• the constitutional limitation on the prohibition on torture to ‘citizens’; • the apparent failure to provide a legislative definition of torture; • persistent allegations of ill-treatment perpetrated by law enforcement officials; • the need to ensure the continued upgrading of conditions in detention facilities • ensuring training on and compliance with the NHRC’s handbooks for the Police, the Prosecutors’ Office and Correctional Institutions; • the need to support and strengthen the Police’s Centre for Human Rights and the Army’s Human Rights Committee; and • implementing the National Action Plan on human rights when it is completed. Sri Lanka The ACJ recommends that the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) urges its government to address the following issues: • the need for Sri Lanka to become a party to the OPCAT, the Refugee convention, the Protocols to the Geneva Conventions, and the Rome Statute. • the lack of consistency of the definition of torture in the Torture Act with that in Article 1(1) of CAT; • section 17 of the Prevention of Terrorism Act overriding the provisions of the Evidence Ordinance which render confessions extracted by torture or while a person is in custody inadmissible; • delays experienced in the handing down decisions of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka in cases of torture; • the increase in complaints of torture made to the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka; • reports of instances of torture in the context of the Prevention of Terrorism Act and in police stations following arrests made on private complaints as well as general reports that torture by the police is ‘endemic’; • the need for the authorities to prevent acts of torture • the need to institute proper witness protection programmes; 51