Freedom From Torture called on the UN Human Rights Council to follow through on a United Nations report into violations of international humanitarian law committed on the island that was released earlier today and ensure that a justice process has “strong international participation”.
The UK based charity’s Director of Advocacy and Policy Sonya Sceats said:
"Today the UN human rights chief has rightly concluded that Sri Lanka's domestic courts are ill-equipped to prosecute the heinous international crimes exposed by the UN investigation.”
"The ball is now firmly in the court of the Human Rights Council. It would be unthinkable for member states to backtrack on the recommendation of their own inquiry for a justice process with strong international participation through a hybrid court.”
She went on to state:
"Sri Lankan torture survivors in treatment with us are adamant that they cannot trust a purely domestic process and will take comfort from the High Commissioner's warning that there must not be a replay of past broken promises. Any process that fails to win the confidence of survivors, including from the Tamil minority, is doomed to fail and may set back the common cause of reconciliation."