Sri Lanka's human rights violations against Tamils as well as the ongoing militarisation and illegal land appropriation are aimed at suppressing the Tamil people's right to self-determination said the Tamil Civil Society Forum (TCSF) in an oral statement to the Human Rights Committee in Geneva today, during Sri Lanka's International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) review.

Stating that the HRC was silent on the denial of Article 1, which related to the right to self-determination of peoples, the TCSF said, "as we noted in our written submissions to this committee the ability of Tamils to enjoy the entire array of rights enshrined in the ICCPR both as individuals and as a collective, rests on their ability to self-determine, the subject of Article 1."

"Indiscriminate arrest and detention made possible by the Prevention of Terrorism Act, was a matter of historical fact, introduced to contain the Tamil Self-Determination movement and to date it disproportionately used against Tamils," the statement, read out by Guruparan Kumaravadivel of the TCSF, said.

"This committee needs to do more than acknowledge the incidence of these violations and point to the need for addressing the structural factors that lead to such systemic violations."

Highlighting the extensive appropriation of land by the government in the North-East, the TCSF charged "these examples confirm that [the] land grab in the North-East which is connected to the larger project of Sinhala-Buddhisisation of the Sri Lankan state, is a project in which all of Sri Lanka's 'democratic' institutions willingly take part."

"Militarisation of the North-East, similarly, has the objective of terrorizing the Tamil population," the TCSF said.

"We urge the Committee to identify the larger aim of the militarization in relation to suppressing peaceful expressions of claims to Tamil self-determination."

See here for full oral statement delivered by the Tamil Civil Society Forum.