By Amanda Hodge –
SRI Lanka has warned a vote this week on a UN Human Rights Council resolution that could lead to a fresh probe into alleged war crimes committed during the 26-year civil conflict will derail the delicate peace process there.
The 47-member council is due to vote tomorrow on the US-sponsored resolution, which calls for the Sinhalese majority government “to address serious allegations of violations of international law by initiating credible and independent investigations and prosecutions of those responsible for such violations”.
It also calls for Sri Lanka to act on recommendations made by its Lessons Learned and Reconciliation Commission, such as demilitarising the former Tamil Tiger-held north and east and publishing the names of detainees.
Buddhist monks protested in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on Monday. A Sri Lankan official called a United Nations initiative “strikingly divisive and polarizing.”/Ishara S.Kodikara/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
US officials have been lobbying hard for the resolution.
But Rajiva Wijesinha, adviser to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on reconciliation, described the aggressive lobbying as “startling” given “human rights and the welfare of civilians in conflict is something they’re not at all concerned with”.
The comment was an oblique reference to the killing of 16 Afghan civilians earlier this month by a US soldier in Kandahar.
Sri Lankan officials in Geneva have been pushing equally hard to defeat the resolution. Those efforts were dealt a blow on Monday when Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh indicated his government was “inclined to vote in favour of the resolution if (it) will cover our objectives, namely the achievement of a future for the Tamil community in Sri Lanka that is based on equality, dignity, justice and self-respect”.
India’s Congress Party-led alliance is under intense pressure from its southern Indian Tamil coalition partner, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam party, to support the resolution.
Mr Wijesinha told The Australian from Geneva he did not believe that Mr Singh’s statement supporting those objectives necessarily represented support for the US push, “because we firmly believe that this resolution will not help to achieve that”.
Sri Lankan officials say much has been achieved since the May 2009 end of the war, with new roads and schools built in the Tamil-dominated north and east. The LLRC largely cleared the army of serious war crimes and human rights abuses, but found individual cases of human rights abuses by Sri Lankan troops.
A report commissioned by UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, however, found “credible” allegations of rights violations by the army and Tamil Tigers.
veedhur / March 22, 2012
“SRI Lanka has warned a vote this week on a UN Human Rights Council resolution that could lead to a fresh probe into alleged war crimes committed during the 26-year civil conflict will derail the delicate peace process there”
Really! what peace process are you talking about, because here in Sri Lanka we don’t see any peace process being pursued. At least not in the last three years since the defeat of LTTE. All we see is entrenchment of majoritarianism.
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Max Silva / March 22, 2012
Peace dawned in Srilanka with the elimination of the Barbaric Tamil Tiger terrorists.What more you want?
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Jimmi / March 22, 2012
Yeah, if SL is truely against imperialism it should have removed its troops from Haiti.
For colluding with UN & US paymasters this is the case now.
Resolution or not, both are not good conditions for us,
With resolution GOSL will be foreced to take some corrective action, but the percieved enimy would be seen as the US. Here, the dead end Paksas have a new cause, we are stuck with them…….
Witout resolution GOSL will go this path to ruin the country and suck every thing dry, they will certainly fall from grace very much quicker, but to get rid of them would be a blood bath..
(This may have been the regime’shidden agenda, his main lust is power, one brother in to racism, other brother into money, all into corruption.
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alex pereira / March 22, 2012
We are talking about a peace process which is not there.
Meeting galore.Outcome zero.This is happening for 3 years and will happen/or not happen for next century.
Cos it has been decided by some majority that other small communities should live from what the govt. gives them, and have no right to get
what they deserve by law.
We ARE SRI LANKANS BY BIRTH, WE HAVE OUR BIRTH RIGHTS.
sINCE 1956-2012 THE GOVERMENTS ARE GIVING THE RIGHTS AND STILL NOT FINISHED GIVING THEM. (tHE MINORITIES ARE NOT FOOLS)
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Max Silva / March 22, 2012
99.9% of the population of the country will not care a damn about a phony resolution.The end result will be that the Tamil Tigers will end up being permanent boot lickers of the Yankees and the Europeans. As far as governor Paki is concerned it is best that he takes up residence in the US or Europe.The average people on the streets will not take this crooks blackmail tactics very lightly.Imagine an American citizen screaming blue murder that Osama Bin Laden’s and Al Qauida’s HR had been violated,would he or she will be able to walk ten yards along a Washington street?Same thing for highway robbers Governor Paki,Suananda,Nimalka and Sunila, the latter two old hens who have suddenly developed late life “Heat”,walking in a Colombo street.Best for them to live in luxury in Geneva.
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