Letter to UN Gen. Secretary requesting to send a UN team to find Prageeth
Wednesday 24 of October 2012
(Lanka-e-News -24.Oct.2012, 5.00PM 22nd October 2012 marked the completion of 1000 days since Lanka e news journalist Prageeth Ekneliyagoda went missing in 2010. A satyagraha was staged in front of the UN office in Colombo and a letter in this connection was handed over on the 22nd . The contents of the letter are as follows :

1. Facilitate a visit by the UN Working Group on Disappearances to Sri Lanka; 
2. Ratify the International Convention for the Protection of all Persons from Enforced 
Disappearance 
3. Implement the recommendations of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission 
(LLRC) by appointing an independent commission to investigate disappearances in Sri 
Lanka; 
4. Ensure accountability for disappearances by identifying and prosecuting those responsible 
and providing information about all persons held in government detention and 
rehabilitation centres and granting them access to their families. 
5. Provide support and livelihood assistance to families of the disappeared, particularly their 
children. 

Sandya Ekneliyagoda, the wife of Prageeth Ekneliyagoda in distress and deep despair stated that she and her children had been roaming the streets in search of Prageeth without avail . Unlike those bereaved families of the persons who had been announced dead , those families of the persons who had gone missing , are facing immense sufferings and grief forever searching for their beloved ones in the hope their disappeared ones can be found somehow , she said in a voice charged with emotion.

Nimalka Fernando who participated in the Satyagraha, regretted , the UN too could not search and find Prageeth even though a thousand days had elapsed. What is the next step that can be taken by this destitute family who is facing untold hardships ?, she inquired