The report released on January 13, 2026 by the United Nations (UN) Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), titled "We Lost Everything - Even Hope for Justice: Accountability for ConflictRelated Sexual Violence in Sri Lanka", reaffirms the long-established reality that Tamil people have been subjected to conflict-related sexual violence for decades at the hands of Sri Lankan state security forces, within a deeply entrenched culture of impunity. The report further confirms that this violence is deliberate, widespread, systemic, institutionally enabled, and ongoing.
Drawing on more than a decade of UN investigations and direct consultations with survivors, the report covers the period from 1985 to 2024 and makes it clear that sexual violence was used as a method of intimidation, punishment, and control against Tamil people. The report underscores that survivors continue to endure conditions of surveillance, intimidation, and harassment that discourage reporting and silence truth-telling.
Tamil women and men were subjected to severe sexual violence, including in detention centres, at checkpoints, and in their homes, as part of coordinated practices intended to inflict lasting harm on individuals and dismantle the social fabric of the Tamil nation.
The cruelty of this sexual violence-including rape, sexual torture, sexual mutilation, and sexual humiliation, inflicted severe physical and psychological harm, destroyed family and community structures, stigmatized survivors, and resulted in social isolation and poverty. It caused long-term health consequences, including reproductive harm, chronic illness, and disability; eroded trust within families and communities; silenced survivors through fear and shame; and disrupted education, livelihoods, and social participation. Its effects extended across generations, manifesting in intergenerational trauma and social exclusion.
This conflict-related sexual violence was systematically directed at the Tamil people and strategically employed by the Sri Lankan state as a deliberate tool with genocidal intent.
None of the perpetrators responsible for this conflict-related sexual violence-an act of genocide committed against the Tamil people by the Sri Lankan state-have been held accountable. Sri Lanka's state-controlled domestic mechanisms have consistently and miserably failed to deliver any form of meaningful remedial justice for the Tamil people, reflecting a deeply entrenched system of impunity within Sri Lanka.