Posts Categorized: Politics

http://webtv.un.org/watch/id-special-advisor-on-the-prevention-of-genocide-15th-meeting-25th-regular-session-of-human-rights/3316281947001 [See also Chapter 15 by France Libertes: Fondation Danielle Mitterrand ] 25th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council Geneva March 7, 2014 Item 3 – Interactive Dialogue with SASG on Prevention of Genocide Organization: Pasumai Thaayagam Thank you Madam Vice President. On the 65th anniversary of the “Convention on the prevention of Genocide” we are… Read more »

by ‘The Economist,’ London, March 8, 2014 DELHI | From the print edition EVIDENCE of past atrocities keeps turning up in Sri Lanka. Last year 154 bodies were unearthed from a mass grave behind a hospital in Matale, in the centre of the island—victims, in all likelihood, of an uprising by Marxist rebels in the 1980s. In… Read more »

BRUSSELS — IN early 2009, as many as 40,000 civilians were killed in the final days of Sri Lanka’s civil war, having been herded into an area about the size of Central Park and subjected to relentless shelling. No one has been held accountable for these crimes, and even now the government in Colombo remains… Read more »

by International Crisis Group, Brussels, February 28, 2014 This briefing note draws on Crisis Group’s extensive reporting on post-war political developments in Sri Lanka, as well as recent interviews with a range of Sri Lankan stakeholders. Read all our published reports on Sri Lanka. Overview The government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) has failed to comply with two… Read more »

Noon Briefing Acting Deputy Spokesperson:  We’ve made it clear that there needs to be more done to get at the heart of what happened in Sri Lanka.  You’ve seen what the Secretary-General’s reports on the situation have said and it’s clear that there continues to be a need for all the facts to be learned… Read more »

The agreement, announced by the Syrian government last week, called for a three-day cease-fire to allow women, children and older men to leave a rebel-held part of the city while food was distributed to those who remained inside.

But the cease-fire was shaky from the start. Some residents refused to leave, fearing their departure would prompt the killing of the remaining rebels. Pro-government Facebook pages also criticized the deal and began a campaign called “No to feeding the gunmen.”

William Schabas, professor of international law at Middlesex University in London who is an authority on war crimes and was among the experts enlisted to examine the Australian inquiry’s evidence, said it was the first to focus on issues that are relevant to a criminal prosecution.

“What it demonstrates is there is clear evidence that a prosecutor can go on,” he said in an interview.

Washington is once again trying to put pressure on the government of Sri Lanka to commission a credible independent investigation of crimes and human rights abuses committed during the end of that country’s bloody civil war in 2009. It was a good move to send a senior American diplomat to the island nation last weekend… Read more »

U.S. Department of State Nisha Desai Biswal Assistant Secretary, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs Colombo, Sri Lanka February 2, 2014 Press Conference With Assistant Secretary Nisha Biswal in Colombo, Sri Lanka AMBASSADOR SISON: I am so pleased to be with you all this evening in order to introduce you to our new Assistant… Read more »

“There is no way he can allow an investigation because an international probe that asks chain-of-command type of questions will lead directly to the Rajapaksas themselves,” Mr. Saravanamuttu said in an interview. “Literally and figuratively, President Rajapaksa must live and die in power.”

Whether the country’s restive north will remain peaceful without further reconciliation efforts is a crucial question. The army continues to occupy thousands of homes and administer its own farms, factories and resorts on appropriated land, for which the government has paid little or no compensation.