Five leading international human rights organizations have called on United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, to use his upcoming visit to Sri Lanka to reinforce international scrutiny and demand accountability for human rights violations, as well as meet with Tamil families of the disappeared and visit the site of the 2009 genocide.
The letter, signed by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Commission of Jurists, the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development, and the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice, expresses deep concern over Sri Lanka’s continued failure to deliver justice for victims of war crimes, enforced disappearances, and systemic abuses.
The groups emphasized that while the government under Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Dissanayake made promises prior to elections, it has shown little political will to implement meaningful reforms since coming to power, instead retaining many of the policies of its predecessors.
The letter underlines the importance of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) maintaining its oversight and continuing its efforts through the Sri Lanka Accountability Project (OSLAP), which has collected thousands of pieces of information that could serve as evidence in future prosecutions. The organizations warned that the Sri Lankan government may use Türk’s visit to lobby for an end to the UNHRC’s scrutiny and the termination of OSLAP’s mandate.
The letter outlines a series of urgent recommendations for Türk’s visit, including:
-
Publicly call on the government to ensure accountability for violations and abuses of international human rights and humanitarian law, especially those constituting crimes under international law, including by allowing OSLAP investigators access to Sri Lanka.
-
Publicly recognize and endorse the efforts of victims and survivors to seek justice and accountability and to engage with OSLAP and call on the government to end reprisals against those who engage with OSLAP and the UNHRC process.
-
Publicly support calls from victims and survivors for the continuation of OSLAP’s mandate, and, in particular, its work on gathering, consolidating and preserving evidence of violations and abuses under international human rights and humanitarian law.
-
Publicly identify clear and measurable benchmarks for progress that are needed for international assistance to be impactful.
-
Meet with the families of victims of enforced disappearances, both from the north and east and from the south of the island.
-
Visit Mullivaikal. We believe that all high-level international visitors to Sri Lanka concerned with human rights should witness the scene of the final atrocities of the war to make clear to both survivors and victims’ families and the government that they insist upon recognizing and addressing those events.
-
Visit mass grave sites associated with civil war rights abuses, such as that at Chemmani near Jaffna, as well as mass graves associated with the JVP uprising in the south.
-
Publicly call on the government to fulfill its manifesto commitment to repeal the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and introduce an immediate moratorium on its use. Any replacement counter-terrorism legislation should comply with international human rights law and standards, which previously published proposals, known as the Anti-Terrorism Bill, did not.
-
Publicly call on the government to end ongoing violations of land rights and the right to freedom of religion or belief, notably in the Eastern and Northern Provinces, where government agencies are engaged in seizing land, as well as Hindu temples, from Tamil communities.
-
Publicly call upon the government to pursue and make public a complete investigation of the 2019 Easter Sunday bombings, prosecute and bring to justice in fair trials those against whom evidence is found, and end the police harassment of families whose members were earlier detained arbitrarily.
-
Insist that any measures proposed by the government of Sri Lanka purportedly to advance truth, justice and accountability, such as reforms to the Office of Missing Persons or a proposed truth and reconciliation commission, meet international standards, including for accountability, and are done in consultation with victims’ and survivors’ groups and Sri Lankan human rights experts.
-
Call on the Sri Lankan authorities to promptly accede to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and implement it fully into national law.
Read the full text of the letter here.
