Sri Lanka Thursday rejected criticism by the UN Refugee Agency over its deportation of asylum seekers to Pakistan and Afghanistan stating Sri Lankan supported the deportation of its own citizens attempted to flee to Australia.
"How can we say that when [our] people migrate to Australia?" government spokesperson Keheliya Rambukwella said, reports Xinhua.
The UN Refugee Agency Wednesday said Sri Lanka was in violation of international law by forcibly deporting asylum seekers to Pakistan.
"Fundamentally, this is a breach of the principle of no forced returns. That's a clear violation of international law," Adrian Edwards, a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) had said.
Rambukwella however, rejected this criticism stating such rules were not applicable to Sri Lanka.
"We are not signatory to these conventions, so they are not binding on us," Rambukwella said.
Last week the UNHCR had appealed to Sri Lanka “to respect the principle of non-refoulement by not sending people back to a place where their lives could be in danger without the opportunity to assess their needs for international protection," and requested access to the over 200 asylum seekers were then detained in Colombo.
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