{"id":259311,"date":"2017-11-15T13:45:19","date_gmt":"2017-11-15T18:45:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rael.org\/?p=259311"},"modified":"2021-02-13T13:36:34","modified_gmt":"2021-02-13T18:36:34","slug":"buddha-tattoo-woman-naomi-coleman-wins-compensation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/buddha-tattoo-woman-naomi-coleman-wins-compensation\/","title":{"rendered":"Buddha tattoo woman Naomi Coleman wins compensation"},"content":{"rendered":"
RAEL\u2019S COMMENT:<\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n
Great! It\u2019s the fundamental freedom of everybody to tattoo whatever religious symbol or figure they wish on their skin. Countries that do not respect this right should be boycotted.<\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A woman who was deported from Sri Lanka for having a tattoo of the Buddha on her arm has won compensation.<\/p>\n

Naomi Coleman, from Coventry, was detained for four days in April 2014.<\/p>\n

Granting her compensation of 800,000 Sri Lankan rupees – about \u00a34,000 – the country’s Supreme Court said her treatment was “scandalous and horrifying” and ruled her rights had been violated.<\/p>\n

Ms Coleman told the BBC Sinhala Service she was “overwhelmed” by the ruling.<\/p>\n

Officers involved in her arrest were also ordered to pay her compensation.<\/p>\n

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\nMs Coleman, a mental health nurse, took legal action against the Sri Lankan authorities after her return to the UK.<\/p>\n

The court ruled there was “no legal basis” for her arrest and said she had been subject to “degrading treatment” by some officers and a prison guard.<\/p>\n

In particular, one guard had “made several lewd, obscene and disparaging remarks of a sexually-explicit nature” towards Ms Coleman, while some police officers had forced her to give them money.<\/p>\n

‘Really frightened’
\nHer lawyer JC Weliamuna told the BBC her deportation had been “contrary to the law governing immigration and emigration”.<\/p>\n

Ms Coleman, who was arrested at Bandaranaike International Airport in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, said previously the detention had left her “really frightened”.<\/p>\n

She told the BBC on Wednesday she was “shocked” and “emotional” on hearing the news.<\/p>\n

“Finally the court has actually seen it that I didn’t do anything wrong,” Ms Coleman said.<\/p>\n

Asked whether she would go back to Sri Lanka, she replied: “I’m not sure, I don’t know. Probably not.<\/p>\n

“I’m very happy. I just wouldn’t want it to happen to anybody else.”<\/p>\n

After an order was made to have her deported, Ms Coleman spent a night in prison in Negombo and two nights in a detention centre while security checks were carried out.<\/p>\n

She said she told police she practised Buddhism and had attended meditation retreats and workshops in Thailand, India, Cambodia and Nepal.<\/p>\n

Sri Lankan authorities take strict action against perceived insults to Buddhism, which is the religion of most of the island’s Sinhalese population.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/uk-england-coventry-warwickshire-41995069<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RAEL\u2019S COMMENT: Great! It\u2019s the fundamental freedom of everybody to tattoo whatever religious symbol or figure they wish on their skin. Countries that do not respect this right should be boycotted.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":297768,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-259311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259311","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=259311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259311\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/297768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=259311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=259311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noproxy.rael.org\/it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=259311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}