A senior minister in Sri Lanka’s government dismissed allowing an international investigation into mass atrocities.

Sri Lanka’s Minister of Justice Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe said there was no possibility of “an international inquiry”.

“That would amount to an unsolicited intervention and a violation of our sovereignty,” the minister told Anadolu Agency, insisting Sri Lanka was “committed to investigate any rights abuses through a domestic process".

Mr Rajapakshe blamed former president Mahinda Rajapaksa for the current OHCHR Investigaion in Sri Lanka.

“It is a fate of his own seeking. President Rajapaksa has written to the U.N. Secretary-General, just four days after the conclusion of the war. It was only after that a U.N. expert committee was appointed to study whether such rights violations had taken place during the final phase of the war. President Rajapaksa has created this situation, not the U.N. and not anyone else, and now it has become a sticky issue,” he said.

But another official in the new government, led by President Maithripala Sirisena, stressed that it would not allow Mr Rajapaksa to face investigators.

Deputy Minister for Justice Sujeewa Senasinghe said that the "international community [should not] be allowed to draw President Rajapaksa’s blood."

"There is a system in place and there are judicial reforms taking place. The first step was the procedurally correct appointment of a new Chief Justice of Sri Lanka," said Senasinghe.

“The new government has better relations with the international community and was voted into office by the people on a platform of promoting governance," he said.

"With us, the interactions are different. We are a government committed to accountability and we will foster strong relations with all the countries.”

A member of the ruling UNP-led New Democratic Front coalition echoed the minister’s sentiments.

“If there is a probe, it should be a domestic process. It cannot be at the behest of a few influential countries out to berate the island,” said Wiijtha Herath, an MP with the JVP.

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