{"id":128599,"date":"2014-08-01T04:41:19","date_gmt":"2014-07-31T23:11:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=128599"},"modified":"2014-09-07T21:51:44","modified_gmt":"2014-09-07T16:21:44","slug":"several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/","title":{"rendered":"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In an analysis on US national security law and policy, New York University School of Law Professor Ryan Goodman has highlighted various laws that can assist the US Justice Department and other agencies in prosecuting US citizen and Sri Lankan Secretary to the Ministry of Defence <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Gotabaya+Rajapaksa&amp;x=9&amp;y=5\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Gotabaya Rajapaksa<\/span><\/a> on his alleged involvement in mass war crimes.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_48414\" style=\"width: 251px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-48414\" class=\"size-full wp-image-48414 \" alt=\"Gotabaya - Secretary MOD\" src=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\" width=\"241\" height=\"237\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg 241w, https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1-50x50.jpg 50w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 241px) 100vw, 241px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-48414\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gotabaya &#8211; Secretary MOD<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Goodman in <a href=\"http:\/\/justsecurity.org\/13403\/road-map-ii-laws-apply-prosecution-citizen-war-crimes-the-case-gotabaya-rajapaksa\/\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">an article on Just Security<\/span><\/a> &#8211; an online forum on law, rights and US National Security has listed out the various legal avenues available to the administration of the case against Gotabaya.<\/p>\n<p>Justice department<\/p>\n<p>1) Criminal liability &#8211; war crimes act of 1996<\/p>\n<p>2) In the case of inadequate evidence for criminal indictment the Justice Department can pursue the Civil RICO &#8211; a vehicle for addressing organized criminal activity including international crimes &#8211; for civil\/criminal liability<\/p>\n<p>Justice Department and other agencies<\/p>\n<p>1) IRS: Tax evasion<\/p>\n<p>Through an investigation of the assets compared to any tax documents Gotabhaya might or might not have filled with the IRS as a US citizen residing abroad.<\/p>\n<p>2) Human rights violations and war crimes unit: Immigration fraud<\/p>\n<p>Considering the past successes in the similar case, Goodman has pointed out that Gotabaya can be prosecuted for failure to disclose material\/information on his involvement in the past crimes in his application for US citizenship<\/p>\n<p>Goodman has written further that evidence for any action under these provisions can be sought from the Matale Mass Grave and his involvement in it as the Coordinating Officer of the Matale district and the Commanding Officer of the 1st battalion Gajaba regiment in the late 80s.<\/p>\n<p>Writing furthermore on how Gotabaya during several occasions during the past few years has publicly attempted to cover up his crimes, Goodman has noted &#8211; \u201cUS government has poured its credibility into promoting accountability in Sri Lanka and now cannot afford to stand by when its own citizen is directly interfering with prospects for independent war crimes investigations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":48414,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1,6969,2375],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-news","category-popular-stories","category-stories"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-07-31T23:11:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-09-07T16:21:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"241\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"237\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/\",\"name\":\"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-07-31T23:11:19+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-09-07T16:21:44+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/9db3d0cfcfa59e1997e3c3524d454cb3\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg\",\"width\":\"241\",\"height\":\"237\",\"caption\":\"Gotabaya\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/\",\"name\":\"Colombo Telegraph\",\"description\":\"In journalism truth is a process\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/9db3d0cfcfa59e1997e3c3524d454cb3\",\"name\":\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/920b3181b0bf86b5c339ad9f0963a89f6a8b19c4b971e629987a021ba7a663df?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/920b3181b0bf86b5c339ad9f0963a89f6a8b19c4b971e629987a021ba7a663df?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"caption\":\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/author\/colombo_telegraph\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph","og_description":"[&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/","og_site_name":"Colombo Telegraph","article_published_time":"2014-07-31T23:11:19+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-09-07T16:21:44+00:00","og_image":[{"width":241,"height":237,"url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/","url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/","name":"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes - Colombo Telegraph","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg","datePublished":"2014-07-31T23:11:19+00:00","dateModified":"2014-09-07T16:21:44+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/9db3d0cfcfa59e1997e3c3524d454cb3"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg","width":"241","height":"237","caption":"Gotabaya"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/several-legal-avenues-available-to-prosecute-gotabaya-for-war-crimes\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/","name":"Colombo Telegraph","description":"In journalism truth is a process","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/9db3d0cfcfa59e1997e3c3524d454cb3","name":"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/920b3181b0bf86b5c339ad9f0963a89f6a8b19c4b971e629987a021ba7a663df?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/920b3181b0bf86b5c339ad9f0963a89f6a8b19c4b971e629987a021ba7a663df?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","caption":"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH"},"url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/author\/colombo_telegraph\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/Gota-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128599"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128599\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129969,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128599\/revisions\/129969"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}