The issue is due to be discussed at the current UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) annual meeting, where a US-backed resolution is due to be tabled. While details have not been made public, the resolution is expected to go further than previous ones in calling for international monitoring of human rights in Sri Lanka.
Last month, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay issued a report that cautiously criticised Rajapaksa government for not adequately addressing human rights violations. While claiming that there had been “significant government progress in rebuilding infrastructure” destroyed during the war, the report expressed concern about the continuing heavy military presence in previous LTTE territory and the “inconclusive” nature of investigations into serious allegations of human rights abuses.
The limited nature of Pillay’s report was underlined by its praise for the recommendations of the government’s own Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC). That commission, which was set up to deflect an international inquiry, whitewashed the government and military and made a series of vague proposals, including the investigation of extra-judicial killings and the disarming of paramilitary groups.
The UNHRC passed a US-sponsored resolution last March calling on the Rajapaksa government to implement the LLRC’s recommendations. President Mahinda Rajapaksa responded with a “national action plan” that put the defence ministry, which is directly responsible for war crimes, in charge of human rights investigations.
The Sri Lankan government and military flatly deny any responsibility for war crimes and blame all civilian deaths on the LTTE. In the final months of the war, virtually all reporters and non-government organisations were banned from the war zones. Nevertheless, several authoritative inquiries have put the civilian death toll due to the military’s offensives in the tens of thousands.
A UN expert panel estimated that at least 40,000 civilians were killed by the military during the last months of the war. Many of the casualties occurred in areas that the military had proclaimed as “no fire zones” and as a result of deliberate attacks on aid posts and hospitals—a war crime in international law. The panel also identified other serious human rights abuses, including extrajudicial killings, disappearances and arbitrary detentions.
Pillay’s report pointed to the inadequacies of inquiries in such high-profile cases as the killing of five Tamil students in January 2006 in Trincomalee, and the execution-style murder of 17 aid workers in Muttur in August 2006. In both cases, evidence pointed to the involvement of the armed forces. Six years later, the government has not released the report of the inquiry into the murders, claiming that investigations are ongoing.
Pillay raised concerns about the strong evidence pointing to the continuing abduction and killing of critics of the Rajapaksa government. This “spike” in disappearances comes on top of some 5,676 cases that remain unsolved and for which no one has been held accountable. Of the thousands of young Tamil men and women detained without trial as “LTTE” suspects, 782 are still undergoing “rehabilitation” and another 262 are in judicial custody.
Those who have been “freed” are being “continually monitored after release”. They have to “register regularly with either the local civil affairs office of the military or the local army camp.” Military and intelligence agencies visit their homes and workplaces to carry out further interrogation.
In the immediate aftermath of the LTTE’s defeat, the military incarcerated nearly 300,000 men, women and children in huge detention camps. Of those, 271,200 have been “resettled”, while 18,000 continue to live with host families. Those who have been resettled have to inform the army if they plan to hold a gathering “irrespective of size or the social or apolitical nature of the event.”
Despite its very limited character, government officials and ministers denounced Pillay’s report as lacking objectivity and impartiality. In what is now a familiar refrain, they accused Western countries of having fallen for the lies promoted by LTTE supporters in the Tamil Diaspora. The Sri Lankan ambassador in Geneva condemned Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch for plans to screen a film on the fringes of the UNHCR meeting that is said to include evidence of the killing of the young son of LTTE leader Prabhakaran.
The US has publicly backed Pillay’s report, which includes a call for an international investigation into human rights abuses in Sri Lanka; a proposal that the Rajapaksa government bitterly opposes. Whether such a call is contained in the US-backed resolution to the UNHCR meeting is not yet clear. US assistant secretary of state Esther Brimmer said the resolution would be a “cooperative effort with the Sri Lankan government.”
On February 18, the European Union announced it supported the US resolution. India, on which the US is counting for support, has not made its position clear. New Delhi will decide its stand after factoring in the dev elopements on the ground.
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has also backed the proposed UNHRC resolution and has sent four of its parliamentarians to Geneva. The TNA is seeking support from various Tamil exile groups, including the British Tamil Forum.
