Amnesty International called for immediate action to address ‘the crisis of impunity that plagues Sri Lanka’ at the opening day of the 18th United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) session today in Geneva. “Any sustainable peace and reconciliation in Sri Lanka will depend on a genuine, independent effort being made to learn the truth about serious violations during the civil war and deliver justice to the victims and their families,” said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific Director. “National efforts to date have fallen far short of the mark, and the ongoing culture of impunity in Sri Lanka is shielding those responsible for past and ongoing abuses from being brought to justice.” Amnesty’s statement came after the head of the Sri Lankan delegation Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe told the council that the Sri Lankan Government's response to alleged human rights violations was “second to none”.
Sri Lanka came under mounting pressure from the United Nations and Western powers on Monday to ensure that perpetrators of atrocities committed in its long conflict that ended in 2009 are held to account. See reports by Reuters , AP and BBC . See related posts: (Monday Sep 12) Ban sends expert panel’s report to UN Human Rights Council, launches probe into UN’s conduct Amnesty urges UN rights council to act on Sri Lanka Sri Lanka squirms at UNHRC Pressure grows for action on Sri Lanka (Tuesday Sep 13) Full international investigation, nothing less - HRW See earlier posts: EU to stress...
Faced with the rising tide of voices calling for an independent international investigation, Mahinda Samarasinghe, Sri Lanka's plantation minister and representative at the UNHRC meeting in Geneva, launched a desperate counter attack. The Sri Lanka delegation has evidently been caught off guard by news that Ban Ki Moon plans to hand over the report by the UN Panel of Experts into allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Sri Lanka to Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, imminently. Samarasinghe fought back, reportedly criticising the UN for being 'biased' and for failing to inform Sri Lanka previously regarding the handing over of the report, and for the very fact Sri Lanka was informally discussed. According to a report in the Sunday Times, Samarasinghe remarked, "The Government of Sri Lanka was concerned at a growing trend in the Human Rights Council to depart from well established principles of procedures in the conduct of the affairs of the Council and noted the failure on the part of the High Commissioner to inform the concerned State, Sri Lanka, regarding a report about Sri Lanka that was transmitted between the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Office of the United Nations Secretary-General." He is also said to have remarked, that the High Commissioner's 'failure' to inform the state in question, raises "serious concerns" and leads to a "loss in confidence" in the High Commissioner's office. The ruffled Samarasinghe, attempting to seek cover behind the infamous LLRC, added, "It is critical to wait for that body to finish its deliberations and come up with its conclusions in due time."
Citing the removal of emergency regulations, the Sri Lankan government has ordered the dismantling of the Ministry of Resettlement and announced the intended aquisition of private lands within High-Security Zones. Rauff-Hakeem, the Justice Minister who made the announcement, explained that if in some areas, the HSZs were needed, the Government would acquire the land legally. He is reported to have said a security assessment would be made before deciding which areas were needed to be retained as HSZs, situated mainly in Vadamarachchi, Valikamam and Thenmarachchi. The dismantling of the Resettlement Ministry, whilst no doubt insignificant in terms of resettlement productivity, serves to undermine the on-going IDP situation over two years after the government declared peace. Moreover, it diminuishes the plight of remaining IDPS, whose right to return to their original lands appears increasingly precarious and their right of appeal, hopeless. In Sampur, where the proposed coal plant will result in over 900 families losing their homes, the Governor Rear Admiral Wijewickrema has threatened that any IDPs who refuse land offered to them by the government will no longer be deemed 'displaced'. See our earlier post 'IDPs branded 'squatters on state land' . These moves are the latest in a draft of measures that expidite the aquisition of private lands in the North-East, with no room for appeal.
The National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) of Sri Lanka has called for the closure of all 470 children’s homes in the country due to ‘rampant’ abuse of the inhabitants. Around 20,000 orphans and children from abusive family backgrounds are housed in homes around the country. Anoma Dissanayake, head of the NCPA told BBC Sinhala: “Shocking incidents are happening in children's homes all over the country. Rarely, there are some very good children's homes but this is the situation in most of the homes. Our aim is to fully establish [a] foster care system replacing children's homes within the...
Human Rights Watch have strongly criticised Sri Lanka’s detention laws and called upon the international community not to be misled by the apparent end of emergency rule. Brad Adams, Asia director of the New York-based body said , “The Sri Lankan government announced that the state of emergency is over, but it is holding on to the same draconian powers it had during the war . Governments that have called for the repeal of the emergency powers should not be fooled by this cynical "bait and switch." The government should repeal all its abusive detention laws and make all laws and regulations related to detention public, instead of engaging in token measures for PR purposes .” 6,000 people will continue to be detained under new legislation, which was passed to replace the lapsed emergency regulations according to the group. They went on to quote Sri Lanka’s previous attorney general, Mohan Peiris who said, “No suspects will be released and there is no change even though the emergency has been allowed to lapse. ” The statement comes ahead of the UN Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva on Monday, where Sri Lanka is preparing to defend itself against growing accusations of war crimes committed against Tamil civilians.
Leaked US embassy cables, created towards the end of 2009, provide an intriguing insight into Tamil National Alliance (TNA) leader R. Sampanthan's thoughts on then upcoming presidential elections. According to a leaked cable dated December 2009, Sampanthan, convinced, despite the widespread Sinhala triumphalism that the Tamil vote still had considerable value, informed US officials that " the best scenario for the Tamil community would be to extract concessions from the presidential candidates ". Moreover, he hoped that the international and domestic communities could "hold the candidates to their promises after the election." The two main candidates were the Sinhala chauvunists, Mahinda Rajapaksa, the incumbent of the SLFP, and the former Army chief, Sarath Fonseka, backed by the other two main Sinhala parties, the UNP and JVP. Seven months after the mass-killings of 40,000 Tamil civilians supervised by the Rajapakse-Fonseko duo, Sampanthan is quoted as asserting he was "looking for the manner in which each candidate would make promises to the Tamil community " before deciding which candidate to endorse. Gestures Sampanthan considered desirable from the two included a "public declaration" or at a minimum "campaign promises". According to the cable, "Sampanthan divulged that many within the Tamil community had asked him to run as an independent candidate, but he assessed that it made no sense for him to win "a couple of hundred thousand votes and lose."
File photo: An international ceasefire monitor of the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission (SLMM) examines two bodies dumped by the roadside in then government controlled Vavuniya town on 13 Oct 2006. Apart from thousands of such extra-judicial killings by Sri Lanka's military, tens of thousands more people have vanished after being taken into custody. Click photo for details. Photo TamilNet.
In an open letter to Commonwealth Foreign Ministers, ten rights groups from across the world condemned the possibility of Sri Lanka hosting the 2013 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM). The ten international, Diaspora and Sri Lanka-based organisations included Human Rights Watch, Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice, the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative and Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA). Highlighting the continued human rights violations and pressing need for an international investigation into allegations of war crimes, the authors called the consideration of Sri Lanka as host 'grossly inappropriate '. 'Awarding the next CHOGM to Sri Lanka would not only undermine the fundamental values on which the Commonwealth is based , but also has the potential to render the Commonwealth’s commitment to human rights and the promise of reforms meaningless.' 'The fact that the host country of the CHOGM goes on to hold the chairmanship of the Commonwealth (from 2013 to 2015) is also a serious concern.' ' Handing over leadership of the Commonwealth to a country with a questionable record in terms of human rights and democracy should not be the outcome of an event that will celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the Harare Declaration .'
Any IDPs who refuse to live on land provided by the government are no longer to be considered 'displaced persons' ordered the Governor of the Eastern Province, Rear Admiral Mohan Jayawickrema, Friday. Jayawickrema alleged that under international conventions those provided with land and housing are not 'displaced'. “ The displaced fall into three categories, namely squatters on state land, land permit holders and owners of private land ,” he explained . In November 2010, a number of reports emerged of Jayawickrema allegedly ordering the burning of a predominantly Muslim village, Kandalkadu, and a Muslim mosque in the Kinniya district. Victims reported that local police had identified Jayawickrema as directly issuing orders to carry out the arson attack. Fifty-four families were forced into homelessness. The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre reported on 1st July 2011 that more than 220,000 civilians remain displaced.