News: experts report

Spokesperson of the Sri Lanka Democracy Forum, Ahilan Kadirgamar talks to Newsclick over phone from New York. He argues that the "Report of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka" brings about valid recommendations, which if heeded by the otherwise triumphalist and denialist Sri Lankan government could pave the way for true reconciliation and accountability in Sri Lanka following the brutal civil war in 2009.

BY SHANIE The thrust of Palihakkara’s lecture was that Sri Lanka, which has in the past enjoyed a diplomatic profile disproportionate to its geographic or demographic attributes and military or economic clout, should be able to show the world that our country, after emerging from an injurious and costly conflict, still retains the strength of character and the political will towards introspection; to look at our own track record and see if we had gone wrong somewhere and if we had, what remedial measures we can, as a civilised society, undertake and what course corrections should be made. We should encourage the building up of a society where peaceful dissent is seen as an enriching experience and an exciting democratic challenge and not an act of treachery or treason.

Radhika Coomaraswamy has said that she would recuse herself if the reference to children in the Lankan conflict as referred to in the UN expert panel report was brought up by a member state.

Ivan Šimonović, Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights New York Office, delivered a statement on behalf of High Commissioner Navi Pillay, echoing similar concerns. He said that, although the world body did not have peace missions in Libya, Syria or Sri Lanka, it must establish accountability for human rights violations there. “In Syria, we must prevent the ongoing, violent suppression of mass protests from plunging the country into a full-fledged armed conflict,” he emphasized. At the request of the Human Rights Council, he continued, the New York Office would send an investigative mission to Syria, which would present a preliminary report in July and its full findings in September. To aid victims and advance long-term reconciliation in Sri Lanka, he urged that country’s Government to implement the recommendations of the Secretary-General’s Panel of Experts, which had concluded that Government forces as well as fighters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) had seriously violated international law in the final stage of the country’s decades-long civil conflict. Furthermore, in defining a new mandate for Southern Sudan, the Council should take into account detailed information on the human rights situation there, and include robust language on human rights protection and promotion.