Defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa reportedly told the UN Human Rights Commissioner that the US had no moral right to lead a resolution against Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), according to the Island newspaper.

Alleging that the US itself was responsible for atrocities around the world, Gotabhaya deduced that US action was therefore irrational. He further sympathised with the apparent difficulty that human rights officials face when dealing with western atrocities.

Gotabhaya said:

"During our meeting at the Defence Ministry, the UN Human Rights commissioner alleged that the government had removed road blocks in the Northern Region just ahead of her visit. She was convinced the government would temporarily do away with road blocks during a visit. Obviously, she was misled by the UN mission here or those who had met her here. I told her there was absolutely no need to do that. In fact, the number of road blocks should have increased during VIPs’ visits to guarantee their security."

The defence secretary accused Navi Pillay of taking up petty political issues, declaring that her comments on the growing authoritarian rule in Sri Lanka were said at the whim of the opposition, saying:

"We are having elections at four different levels; presidential, parliamentary, provincial council and local government. People have the freedom to exercise their franchise to get rid of the government in power. It is unfortunate the likes of Pillay are blind to the ground reality and tend to issue statements without examining facts,"

"Those who feared to call Prabhakaran a terrorist, happily describe the President as a dictator. The people are not blind to such machinations."