Opinion

Why this sudden change?

06 Feb 2015 - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The US sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka at the last UNHRC March session delegated its authority to United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to appoint an international investigation panel to investigate and report within a 12 months period to the council its final report. However, even before passing this resolution Sri Lanka vehemently objected to this resolution with the support of 12 other members of the UNHRC. At that time Sri Lanka’s stance was not to assist or co-operate with this commission of inquiry. The international investigation panel end of October 2014 announced that they have closed the office for accepting oral and written submissions. This panel had no opportunity to visit Sri Lanka but they gathered information and evidence visiting other western countries. In the meantime USA and the newly appointed UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as well as the UN Secretary General respectively and repeatedly requested from the Sri Lanka Government to co-operate with this resolution because they hardly needed the host country assistance like other commissions of inquiries conducted by UN appointed panel. According to reliable sources now the draft report has already been prepared and finalized. Surprisingly, after January 08th Presidential Election and formation of the National Government USA had changed their tune and now various top USA Officials are making adverse comments because there are several unanswered questions and issues.

Surprisingly, after January 08th Presidential Election and formation of the National Government USA had changed their tune and now various top USA Officials are making adverse comments because there are several unanswered questions and issues.

Is that because of regime change as they expected or is it as a result of the 100-day programme and its foreign policy or is it as they believe the new atmosphere can conduct a credible domestic investigation? Former USA ambassador Theresa Shaper requested from the US government and UNHRC High Commissioner to immediately suspend the inquiry and further stated to apply a soft policy against Sri Lanka rather than their hard policy applied previously. Similarly, this request has been endorsed by former USA Ambassador Robert K Bogus. This is the first time that after 10 months of passing the resolution a high official who knows about Sri Lanka made this request. If this request is accepted by USA it is a great defeat for the LTTE Diaspora for the first time since 2009. Unfortunately TNA is making further requests from USA and UNHRC even after the government change not to stop the inquiry. That’s why they even supported the coalition and didn’t accept any Cabinet portfolios or become part of the Government. The coming weeks are very crucial for Sri Lanka because the Commonwealth Secretary General and Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Nisha Biswal and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Atul Keshap will be travelling to Colombo. They will review bilateral and regional issues with the new Sri Lankan Government, civil society and religious leaders, and other officials. This will be the first visit to Sri Lanka by a senior State Department official since national elections were held in January.

Theresa was a very high ranking former US state department official and she recommends to Sri Lanka to propose a viable plan to carry out the remaining LLRC recommendations with the assistance of Sri Lanka friendly countries to the forth coming UNHRC sessions. Immediately after the elections Sri Lanka’s new Foreign Minister and senior advisor to the President Dr. Jayantha Dhanapala visited Geneva and met UN Officials and conveyed the new foreign policy and extended Sri Lanka’s assistance to UNHRC and continued the dialogue with UNHRC High Commissioner. Because of this new trend UNHRC members can persuade Sri Lanka to conduct an independent domestic inquiry with specific assistance by the Commonwealth Good office Human Rights division. I firmly believe we should utilize this great opportunity because one of the LLRC recommendations is to appoint an Ombudsman to liaise with the Attorney General to take action against those who are responsible for disappearance cases. According to the Disappearance Commission statistics out of 19,421 applications received, 2000 are serious and should be investigated for further action. Therefore I believe in this context that the UNHRC may postpone the inquiry against Sri Lanka until a solution is found locally.

Opinion

Why this sudden change?

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