India’s External Affairs Ministry said that the decision to abstain from the resolution on Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council last month was a “political decision” for the welfare of the Tamil people in Sri Lanka.
Responding to a question about Finance Minister Chidambaram’s criticism of India’s abstention, Foregin Secretary Sujatha Singh said the resolution was “extremely intrusive”.
“Any decision relating to foreign policy is a political decision, is it not? And no official will take a decision without taking a political sign off,” she told PTI.
“The last two resolutions called upon Sri Lankan government to look into the issue and to work toward reconciliation. This year the resolution was extremely intrusive. It proposed an international mechanism, an open ended international mechanism, and in our mind we do not want such an intrusive mechanism,
“It’s not just showing solidarity with the Tamils in Sri Lanka for the sake of showing solidarity. We have to be able to get results on the ground and we have to show to Tamils in Sri Lanka that we are able to help them,
“You know the biggest housing project in the world is being implemented over there (by India).”
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