The United Nations Human Rights Council has adopted a new resolution on Sri Lanka, granting it a further two years to implement a previous resolution from 2015 that mandates a hybrid accountability mechanism.

Resolution L.1 was adopted at the council in Geneva earlier today without a vote, after Sri Lanka announced it would be co-sponsoring it.

A mother of two children was found stabbed to death in Vavuniya yesterday. 

Two police officers were arrested in Vavuniya on March 19, following the earlier arrest of five men two days prior for treasure hunting near the Poompukar Crematorium in Vavuniya. 

The UN human rights chief called on Sri Lanka to ensure “consistent, comprehensive and accelerated” implementation of a resolution on accountability in an address to the Human Rights Council today, where she urged Colombo to hold perpetrators of crimes to account.

Presenting her report to the council in Geneva, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said her office “encourages” Sri Lanka ”to implement a detailed and comprehensive strategy” for the transitional process with a fixed timeline”. 

Thanking the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights for her report, India said it looked forward to "the implementation of its other important commitments made to the international community, including the full implementation of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka."

Member states urged the UN Human Rights Council to ensure justice is delivered on in Sri Lanka through a time-bound strategy during today's interactive dialogue on the report by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, with Canada reiterating the call for international judges. 

Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada (LRWC) called on members of the international community to exercise universal jurisdiction “to hold perpetrators of atrocity crimes in Sri Lanka accountable,” in a statement delivered at the UN Human Rights Council today.

The US State Department released its 2018 report on the human rights this month, raising ongoing concerns in Sri Lanka of impunity, arbitrary detention, unlawful killings, torture, sexual abuse and media intimidation. 

Families of the disappeared across the Eastern Province gathered in Batticaloa today to demand justice and for Sri Lanka to the be referred to the International Criminal Court. 

Sri Lanka’s president said that his government would be marking May 2019 as the “10th anniversary of dawn [of] peace”, at a time when Tamils around the world will be commemorating the tens of thousands massacred by Sri Lankan security forces.

Maithripala Sirisena told an audience of Sri Lankans in Kenya that “a special event will be held in May to celebrate the 10th anniversary of dawn peace after the 30-year war” (sic).