Police should remove language barriers, says Trinco Bar President

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 February 2005, 16:13 GMT]
Mr.Kasinather Sivapalan, newly elected President of the Trincomalee District Bar Association (TDBA) said he would request the police to appoint Tamil speaking personnel in all police stations in the Trincomalee district to record complaints in Tamil language and also to submit reports in courts of law at least with Tamil translation.

Mr.Sivapalan, a senior lawyer and a leading human rights activist was unanimously elected President of the TDBA for the year 2005 Friday evening.

He added that he will meet the Constitutional Affairs Minister Mr.D.E.W.Gunasekara to request him to take immediate steps to implement the Official Languages Act and Court Languages Act for the northeast province without any further delay.

Currently complaints in the police stations in the northeast are recorded in Sinhala and police submit reports in cases in law courts only in Sinhala without a translation in English or Tamil, legal sources said.

Mr.Sivapalan in January 2005 participated as the sole delegate from Sri Lanka at the Wilton Park Conference on Transitional Justice and Rule of Law in post-conflict society held in London with the assistance of the Centre for Transitional Justice based in New York and supported by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the British Government.