Sri Lanka’s foreign minister told Economy Next that he expected that a United Nations Human Rights Council resolution on accountability for mass atrocities would be passed, despite lobbying member states to water down the text of the document.
“This is nothing unexpected,” Ali Sabry said from Geneva. “There was so much pressure on some countries to vote in favour of the resolution. So we knew this… The composition has changed and some of our friendly nations are not there and some abstained.”
Ahead of the vote, the foreign minister and Rajapaksa ally blamed the Tamil diaspora for being behind the resolution, which calls on the UN human rights chief’s office to collect evidence that could be used in future war crimes trials.
His remarks come despite more than 13 years having passed since a Sri Lankan military offensive killed tens of thousands of Tamil civilians, and not a single military or government official having been held accountable for the crimes committed. Instead, Sri Lanka has denied any rights violations have taken place and promoted officials accused of war crimes. Eelam Tamils have long maintained the massacres amounted to a genocide and called for an international accountability mechanism.
Many Tamils have been critical of the resolution, stating that it does not go far enough to further accountability and have called for Sri Lanka to be referred to the International Criminal Court.
