The High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, reiterated her office's mandate for establishing and conducting international investigations during a meeting on Monday between the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) and NGOs on the sidelines of the 25th session of the Council.

Asked to clarify the remit of the OHCHR mandate, Ms. Pillay stressed that the OHCHR "has the power to establish an international mechanism" to investigate crimes, as it falls under the human rights protection mandate of her office. 

"Now apart from calling for an international investigation, we have interpreted our mandate to say that the High Commissioner herself has power to investigate a situation," said Ms. Pillay.

"This did come out when we needed legal advice to see whether the Secretary General can himself set up a panel on Sri Lanka when as you know not a single inter-governmental forum had addressed the issue of the serious crimes committed. Obviously the fact that the Secretary General went again means that we are very clear that the UN does have these powers, because it falls under the overall mandate of protecting human rights."

Highlighting the OHCHR's close working relationship with the ICC, Ms. Pillay said,

"This is the one organisation that is called on to work closely with the International Criminal Court as well, as they are often interested in the information that our commissions have got."

Stressing that the OHCHR would not make calls for an international investigation "idly", she explained that those calls would only come after the office knows from evidence that they cannot expect a credible domestic mechanism.

Referring to the case of South Sudan, Ms. Pillay said,

"You know we do stand ready to help national governments by way of training of judges, providing them with information to hold these national investigations. For instance it was the AU that has established a Commission of Inquiry for South Sudan." 

"The AU in calling for such a commission spoke of accountability and an end to impunity, which I welcome - very, very important that it comes from the AU."

"Now obviously they did want to do this on their own, but they did approach us, to share information, and we've done that already, and I offered to assist them in any way we can."

Thanking the OHCHR for their work on Sri Lanka and the Tamil people, NPC Councillor Ananthy Sasitharan spoke bout the arrests of human rights activists over the last week, highlighting the cases of Balendran Jeyakumari and her daughter Vipooshika and added that she hoped for a strong resolution, which will create an international Commission of Inquiry into war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

Responding to Ms Sasitharan’s questions, Hani Megally of the OHCHR said that the High Commissioner’s report had called for an international investigation, as they saw little movement when they tried to work with Sri Lanka to address human rights issues.