SRI LANKA: Fighting together against unlawful acts of lawful authorities

SRI LANKA: Fighting together against unlawful acts of lawful authorities

FOR PUBLICATION AHRC-ART-014-2011
February 11, 2011
An Article by the Asian Human Rights Commission
SRI LANKA: Fighting together against unlawful acts of lawful authorities
Basil Fernando
For the last 20 years I have been living in Hong Kong. Here over 98% of the population is Chinese. I belong to the small minority which includes many other races and will try to illustrate some issues by using this experience.

In any country there is a formal legal system and an operational one. The Formal system consists of laws -- statutes -- customary laws -- judicial precedents and in the modern context obligations under the international law -- and an operational system, meaning the way lawful authorities implement the law. A good or functional legal system is one where the formal system and the operational system are consistent with each other. This does not mean that there are no violations of the formal system by the operational system. It means that violations are very limited and there are systems in place to correct the violations and to sanction the violators. The legal system in Hong Kong belongs to that category. It is not perfect, but there is a high degree of conformity between the law and its implementation Full Story.>>>
SRI LANKA: Fighting together against unlawful acts of lawful authorities - 2011-02-11

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