the tamil tigers. thing and i think i could be abducted again if i went back i have no faith in our current government as they preach something and do something yes i hope and if i am forced back to sri lanka i will commit suicide. milton's lawyer says many young relatives of former tamil tiger fighters have been kidnapped and tortured in sri lanka.

the. coolest sit around get a one man represents a number of tamil men who are claiming asylum in the u.k. because they fear their lives are in danger under sri lanka's current regime that torture is systematic and widespread the purpose we can see is to instill fear among the top knows not to. revolt again or at the same time not to give evidence against the war crimes in two thousand and nine how many cases do you have where sri lankans of been abducted and tortured under the current government. since two thousand and fifteen since the new government came into force we have documented at least eighty cases which had been corroborated by medical evidence and other sorts of independent evidence mostly said livy have in two thousand and eighteen we have at least six cases of torture. other asylum seekers in london claimed they

were abducted and tortured for months before managing to escape sri lanka. this man who we'll call our juneau was accused of trying to revive the tamil tiger movement an allegation he denies. them and the. there was there from april to just. be me and beat me many times but i can't tell you certain things about how their daughter had me and the woman that i do or three times i resisted but they beat me up by david on my back with a hot iron door i still have the scars. after the readings. i do says he was held at a military base called joseph camp where he was tortured insecurely abused at least

thirty times he could hear the screams of other men being tortured these tamil asylum seekers still carry the scars gina remains haunted by the experience. people say that the ice cream allowed in my sleep at night i have bad dreams dreams that i am dead that i am being beaten that. in our therapy i have a london city church other tamil asylum seekers captured the beauty of a new home but i do know can't forget the horrors of war in. pendent doctors confirmed juneau and milton have injuries consistent with torture but the u.k. home office has rejected their asylum claims. because i was working in my uncle's shop in. my father was a fisherman and i don't get paid to help him there was no economic hardship if my

life was not under threat i would be in my family. the sri lankan government and the police denied there were just sites in the country they say the asylum seekers economic refugees seeking a better life run the risk. there were. against the border to live there before. me i don't the in the newsroom for anyone. as you have on your confident that the days of the white banner. you're not after these different. despite those denials the office of missing persons wants to investigate all wideband abductions and military bases where torture is said to have occurred can you say testimony from people who have survived what. yes

yes we have and there is provision even by video link to have. to listen to weaknesses. who are not in the media presence of the commission are the forces. destroying can government is promising to provide compensation to families of the disappeared if they think it's justified future a few years will go from delay that innocent person might be morally. better in new york to give the government. they can be compensated. sanjoy millet goda wants all families of the missing to be treated fairly. now some money. i've learned that the bin and sadness is the same for all widows. it doesn't matter if they are from the north or south sinhalese everyone is looking

for truth and justice and it cut in mexico my fear is how long will i have to fight this battle. if instills disappearances continue with impunity it's a battle that will tear more sri lankan families apart. every year in pakistan hundreds of women are victims of so-called honor killing one on one east searches for the truth in a case that exposes the growing clash between old beliefs and modern life on al-jazeera.