Several prominent Tamil civil society groups from across the North-East have urged the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussain to “act swiftly” to prevent the “undermining” of the inquiry into Sri Lanka’s mass atrocities conducted by his office.
In a letter to the high commissioner, the 15 organisations, led by the Tamil Civil Society Forum, said the government has not consulted with victims in initiating a process to design a domestic justice mechanism, noting that Mr Hussain urged Sri Lanka to do this.
“We write to state with regret that we are unaware of any such process of consultation that the Government of Sri Lanka has initiated with the victims. A huge majority of these victims as you are aware are from the Tamil community and the government has not had any consultation at all with the Tamil community in the design of a mechanism,” it said.
The organisations expressed concern about a recent announcement by the UN Resident Coordinator in Sri Lanka Subay Nandy, suggesting that the UN had decided to fund a domestic mechanism, despite the failure of the Sri Lankan government to consult with the victims till date.
“[W]e take note with serious concern the recent announcement by the UN Resident Coordinator in Sri Lanka that the UN has already decided to fund a domestic mechanism,” the letter stated.
The civil society groups further questioned the high commissioner on how the UN decided to support a domestic mechanism without the government making a proposal or conducting a consultation and asked whether the announcement does not pre-empt any recommendations in the OISL report, due to be published in September.
See full letter here.
UN to establish fund to set up accountability mechanism in Sri Lanka (08 June 2015 )
Tamil civil society groups welcome UN official's report (13 April 2015)
Human Rights Chief should officially request Sri Lanka to give OISL access to North-East says TCSF (20 February 2015)
TCSF urges UN to avoid delaying report into Sri Lanka's atrocities, take steps towards accountability
(12 February 2015)