{"id":188080,"date":"2018-03-02T00:00:25","date_gmt":"2018-03-01T18:30:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=188080"},"modified":"2018-03-05T01:38:38","modified_gmt":"2018-03-04T20:08:38","slug":"why-this-governments-geneva-process-is-virtually-stalled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/why-this-governments-geneva-process-is-virtually-stalled\/","title":{"rendered":"Why This Government\u2019s Geneva Process Is \u201cVirtually Stalled\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Sanja De Silva Jayatilleka<\/a>\u00a0\u2013<\/strong><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sanja De Silva Jayatilleka<\/p><\/div>\n

Far from being able to handle itself in a responsible manner to represent Sri Lanka at the UN and engage robustly with the international community when Sri Lanka is under severe scrutiny, this \u2018Unity\u2019 government failed to send a delegate (usually at Head of State or Ministerial Level) to participate at the High Level Segment of the ongoing session of the UN Human Rights Council<\/a>. It is clear that the Unity government is in serious crisis. <\/span><\/p>\n

Ministers of the UNP were huddled in numerous corners in efforts to save their Prime Minister from being replaced in an inner-party rebellion and the party itself from being thrown out of the \u2018unity\u2019 arrangement by their junior partner, the SLFP. Despite a temporary respite with the party succeeding in avoiding both fates, the crisis continues, with daily public demonstrations suppressed with water cannon and tear gas, fast becoming the defining feature of this government which paints itself internationally as a staunch defender of human rights. <\/span><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights airs his frustration in Geneva at the lack of progress in implementing the utterly unrealistic Resolution 30\/1 of 2015, initiated by the US and co-sponsored gleefully by this supine government, an act which preempted the rest of the Human Rights Council declaring their reservations about the Resolution. <\/span><\/p>\n

Instead of talking down to Sri Lanka from a great height, the UN High Commissioner and others (States and sundry NGOs) who are planning on similar denouncements when his report is formally submitted on the 21<\/span>st<\/sup><\/span> of this month at the Council, should ask themselves why, even under this pathetic Unity government, bending over backwards to please the international community at every available opportunity, their prescription has not been implemented. <\/span><\/p>\n

They won\u2019t have to look too deep to find that it is un-implementable. Whoever had this bright idea in the first place decided to use Sri Lanka as an experiment in Transitional Justice, a still-evolving concept, when there clearly wasn’t a \u201ctransition\u201d they could impose their conceptual framework on. But they thought we were stupid enough to swallow that, and this government duly proved it was, but the people certainly weren\u2019t and didn’t. <\/span><\/p>\n

Sri Lanka was clearly an unusual situation. Firstly, there was a rare and decisive victory in a situation of total war over a terrorist army. Secondly, it was unique in that terrorism had thus for been carried out by individuals, small groups employing guerilla tactics, or large militias, but not a parallel \u2018regular\u2019 army deploying large formations, artillery units, with a navy and air force to boot. This unusual combination of facts, further complicated by an ethnic aspect to the conflict, needed a well-thought out post-war programme, not the one the West hurriedly imposed on us, supported by desk-bound UN bureaucrats who didn\u2019t have sufficient knowledge or experience to design one for such complex circumstances, including in the case of the infamous Darusman panel, which neither exercised sufficient academic rigour nor maintained acceptable evidentiary standards in compiling their report.<\/span><\/p>\n

Going by the report of the UN Special Rapporteur on Terrorism presented at the Council, they haven\u2019t even got themselves a suitable definition of \u201cTerrorism\u201d yet, in order to agree on how its evil manifestations should be dealt with and the circumstances in which such evil has to be combatted. While the safety of civilians is always a matter of priority,\u00a0 <\/span>it is no easy task, and without a comprehensive understanding of this phenomenon and its damaging and lasting effects on the civilian populations and their governments which have been terrorized and held hostage for years, any solution could only be tentative, not a Biblical pronouncement. <\/span><\/p>\n

Most UN interventions in post-conflict areas have been in places where peace was \u201cnegotiated\u201d with or without UN mediation, and therefore the conduct of the UN, its officials and its agencies, was based on the relevant \u201cpeace-agreement\u201d. UN intervention also helped in countries where societies were in \u201ctransition\u201d from military or military backed one\u2013party dictatorships to civilian democratic governments. <\/span><\/p>\n

Sri Lanka was in none of these categories. The peace-building playbook didn’t have a ready-made solution, so one was hastily put together without adequate thought and sought to be implemented in the similar manner to what they had experienced before. <\/span><\/p>\n

Andrew Gilmour, UN Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights proved this when he declared in November 2017 in New York, that \u201cTransitional justice is an essential element of the UN system\u2019s work in peace building and sustaining peace in Sri Lanka\u2026As we all know, the conflict in Sri Lanka ended without a peace agreement<\/b>. In the absence of such a document that would guide the Government and Sri Lankan society in working towards a sustainable peace, Human Rights Council resolution 30\/1 established the framework<\/b> by which the Government of Sri Lanka, victims and civil society can address the root causes of the past conflict and put in place the foundation for a peaceful, sustainable future that protects human rights.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Seriously? Surely it has to be understood that a \u2018a peace agreement\u2019 as a framework is not the same as a hostile UN resolution in a very different context, deeply unpopular in the country, signed by politicians who are seen as poodles of the West and who were opposed to the war against terrorism and separatism in the first place. <\/span><\/p>\n

What are the UN High Commissioner\u2019s beefs about non-implementation in his latest report? Here are a few:<\/span><\/p>\n