In the final analysis, an autocratic government, whether run by the Communist Party in Beijing or by the Rajapakse family in Colombo, fears people with a political will that oppose its own. It is secondary whether the people use the ballot box, civil disobedience or armed combat to achieve their aim. What need to be nipped in the bud are people coming together as a community: therefore it is made a criminal act. As long as mourning facilitates the restoration of community, it will be opposed by oppressive governments. And as long as it is opposed – be it five years or 25 – the people will not give up trying to restore community either.
Posts Categorized: Human Rights
The War That Wasn’t Live
There was no BBC or CNN inside the war zone, which is perhaps why Sri Lanka is one of the great untold war stories of this century. It is certainly one of the bloodiest…
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s legal advisers are, however, clear that “most civilian casualties in the final phases of the war were caused by government shelling,” which they described as “large scale.” They also accused the Sri Lankan Army of systematically, knowingly, and repeatedly shelling all hospitals in the war zone, depriving civilians of food and life-saving medicine, and attacking all safe zones it had declared for civilians…
Another reason that the world failed to take closer notice of the Sri Lankan civil war was Colombo’s successful rebranding of its decades-long ethnic-territorial conflict as part of the global “war on terror.” That meant the world signed off on the destruction of the rebels, wrongly assuming that without the troublesome Tigers there would be an equitable peace in Sri Lanka. The terror label made it easy to discredit all Tamils as Tamil Tigers, blurring the boundary between combatants and civilians. Scottish, Bangladeshi, Italian, and Australian eyewitnesses were denounced as “White Tigers” far too sympathetic to the “terrorists.” U.N. employees were intimidated, threatened, expelled, and spied on, with the result that the organization failed to speak up about war crimes its own staff had witnessed firsthand and failed to publicize the significant casualty numbers they had collected.
Freedom of the Press 2014
http://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/freedom-press-2014#.U2JHiyhXguN Sri Lanka’s press labeled ‘not free.’ “Sri Lanka’s score also slipped by another 2 points, from 74 to 76, marking a dramatic decline of 20 points over the last decade. Increased harassment of both local and foreign journalists trying to cover protests and sensitive news stories, as well as attacks on printing and distribution… Read more »
Sri Lanka to be Investigated for War Crimes
If seeing is believing, then what brought Sri Lanka to international attention was the Britain’s Channel 4 expose of war crimes. From that time onwards Sri Lanka has been back-peddling on the war crimes charges. Then the international community took an interest and it ended up in the UNHRC, which decided the case against Sri… Read more »
Political Instability & Genocide in the Asia Pacific
Sri Lanka is something of an anomaly as the only institutionally democratic state to have committed genocide.
Where Genocide Is Most Likely To Happen Next
Twenty years after the horrors of the Rwandan genocide, researchers at The University of Sydney have created a model predicting which countries will experience targeted mass violence across the globe. Known as the Atrocity Forecasting Project, the model plugs in more than a dozen “instability variables,” which include statistics on civil wars, regime changes, assassinations, neighboring state conflicts,… Read more »
CPJ: Impunity Index 2014
4 Sri Lanka
Impunity Index Rating: 0.443 unsolved journalist murders per million inhabitants
Last year: Ranked 4th with a rating of 0.431
Inducing Fear
That this escalation in militarisation occurred at a time when the international community was scrutinising Sri Lanka is unsurprising. Intended to prevent a repeat of the protests even during the British Prime Minister’s visit to Jaffna, the arrests of prominent campaigners took place as the UN Human Rights Council began, effectively silenced any popular expressions… Read more »
Women Under Siege
CONFLICT PROFILES SRI LANKADespite Sri Lanka’s 26-year civil war being declared over in May 2009, scholars continue to describe the post-conflict state of the country as “fragmented.” With an estimated80,000 to 100,000 citizens killed, according to the United Nations, and an unknown number raped and sexually tortured during the ethnic clashes, whole sectors of Sri Lankan society were left in… Read more »
UN Inquiry Just the Start of a Long Road to Justice
Sri Lankan human rights activists campaigned hard for an independent international commission of inquiry into war crimes during the end of the conflict in 2009. Last month members of the UN Human Rights Council did finally vote to set up an inquiry. To many governments it looks as if the issue of accountability is now… Read more »
SL Campaign: Release of the Detained
Death of “Gobi” should mean release of the detained We are today calling for the release of Jeyakumari Balendran and at least 60 others detained under the prevention of terrorism act in the last month, following the Sri Lankan Army’s announcement that they had killed suspected LTTE revivalist Selvanayagam Kajeepan AKA Gobi. We are suggesting a travel ban… Read more »
HRW: Asset Freeze Threatens Peaceful Dissent
“Putting organizations engaged in peaceful political activity on a terrorist list is a modern version of McCarthyism.”
Land Grabs Jeopardize Peace in Sri Lanka
Christina Williams is an attorney and founder of Reinventing the Rules, a website dedicated to covering the latest trends and lessons learned in the rule of law sector. She has worked on human rights campaigns related to Sri Lanka for several years and is currently focusing on women and land rights in the region. The end… Read more »
Transcending Terror
It is the mass banning of Tamil civil society…It is, however, also a deliberate attempt to stop the outflow of information regarding on-going atrocities in the Tamil areas, to the international community via diaspora networks, precisely at a time when it is critical. Indeed in 2009, as the mass civilian slaughter ensued, it was the diaspora, not international bodies such as the UN, that provided the most accurate portrayal of events on the ground.
ICJ: UN Investigation Offers Hope to Victims in Sri Lanka
The UN Human Rights Council resolution to establish an international investigation into allegations of human rights violations and abuses committed by both sides in Sri Lanka’s civil war gives hope to tens of thousands of victims who continue to be denied truth and justice. “The resolution sends a strong message to the Government of Sri… Read more »
US Official Comments on UNHRC Resolution on Sri Lanka
Secretary of State John Kerry 03/27/2014 10:09 AM EDT UN Human Rights Council Vote on Sri Lanka Reconciliation Press Statement John KerrySecretary of State Washington, DC March 27, 2014 Today’s vote in the UN Human Rights Council sends a clear message: The time to pursue lasting peace and prosperity is now; justice and accountability cannot… Read more »
USTPAC Welcomes UN Human Rights Council-led Investigation
USTPAC Press Release HRC25 Resolution on Sri Lanka 032814 WASHINGTON DC, March 28 2014: On Thursday, March 27, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) adopted a resolution on Sri Lanka, A/HRC/25/L.1/Rev.1, which creates an international investigation into widespread human rights violations committed during the war that ended in May 2009. “Tamils have waited nearly… Read more »
UNHRC Resolution Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka
Human Rights Council Twenty- fifth session Agenda item 2 Annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and reports of the Office of the High Commissioner and the Secretary-General Albania,* Austria, Belgium,* Bulgaria,* Canada,* Croatia,* Cyprus,* Denmark,* Estonia, Finland,* France, Georgia,* Germany, Greece,* Hungary,* Iceland,* Ireland, Italy, Latvia,* Liechtenstein,* Lithuania,* Luxembourg,* Mauritius,*… Read more »
Facing a War Crimes Inquiry, Sri Lanka Continues to Vex the U.N.
UNITED NATIONS — What to do with Sri Lanka? The island nation, triumphant after nearly three decades of war against ethnic separatists, has vexed the United Nations. Five years after the war’s brutal ending, the world body has been unable to address grave human rights violations committed by the warring parties, making Sri Lanka something… Read more »
Why a UN Probe of Sri Lanka Would Spark New Hope for Reconciliation
Five years ago, Sri Lanka’s civil war reached a bloody conclusion on a stretch of beach in the island’s northeast, as government forces pummeled the remnants of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and thousands of Tamil civilians trapped near them. The government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, flush with triumphalist fever, insisted it had done… Read more »