STRENGTHEN CONSTRUCTIVE ENGAGEMENT BY FASTER CHANGES ON THE GROUND--Jehan Perera
- Details
- Monday, 12 October 2015
The co-sponsoring of the Geneva resolution by the government and the support given to it by the TNA is a positive indication of the evolution of a spirit of partnership and joint problem-solving at the highest levels of national and international decision making that is necessary for promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka. However, this goodwill needs to be seen in practical terms at the ground level too in which people become the direct and immediate beneficiaries. Most people appear prepared to give the new government a chance at this time. It is important that the people’s confidence in the process of transition is sustained. However, observations from the ground are that the majority of people are not aware of the significance of the resolution or the content of its recommendations. In the North there is frustration at the slow pace of change.
There are groups both in the North and South of the country that are trying to generate opposition to the UN resolution. A group of 71 Sinhalese university academics have issued a public statement expressing their opposition to the involvement of foreigners in the accountability process. In the North, on the other hand, there are Tamil groups that are angry that the resolution does not provide for the setting up of a fully international judicial mechanism. In Paris, Tamil Diaspora activists even went to the extent of violently attacking a meeting at which parliamentarians from the TNA were speaking. They accused the parliamentarians of betraying the Tamil people by agreeing to less than an international accountability mechanism. The TNA which won the overwhelming majority of parliamentary seats at the general elections has been taking a moderate approach in its relationship with the government.
GOVERNMENT TAKES CHARGE BY CO-SPONSORING GENEVA RESOLUTION--Jehan Perera
- Details
- Monday, 05 October 2015
By co-sponsoring the resolution on Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka the government has taken the initiative with regard to the implementation of its recommendations. Some of the recommendations are controversial. The main controversial recommendation is to set up a judicial accountability mechanism with international participation. But the gain for the government is that it is in charge of the implementation. In addition, for the first time since 2009 when Sri Lanka was taken before the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the government succeeded in obtaining the unanimity of the members of the international community represented there regarding Sri Lanka’s future.
The time table for reporting back to the UN Human Rights Council gives the government a degree of flexibility in getting its implementation mechanisms in order. The government is expected to give its written report on implementation in March 2017, which is 18 months away. At that time the government will have to defend and justify its progress or lack thereof in the implementation of the recommendations to be found in the resolution. Prior to that there will be a continuous assessment made of the implementation of the recommendations by the UN High Commissioner who will also be giving an oral update to the UN Human Rights Council in nine months.
As can be expected the opposition parties took the view that the government gave in to the Western led international community by agreeing to co-sponsor the resolution on Sri Lanka. They have argued that by co-sponsoring the resolution, the government is left with no option but to implement the recommendations which have been imposed on Sri Lanka. The previous government which was led by those who are now in the opposition argued that the successive resolutions of the UN Human Rights Council were damaging to Sri Lanka’s interests. But they could not prevent the resolutions being passed despite their opposition, and each time the resolution was stronger in terms of what was being imposed on the country.
TAKING RECONCILIATION PROCESS FORWARD AFTER CO-SPONSORED RESOLUTION IN GENEVA--Jehan Perera
- Details
- Monday, 28 September 2015
The government took a major step forward in rejoining the international community on equal terms when it reached agreement with the United States and other Western countries in the UN Human Rights Council to co-sponsor the resolution on the future its post-war accountability process. For the past six years Sri Lanka was on the defensive internationally for its conduct of the last phase of the war. From 2012 onwards it was at the receiving end of increasingly adverse resolutions by the UN Human Rights Council. The resolution in 2014 mandated an international investigation into the past. Each year the meetings of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva became the occasion of confrontation abroad and for political mobilization within the country in which ethnic nationalism took the centre stage.
The new government’s agreement with the United States to co-sponsor the draft resolution that will be presented to the UN Human Rights Council on Wednesday is an indication that both sides sat together to sort out the problem. Unlike its predecessor the present government has acted on the rational basis that a policy of confrontation would not solve the problem but only aggravate it. Although the confrontational approach of the previous government was popular at home it was leading to an internationally imposed outcome which would have made a bad situation worse. The government’s problem solving approach enabled it to convince the United States, and other Western countries, to drop the specific reference to a hybrid judicial mechanism. This was the most controversial feature of the UN Human Rights High Commissioner’s report on Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka.
25.09.15 Media Release
- Details
- Monday, 28 September 2015
GOVERNMENT CAN PROVE ITS COMMITMENT BY ADDRESSING ISSUES OF THE PAST WITHOUT DELAY
The release of UN Report on alleged war crimes and human rights violations in Sri Lanka’s war is an important step in the country’s transition to reconciliation. It will require the Sri Lankan government and people to give their attention to the unhealed wounds of the past that continue to fester in the body politic. The spirit in which the government needs to approach the accountability and healing process is that it is right for Sri Lanka, and not because of international or other external pressures. If approached in this way, seeking international expertise becomes necessitated by need rather than by politics.
The UN Report calls, among others, for reviewing all cases of detainees held under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, publishing unpublished reports of human rights-related inquiries, prioritizing the return of land, and developing a national reparations policy. It calls for a hybrid judicial mechanism with the participation of Sri Lankan and international judges, lawyers, prosecutors and investigators to ensure accountability. It also calls on the government to ratify the convention on Enforced Disappearances, the additional protocols to the Geneva Conventions and the Rome statute of the International Criminal Court.
