{"id":191318,"date":"2018-06-14T17:10:18","date_gmt":"2018-06-14T11:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=191318"},"modified":"2018-06-15T18:27:23","modified_gmt":"2018-06-15T12:57:23","slug":"claims-about-the-gash-despatches-exposed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/claims-about-the-gash-despatches-exposed\/","title":{"rendered":"Claims About The \u2018Gash Despatches\u2019 Exposed"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the end of last year, the Sri Lanka Campaign published a critique\u00a0<\/a>of an intervention in the House of Lords by Lord Naseby. In that intervention, Lord Naseby sought to discredit prevailing UN accounts about the nature and extent of atrocities committed during the final stages of the civil war in Sri Lanka, and urged members of the international community to row back pressure on bringing perpetrators to justice.<\/a>[1]These arguments were based on what he referred to as \u201creal gems\u201d<\/a>of fresh evidence contained in 39-pages of war-time diplomatic despatches from UK Military Attach\u00e9 Colonel Anton Gash, obtained through a Freedom of Information request to the UK Foreign Office.<\/p>\n

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Naseby And Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/p><\/div>\n

Prior to the publication of our critique, the Sri Lanka Campaign made multiple written requests to Lord Naseby to share the entirety of the despatches with us, in order that we could properly verify and scrutinise the limited extracts that he had disclosed in Parliament. Those requests were repeatedly refused, amid a series of evasive and at times farcical responses.<\/p>\n

Initially the Sri Lanka Campaign was told that we should try and locate the documents online, despite the fact that they had not been published to the web by the FCO or anyone else. Then we were told that the files were in hard-copy only, and that since Lord Naseby did not have a personal secretary, it would not be possible for us to receive duplicates or an electronic version. Our offer to meet Lord Naseby in person so that we could scan the documents for him was flatly ignored.<\/p>\n

Later, we made multiple requests for the release of the despatches to the head of a UK-based advocacy group, named by Naseby in Parliament as having assisted his FOI request and engaged in circulating press releases from Naseby\u2019s office to Sri Lankan journalists.<\/a>[2]Those too were not taken up, and it was again suggested that we contact the FCO.<\/p>\n

One of our colleagues did just that, and earlier this year we received the documents in full.<\/p>\n

Their contents make clear why those in possession of them may have been so unwilling to release them: they expose many of the citations provided by Naseby in the House of Lords as both selective and misrepresentative of the source material. We are pleased to finally be able to publish the despatches here, along with some (non-exhaustive) analysis below. <\/a>[3]<\/strong><\/p>\n

Civilian casualty figures<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

In our critique\u00a0<\/a>of Naseby\u2019s statement to the House of Lords, we began by taking issue with the following quote from the despatches on the issue of civilian casualty figures:<\/p>\n