A/HRC/45/45/Add.1 accountability through the criminal justice system. Other special procedure mandate holders, including those mentioned above, have received this information. The Special Rapporteur, on the basis of the dismal record of accountability in the country, is strongly of the view that, in its current state, the criminal justice system in Sri Lanka is inadequate and flawed.25 45. Regrettably, the zeal showed in combating crimes against the State is often absent when State agents are the presumed perpetrators. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has tracked more than 20 emblematic cases, including the killing of 5 youth in Trincomalee in 2006, the disappearance of 11 youth in 2008 and 2009, the killing of 17 humanitarian workers in Muttur in 2006, the assassination of Members of Parliament Joseph Pararajasingham and Nadarajah Raviraj in 2005 and 2006 and the killing of journalist Lashanta Wickremantunge in 2009. No progress has been made in the investigations of these cases. 46. The Attorney General informed the Special Rapporteur of efforts to investigate some of these cases and problems encountered in obtaining evidence, witnesses and military records. While some of these challenges are certainly serious, it is hard to accept that they alone can explain the decade-long lack of progress. 47. The factors underlying the poor performance of the criminal justice system are manifold. They include inadequate administrative procedures, such as the non-consecutive nature of trial hearings; inadequate personnel management, with frequent transfers of judges, which increases delays; insufficient human and material resources; and unresolved challenges relating to the political sensitivity of these cases. 48. There is a combination of insufficient investigative capacity in the police force, which leads investigations at the level of non-summary inquiries; dispersed forensic expertise; a lack of accountability among judicial medical officers, who work as independent consultants without access to centralized records or document management support; and a limited role played by the Office of the Attorney General in the early stages of an investigation, which thwarts progress. Even basic elements such as the preservation of information is often inadequate, with evidence and documentation on key cases reportedly being lost during natural disasters, something that could be prevented through the digitization and protected custody of those materials. It is unusual for middle-income countries like Sri Lanka to have such problems. 49. Sri Lanka urgently needs to improve its scant expertise on the investigation and prosecution of “system crimes”, in other words crimes that involve the systematic and coordinated use of State organs and that result in large-scale violations and abuses of international human rights or international humanitarian law. This would include specialized expertise on investigations, forensics and the design of prosecutorial strategies. Improving judicial capacities regarding system crimes is as necessary as it is urgent. 50. The Special Rapporteur strongly encourages the Government of Sri Lanka to consider restructuring the Office of the Attorney General, which currently acts both as public prosecutor and as attorney for the State. This dual role risks creating conflicts of interest when addressing crimes committed by State officials. The authority of the Attorney General to continue or suspend investigations, and to assign venues for criminal procedures – which, in a linguistically and ethnically diverse and fractious society, plays an almost 25 The Special Rapporteur cannot endorse the recommendations of each special procedure individually but does so globally. He fully endorses the call for the urgent repeal of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which is seen to have enabled serious human rights violations (including long-term administrative detention, lack of access to a defence and admissibility of confessions) and its replacement by counter-terrorism legislation fully compliant with international standards. The Act continues to be implemented in respect of people who have already been or are currently being taken into custody under the Act (in some cases without indictment and for as long as 14 years). See, e.g., the October 2016 submission of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka to the Committee against Torture (www.hrcsl.lk/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Report-to-CAT-Committee-.pdf) and the letter dated 26 October 2018 from the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism addressed to the Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations Office and other international organizations in Geneva (https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=24155). 9