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US Congressional Caucus hosts briefing on security sector reform in Sri Lanka

On September 6, the U.S. Congressional Caucus on Ethnic and Religious Freedom in Sri Lanka hosted a briefing on security sector reform in Sri Lanka. The co-chairs of the Caucus, Representatives Bill Johnson (Republican – Ohio) and Danny Davis (Democrat – Illinois), gave opening remarks about the need to pressure the Sirisena government to implement security sector reforms.

Representative Johnson noted that “essential reforms to Sri Lanka’s security sector are still badly needed,” citing the need for the Sirisena government to repeal the Prevention of Terrorism Act. He also echoed the finding of a UN expert that “the use of torture is deeply ingrained in the security sector in Sri Lanka.”

Representative Davis recounted how, during the war, his host in Sri Lanka was murdered and an orphanage he had visited was bombed by the government. Quoting Frederick Douglass in saying, “if there is no struggle, there is no progress,” Representative Davis then commended “the people who’ve been fighting, working, and trying to raise enough awareness so that world leaders would also be engaged and involved.”

After the Representatives’ remarks, Kara Bue of Armitage International and Anjali Manivannan of People for Equality and Relief in Lanka (PEARL) delivered their presentations, after which the floor opened for discussion and questions.

Bue offered background on the security sector in Sri Lanka, why it needs to be reformed, and some of the challenges to reforming those institutions. Bue’s presentation delineated several ways in which security sector reform is lacking: (1) the security sector is excessively large, (2) the current defense budget is approximately as high as it was during the war, (3) the military is at least 95% Sinhalese, (4) the military continues to operate under a Sinhalese Buddhist ethos, (5) the majority of security forces remain stationed in the postwar North-East, (6) the military occupies large tracts of land in the North-East, (7) the military intrudes into civilian life and commercial activities in the North-East, and (8) there has been total impunity for the military’s crimes since the end of the war. After outlining these problems, Bue observed that certain reform steps, such as reducing the number of soldiers in the North-East, releasing land, or recruiting non-Sinhalese police, are easy administrative tasks for a government to perform. However, the Sirisena government lacks the political will to address even these low-hanging fruits.  

In the first half of her presentation, Manivannan summarized the findings of PEARL’s latest report, Delayed or Denied? Sri Lanka’s Failing Transitional Justice Process. She emphasized the Sirisena government’s failure to vet—let alone prosecute—soldiers, as indicated by the government’s reassurances to the military and Sinhalese voters that so-called “war heroes” would never stand trial. She expressed concern about the 44 incidents of U.S.–Sri Lanka military cooperation from March 2017 through May 2018 as well as the U.S. State Department’s August pledge (pending Congress’s approval) to provide $39 million to Sri Lanka in foreign military financing.

Manivannan noted that military cooperation without meaningful security sector reform may yield problematic results for the U.S.’s image. To illustrate this point, she described how the U.S. Navy trained Chief of Defence Staff Admiral Ravindra Wijegunaratne, and he since became wanted for helping a suspect evade arrest for wartime abductions and murders. Manivannan stressed that war criminals are not “bad apples,” but the result of a military in which the perpetration of human rights violations is extremely systematic and normalized. Accordingly, she recommended that the U.S. and other states make vetting a prerequisite for trainings in order to preclude the participation of alleged war criminals. She also recommended that the U.S. track the deployments of training and workshop participants to determine if they are being sent (for either a first deployment or redeployment) to the North-East.

Manivannan ended her presentation by calling for a complete halt to military cooperation and financial support—at least until Sri Lanka’s security sector is reformed and held criminally accountable for atrocities and ongoing human rights violations. She also urged states to strengthen both their stance toward Sri Lanka and their statements condemning Sri Lanka instead of rewarding the country despite the government’s worryingly slow progress. Bue disagreed with Manivannan and instead thought that, because of increasing U.S. security interests in the Indo-Pacific region, the U.S. should not suspend military cooperation with Sri Lanka. Manivannan responded that military cooperation must be contingent on tangible reforms since whatever screenings the U.S. is doing before trainings and workshops does not seem effective.

The briefing concluded with a question-and-answer session between the audience and the panelists. Audience members asked questions about steps the U.S. could take to facilitate security sector reform, the relationship between democracy and security sector reform, U.S.–Sri Lanka military cooperation, and the role of the Tamil diaspora in pushing for security sector reform.

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