The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein will visit Sri Lanka before the country is to come under review at the UN Human Rights Council, according to media reports.
Colombo Gazette stated that the High Commissioner will visit the island and is expected to hand a UN report over to Sri Lankan government officials, including president Maithripala Sirisena.
The report is expected to detail the deaths of tens of thousands of Tamil civilians during the final phase of the island’s armed conflict. A previous United Nations report found that the majority of deaths occurred due to Sri Lankan government shelling.
However, the editor of Swarnavahini TV tweeted an email from Rupert Colville, spokesperson for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, stating that the High Commissioner will not be visiting before the UN session in September.
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It is not yet known whether members of the investigative team, who were refused entry on to the island, will be accompanying the High Commissioner.
The report that the High Commissioner is due to hand over was originally scheduled to be released in March of this year, but was delayed until September.
At the time of the delay, which the Sri Lankan government celebrated as a diplomatic success, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein spoke directly to the victims and gave his “personal, absolute and unshakable commitment that the report will be published by September."
“I want this report to have the maximum possible impact in ensuring a genuine and credible process of accountability and reconciliation in which the rights of victims to truth, justice and reparations are finally respected,” he had said.
See more of his comments here.