October 16, 2025
The full briefing in English is available for download here
The Discovery of Chemmani Mass-grave and Its Significance
In February 2025, skeletal remains were discovered during construction at Chemmani, Jaffna. During 54 days of excavation, 240 remains were recovered, including those of children, toddlers, and infants. More than 90% had no clothing attached, with artefacts including a UN school bag and children’s toys. This makes Chemmani the second largest mass grave site in Sri Lanka.
The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka assessed that there is a “reasonable likelihood that the burials were unlawful and pursuant to extrajudicial killings.” For families of the disappeared, however, the exhumation is not simply a forensic exercise but a test of the Sri Lankan State’s willingness and ability to confront its past and uphold its legal obligations. “We want accountability. We don’t want to worry about religious rites or about the skeletons…what we really want is accountability,” stated one mother of a disappeared person.
Historical Pattern of Impunity
Chemmani became known as a mass grave site in 1998 when Corporal Somaratne Rajapakse confessed that 300-400 bodies had been buried there under military control in 1996. Despite exhumations with international oversight in 1999 recovering 15 remains, cases against the accused military personnel stalled indefinitely.
The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka’s 2002 inquiry documented over 300 disappearances in Jaffna during 1990-1998. Its 2003 report found arrests were carried out openly with identifiable witnesses. Despite this evidence, institutions failed to act.
Systematic Violations in the Current Investigation
The 2025 excavation and investigation process reveals interconnected violations forming a coherent system of obstruction. Families face systematic exclusion through surveillance and intimidation. One mother stated: “I am being surveilled 24 hours. When we narrate the truth, that will affect the perpetrators so they will want us to shut up.”
Cultural harm occurs through suppressed collective mourning. “We have not been able to cry as a collective, and instead only engage in individual healing processes. The Government hasn’t recognized our grief, and instead calls us terrorists,” noted a community member. Information chaos compounds these violations, with no official communication structure and arbitrary restrictions on journalist access.
Despite available evidence, prosecutorial inaction persists. The CID faces inherent conflicts of interest as a State institution previously implicated in disappearances. “With CID getting involved it’s like a thief catching a thief,” observed one community member.
The Urgency of Action
Families demand international involvement because domestic mechanisms remain structurally compromised. “These mass graves are the result of conflict between two ethnicities. How can the other side, which is the State, investigate and provide reparation,” explained one community member. This demand stems from institutional failures spanning three decades. More than 20 mass grave sites having been partially exhumed since 1994, yet hardly any family has received remains.
The Office on Missing Persons (OMP) acknowledges critical gaps: shortage of forensic anthropologists and geneticists, absence of centralized DNA databases, inadequate laboratories, and reliance on archaeologists rather than mass grave specialists. These structural deficiencies provide additional justification for international intervention.
Time constraints make delayed action equivalent to denial of justice. “I want to see justice at least when we are alive, we only want justice,” said one mother. “Many mothers and fathers of the disappeared have died, if there’s no justice, Tamil people will think there’s no future,” warned another community member.
Families understand accountability as essential for preventing future violations. Only through accountability will there be non -recurrence. We won’t get justice if it just gets delayed like this,” one mother observed
The Path Forward
The roadmap from impunity to accountability requires fundamental transformation. This includes establishing international investigation mechanisms with prosecutorial authority; providing immediate technical assistance to address forensic gaps; ensuring meaningful family participation with protection from intimidation; securing official recognition of systematic violations; and immediately disclosing suppressed investigation reports including the 1998 Ministry of Defence report.
The international community confronts a fundamental question about the enforceability of international human rights law. “Even as skeletons if we don’t get justice, there is no meaning for Tamils to live in this country,” stated one mother. Chemmani can either mark a turning point toward justice or become another symbol of institutional failure.
“We ask for justice only so that our loss is accepted and recognized.”
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