Amnesty says Sri Lanka fails to probe war abuses

Home > Tamils - a Trans State Nation > Struggle for Tamil Eelam > Indictment against Sri Lanka > Sri Lanka's Continued Ethnic Cleansing 2009... - after Tamil Armed Resistance Ends... > the Record Speaks....

INDICTMENT AGAINST SRI LANKA

Sri Lanka's Continued Ethnic Cleansing ...
- after Tamil Armed Resistance Ends on 17 May 2009
- the Record Speaks...

Amnesty says Sri Lanka fails to probe war abuses
Ravi Nessman, (AP) 11 June 2009

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) � The Sri Lankan government has never seriously investigated reports of human rights abuses during 25 years of civil war and needs to rapidly overhaul its justice system to bring peace to the country, Amnesty International said Thursday.

The London-based rights group said the problem is even more urgent in the wake of the government's defeat of the Tamil Tiger rebels last month in a bloody offensive that left more than 7,000 civilians dead, according to the United Nations.

Human rights groups and diplomats accused the government of shelling heavily populated civilian areas and said the rebels held thousands of civilians as human shields, shooting those who tried to flee. Both sides denied the accusations.

"If communities that have been torn apart by decades of violence and impunity are to be reconciled, the Sri Lankan government should initiate internal reforms and seek international assistance to prevent ongoing violations and ensure real accountability for past abuses," said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific director.

In a report, the group called for the establishment of an international commission to investigate those allegations because past government probes into abuses have gone nowhere.

The government has repeatedly brushed off such calls, saying an international probe would interfere with the country's sovereignty. Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe declined to comment, saying he had not seen the report.

Last March, an international panel of experts established to advise the latest commission of inquiry resigned, saying the government lacked the political will to properly investigate alleged abuses, including the 2006 execution-style slaying of 17 aid workers for the French organization Action Against Hunger.

The Amnesty International report accuses the government of interfering with past investigations, by using bribes, threats and even murder to eliminate witnesses.

It said the vast majority of human rights violations are never investigated and those that are rarely end in convictions because hearings drag on, witnesses refuse to testify and in some cases even the prosecution does not show up.

At the same time, the country's human rights commission has been stripped of its authority, local rights activists have been threatened, the U.N. has been obstructed and the press has been stifled, the group said.

Meanwhile, a Japanese mediator in the conflict said President Mahinda Rajapaksa promised to work for political and democratic reform in the country following the victory over the separatist rebels.

Yasushi Akashi said the president also told him Thursday that he would push for a political compromise with the country's Tamil minority to resolve the ethnic conflict that has roiled Sri Lanka for more than a quarter century.

Diplomats and aid workers have pushed for the government, dominated by the Sinhalese majority, to be magnanimous in victory or risk re-igniting the conflict. They have also called for the swift resettling of nearly 300,000 ethnic Tamil civilians displaced by the fighting who are living in military-run camps in the north.

The aid group World Vision warned that the camps do not have adequate sanitation and the impending monsoon season could put tens of thousands at risk of diarrhea, cholera and mosquito-borne illnesses. The group said at least 11,500 more latrines were needed to bring the camps up to international standards.

"When the rains come in two weeks or so, I can't imagine what conditions will be like due to the lack of any proper drainage and toilet system," said Suresh Bartlett, World Vision's country director.

Akashi said the camps were badly congested, had urgent sanitation problems and needed international assistance to resolve the issues.

Injustice Fuels Sri Lanka's Cycle of Abuse and Impunity
by Amnesty International, June 11, 2009

"There is strong ground to question the Sri Lankan government�s sincerity about its most recent promise to provide accountability for the war crimes and human rights violations that occurred in the past few months, given the extremely poor track record documented in Amnesty International�s most recent report," said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International�s Asia-Pacific director.

Amnesty International has issued a new report on Sri Lanka, entitled: "Twenty Years of Make-Believe: Sri Lanka's Commissions of Inquiry." Below is a press release about the report:

Amnesty International has accused the Sri Lankan government of trapping the country in a vicious cycle of abuse and impunity. A new report published on Thursday by the organization details the Sri Lankan government�s failure to deliver justice for serious human rights violations over the past twenty years.

"Twenty Years of Make-Believe: Sri Lanka�s Commissions of Inquiry", documents the failure of successive Sri Lankan governments to provide accountability for violations, including enforced disappearances, killings, and torture.

Since 1991, the Sri Lankan government has formed nine ad hoc Commissions of Inquiry to investigate enforced disappearances and a number of other human rights-related inquiries.

These commissions of inquiry have lacked credibility and have delayed criminal investigations, according to Amnesty International, who accused the government of failing to protect victims and witnesses. While most, if not all, of these Commissions of Inquiry identified alleged perpetrators, very few prosecutions for human rights violations have resulted.

From the outbreak of anti-Tamil rioting in July 1983, which led to full-scale armed conflict between the state and the Tamil Tigers (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam � LTTE), increasing numbers of people were victims of gross human rights violations in Sri Lanka. By the late 1980s, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial executions had reached vast proportions.

These violations occurred in the context of two major conflicts in the country: the government�s war with the LTTE in the north and east of the country, and a second confrontation between government forces and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (People�s Liberation Front, JVP), a southern-based Sinhalese party that sought to overthrow the government.

By 1991, the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances had received almost 15,000 reports of enforced disappearances and had transmitted 4,932 cases to the government of Sri Lanka.

President Ranasinghe Premadasa created Sri Lanka�s first Commission of Inquiry into "involuntary removals of persons" in January 1991. Its mandate was extremely limited, dealing only with new enforced disappearances that occurred after the establishment of the CoI (the vast majority of Sri Lanka�s tens of thousands of reported enforced disappearances from the period occurred between 1988 and 1990).

Since 1991, there have been nine Commissions of Inquiry to investigate enforced disappearances and a number of other human rights-related inquiries. While most, if not all, of these Commissions of Inquiry identified alleged perpetrators, very few prosecutions for human rights violations have resulted.

The Sri Lankan government has brushed off requests for an independent investigation into violations in the context of the recent military conflict, in spite of a 23 May joint statement by the Sri Lankan President and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stating that: "The Government will take measures to address those grievances".

"There is strong ground to question the Sri Lankan government�s sincerity about its most recent promise to provide accountability for the war crimes and human rights violations that occurred in the past few months, given the extremely poor track record documented in Amnesty International�s most recent report," said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International�s Asia-Pacific director.

Amnesty International has called on the government to use the opportunity created by the end of military operations against the LTTE to provide accountability for serious violations and abuses committed by both sides during the last months of fighting which cost thousands of lives and displaced hundreds of thousands of people.

"As the Sri Lankan people contend with the most recent abuses committed by both sides of the recent conflict, particularly during the last few months of the fighting, the reality is that they have been haunted by injustice and impunity for years," said Sam Zarifi.

"If communities that have been torn apart by decades of violence and impunity are to be reconciled, the Sri Lankan government should initiate internal reforms and seek international assistance to prevent ongoing violations and ensure real accountability for past abuses."

As an immediate priority, Amnesty International is calling for the establishment of an independent international commission to investigate allegations of serious violations and abuses of international human rights and humanitarian law by both the Sri Lankan forces and the Tamil Tigers in the recent military hostilities.

"The Sri Lankan authorities have had little success in providing accountability for abuses against civilians committed by the LTTE; they are even less likely to effectively investigate and prosecute their own forces for violations of human rights and humanitarian law," Sam Zarifi said.

"Given the scale of the problem of impunity in Sri Lanka, accountability can only be achieved with the active commitment of the Sri Lankan government, supported by systematic and sustained international human rights monitoring and technical assistance."

To address the need for broader human rights protection and reform, Amnesty International has called for the establishment of a UN human rights monitoring presence under the auspices of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to investigate reported abuses and assist Sri Lanka�s national institutions to deliver justice.

Amnesty International is holding a public panel discussion on Friday at a side event at the UN Human Rights Council session. The panel will be discussing the finding of the report in detail and include: Gene Dewey, a member of the last International Commission of Inquiry on Sri Lanka Dr Manoharan, whose son was killed in the �Trico 5� incident, one of the high profile human rights cases where the family are still waiting for justice.