The Sri Lankan government has been making contradictory statements regarding the implementation of a United Nations Human Rights Council resolution on accountability, said former Sri Lankan foreign minister G. L. Peiris.
“The sixth paragraph of the resolution clearly mentions the involvement of foreign judges,” said Mr Peiris. "However, President (Maithripala Sirisena) repeatedly denies the involvement of foreign expertise in a domestic mechanism and says the government can't rush the investigation.”
“How can we say we will implement only a part of the proposals,” questioned Mr Peiris, who has represented Sri Lanka at the UN HRC in Geneva. “We could have done that if the proposals were brought by some other country but this resolution was co-sponsored by Sri Lanka and the government requested all other countries at the UNHRC to pledge their support to the resolution.”
Mr Peiris also highlighted the inconsistency in statements by the Sri Lankan president and Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.
"President says no external forces will be allowed to intervene in our internal affairs but Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said the government was standing by the UNHRC resolution,” Mr Peris added. “The government has no single policy on the resolution."
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