Poet Ahnaz Jazeem, who was detained for 19 months under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) before being released in December 2021, signed a petition against the PTA in Mannar over the weekend.
Jazeem, joined by his family and hundreds of other locals, signed the petition launched by TNA MP Sumanthiran earlier this month, calling for the notorious PTA to be repealed.
“This PTA doesn’t respect the most fundamental human rights, it is a cruel law,” said Jameez, who was detained in May 2020 by Sri Lanka's Terrorism Investigation Department (TID) for allegedly "promoting extremism and violence" to childen.
Jazeem said that “they [the Sri Lankan government] will arrest anyone they want to further their political agenda" and "those that criticise them are detained immediately for no reason under the PTA."
He also added that the PTA has “destroyed the lives of thousands of young people”.
“If we continue to let this happen, we will never be able to live peacefully in this country," Jazeem said.
His arrest in 2020 was based on an unofficial translation of one of Jazeem’s poems, titled “Navarasam.” Tamil literature experts and scholars noted a lack of incendiary language and therefore baseless detention of Jazeem. Jazeem was only allowed access to his lawyers a year after he was taken into detention.
Like Jazeem, many Tamils and Muslims continue to languish in prison due to the draonian legislation which fails to comply with international human rights standards.
