Sri Lankan Official Says War Hero Could Be Executed for ‘Treason’

by Robert MacKey, The Lede, New York Times blog, June 7, 2010

In an interview with the BBC, Sri Lanka’s powerful defense minister, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, exploded with rage and said that the former head of the country’s military, Gen. Sarath Fonseka, who was lauded last year for defeating a Tamil separatist insurgency, could be hanged for reportedly claiming that the government had ordered the military to execute prisoners.

General Fonseka was arrested in February, just days after losing a presidential election to Mahinda Rajapaksa, the defense secretary’s brother, and charged in a military court with having engaged in opposition politics while still serving in the government.

Last month he appeared in civil court to answer a separate charge that he had incited unrest by saying in a newspaper interview that the defense secretary had ordered the execution of surrendering Tamil Tiger rebels. As the BBC reported, the general “said he had been misquoted by the newspaper and that the case was part of an attempt to silence him.”

Stephen Sackur, who conducted this week’s interview with Gotabaya Rajapaksa, explained on the BBC’s Web site:

General Fonseka told me, in a clandestine telephone interview, that he would be prepared to testify before any independent investigation of alleged abuses during the Tamil war. “I will not hide anything,” he said. When I put this possibility to Mr. Rajapaksa he responded with an extraordinary tirade.

In the interview, after Mr. Sackur asked if General Fonseka was in detention and faces court martial “because he, in essence, accused you of a war crime?” Mr. Rajapaksa shouted:

He can’t do that. He was the commander. He’s responsible — that’s a treason! We will hang him if he do that! I’m telling you, that’s a treason! How can he lie that? How can he betray the country? How can he, by such lies — if he says that, he is a liar. He is a liar!

Since the end of the war with the Tamil Tigers, Sri Lanka’s government has resisted calls for an international war crimes investigation from human rights groups and the United Nations.

The conflict between Sri Lanka’s defense secretary and its former military commander is also complicated by the fact that Mr. Rajapaksa is an American citizen, who once worked as a computer systems administrator in Southern California, and General Fonseka holds a green card granting him the right to permanent residence in the United States. As The Lede mentioned in January, during Mr. Fonseka’s visit to America to see his daughters last year, he was reportedly asked by the Department of Homeland Security to discuss Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s possible involvement in war crimes during the final campaign against the Tamil Tigers. Mr. Fonseka returned to Sri Lanka instead.

In excerpts from the interview broadcast on Sri Lankan television, Mr. Rajapaksa strenuously defended the conduct of Sri Lanka’s military during the conflict with the Tamil Tigers. “I can tell you one thing,” he said. “Our military was a highly disciplined military.”