{"id":138186,"date":"2015-01-30T00:10:37","date_gmt":"2015-01-29T18:40:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=138186"},"modified":"2015-02-03T21:11:22","modified_gmt":"2015-02-03T15:41:22","slug":"way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya\/","title":{"rendered":"Way To Prosecute US Citizen Gotabaya"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Prof.<\/a>

Prof. Ryan Goodman<\/p><\/div>\n

By\u00a0Ryan Goodman<\/span><\/a>\u00a0–<\/strong><\/p>\n

One Way Sri Lanka Can Shield its ex-Defence Secretary from a U.S. Criminal Prosecution<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Last week, Sri Lanka\u2019s Justice Deputy Minister responded to an\u00a0Op-Ed<\/a><\/span>\u00a0that I published in the\u00a0New York Times<\/em>, in which I described reasons that the United States can and should pursue a criminal investigation of U.S. citizen and Sri Lanka\u2019s ex-Defence Secretary, Gotabaya Rajapaksa<\/span><\/a>. In this post, I respond to the Deputy Minister<\/span><\/a>\u2019s statement that his administration would protect Mr. Rajapaksa from a criminal trial by the United States, if it\u00a0ever came to that.<\/p>\n

Here are the key parts of the Deputy Minister\u2019s\u00a0remarks<\/a><\/span>, published in the state-owned newspaper\u00a0Daily News<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is true according to the said U.S. war crimes statute enacted in 1996, that nationality requirement is easily satisfied in terms of Gotabhaya Rajapaksa\u2019s U.S.citizenship for them to prosecute him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut not within Sri Lanka\u2019s jurisdiction,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

\"Gotabaya<\/a>\u201cNo other country can do what it likes in our jurisdiction. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa is safe as long as he stays within the jurisdiction of Sri Lanka,\u201d explained Deputy Minister Senasinghe.\u00a0Asked what the government\u2019s position was in regard to probing allegations of war crimes in Sri Lanka in view of the UN inquiry which is already underway in this respect, Senasinghe said: \u201cour position is very clear. We will conduct a domestic probe with the assistance of the UN.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under the law, it is true that President Sirisena<\/span><\/a>\u2019s administration could legally secure Mr. Rajapaksa\u2019s safety from a U.S. war crime prosecution if he stays in Sri Lanka\u2014under one condition. The Sri Lankan government would have to prosecute him themselves.<\/p>\n

The United States and Sri Lanka have a long-standing\u00a0extradition agreement<\/a>\u00a0that would apply directly to Mr. Rajapaksa and to the offences he allegedly committed.\u00a0 Unequivocally, article 1 of that agreement obligates Sri Lanka to extradite \u201cpersons sought by the authorities of the [United States] for trial or punishment for an extraditable offence.\u201d Accordingly, although the Deputy Minister\u2019s statement is true\u2014that \u201cno other country can do what it likes in our jurisdiction\u201d\u2014Sri Lanka has already formally agreed to give the United States access to criminal suspects in such cases.<\/p>\n

The Deputy Minister may well recognize that the obligation to extradite would loom over the case. His statement that Mr. Rajapaksa \u201cis safe\u00a0as long as he stays within the jurisdiction of Sri Lanka<\/strong>\u201d suggests he knows that Mr. Rajapaksa could also put himself in jeopardy by stepping foot in other countries that have an extradition agreement with the United States. As things stand, he cannot fly with ease to London for a weekend, an important conference, or a relative\u2019s graduation\u2014who knows whether a sealed US indictment may already be out there, in which case he could be apprehended at Heathrow and extradited to the United States (see\u00a0Section 5(2) of the UK-US extradition agreement<\/a><\/span>).<\/p>\n

There is one legal \u201cescape\u201d from the obligation to extradite, however.<\/p>\n

The bilateral agreement between Sri Lanka and the United States, like most extradition agreements, prohibits cases of \u201cdouble jeopardy\u201d\u2014prosecuting the person twice for the same crime. Article 5 states: extradition \u201cshall not be granted\u201d when the individual has already been subject to prosecution and \u201cconvicted or acquitted\u201d of the offenses in the home state. But that requires a full-blown and genuine trial, and nothing short of it. Article 5, indeed, stipulates that extradition shall not be precluded if local authorities \u201cdecided not to prosecute the person \u2026 or to discontinue any criminal proceedings.\u201d Sri Lanka would have to see a trial through to the end.<\/p>\n

In short, if Sri Lanka prosecutes Mr. Rajapaksa that could indeed shelter him and preserve the country\u2019s broader sense of autonomy. But if the Sri Lankan authorities do not act, at some point another party\u2014in this case the United States in pursuit of its own citizen\u2014might step in. As I discuss in the op-ed, hopefully the Obama administration will signal a commitment to pursue such a path so that Sri Lankans are encouraged to take the legal matter into their own hands first. Recent public statements by senior Sri Lankan officials may indicate that they genuinely believe there is sufficient political space for such a prosecution\u2014including an\u00a0important interview<\/a><\/span>\u00a0with the new Foreign Minister (and here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0and\u00a0here<\/a><\/span>) and by\u00a0President\u00a0Sirisena\u2019s then spokesperson and now Minister off Health and Cabinet Spokesperson<\/a><\/span>.\u00a0The United States can help engage current\u00a0political will to ensure the pronouncements of these senior officials become tangible government policy.<\/p>\n

*Ryan Goodman –\u00a0Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Professor of Law,\u00a0Co-editor-in-chief, Just Security,\u00a0Professor of Politics and\u00a0Professor of Sociology –\u00a0NYU School of Law.\u201cOne Way Sri Lanka Can Shield its ex-Defence Secretary from a U.S. Criminal Prosecution<\/a>”\u00a0<\/em>by Rayan Goodman, originally published on JustSecurity.org on January 28, 2015.<\/em><\/p>\n

Related posts;<\/strong><\/p>\n

Several Legal Avenues Available To Prosecute Gotabaya For War Crimes<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":138187,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,46,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-138186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-constitutional-reforms","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nWay To Prosecute US Citizen Gotabaya - 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\/way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Way To Prosecute US Citizen Gotabaya - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[…]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-01-29T18:40:37+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-02-03T15:41:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/ryan-goodman2.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"120\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"150\" \/>\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=\"4 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\/way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/way-to-prosecute-us-citizen-gotabaya\/\",\"name\":\"Way To Prosecute US Citizen Gotabaya - 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