Sri Lanka News First - Government contracts Chinese firm to destroy bodies buried in Nandikadal lagoon
Diplomatic sources say that the government has permitted a Chinese firm to commence a project at the Nandikadal lagoon where Sri Lankan security forces had buried thousands of bodies of LTTE cadres during the final stages of the war last May.
The Chinese firm has been assigned to exhume the bodies and destroy them beyond recognition. More
TamilNet – Mass grave discovered in Mass grave discovered in Naachchikkudaa, Mannaar
De-mining workers of Danish De-mining Group (DDG) have discovered a mass grave in Naachchikkudaa area in Mannaar containing 75 to 100 skeletal remains while engaged in de-mining in the area, informed sources in Mannaar told TamilNet Wednesday. Sri Lanka Army (SLA) had not permitted resettlement in Naachchikkudaa earlier claiming that the area was infested with landmines and a great quantity of explosives lying buried at the height of the war had taken place in Naachchikkudaa. It is suspected that the skeletal remains discovered may have belonged to young men and women, the sources added. More
UN - Domestic inquiries into extrajudicial killings insufficient, UN expert stresses
An independent United Nations human rights expert today stressed the need for international inquiries into serious allegations of extrajudicial executions in cases where national probes have been insufficient, citing examples relating to the Gaza Strip and Sri Lanka.
In many instances, domestic commissions of inquiry had only resulted in “comprehensive impunity,” Philip Alston, Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said as he presented his annual report to the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council (HRC).
“Overall, the track record of such inquiries is remarkably poor,” he added. More
Hindustan Times – Huge civilian toll in Lanka war: Indian doc
by Sutirtho Patranobis
One year after the end of the Sri Lankan civil war, one of the Indian doctors who treated Tamil refugees during the last months of the conflict says there were “massive casualties” among the civilian population.
The Sri Lankan government has denied any targeted killing of civilians and contested figures by the United Nations that 7,000 civilians died in the final phase of the conflict.
“We were not prepared (for what we saw) when we reached the camp… the extent of injuries… long lines of people,” the doctor told HT over phone from India, speaking on condition of anonymity. more
The Age (18/05) – Military blamed in Sri Lanka
ABC Radio Australia (18/05) – Calls for new probe into end of Sri Lankan civil war – Read transcript & listen to interview
The Independent (UK 18/05) – Sri Lanka accused of war crimes in final onslaught
The Telegraph (UK 19/05) - A year after the defeat of the LTTE, human rights are still pivotal in Sri Lanka
Al Jazeera English (18/05) – Fighting impunity in Sri Lanka
SMH – Sri Lanka under fire for killing thousands
by Matt Wade
A YEAR after Sri Lankan troops crushed Tamil Tiger rebels on the battlefield, the International Crisis Group has accused the military of killing tens of thousands of Tamil civilians in the closing stages of the conflict.
An investigative report by the Brussels-based group blames both the army and the rebels for atrocities but attributes most of the civilian deaths during the war’s bloody conclusion to government bombardment of crowded ”no-fire zones”.
”All but a small portion of these deaths were due to government shelling,” the report said.
Last May Sri Lankan troops routed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) forces that had waged a violent 26-year struggle for a Tamil homeland.
As government troops surrounded the rebels, about 300,000 Tamil civilians were trapped amid heavy fighting on a narrow strip of coast in the country’s north-east.
”Evidence gathered by Crisis Group provides reasonable grounds to believe that during these months the security forces intentionally and repeatedly shelled civilians, hospitals and humanitarian operations,” the report said. More
SMH - Sri Lanka’s ethnic divisions still deep and dangerous
by Matt Wade
The President shows little sign of using his dominant political power to push through serious political reforms, writes Matt Wade.
IN THE dying days of Sri Lanka’s civil war, the army liked to show off the military hardware it had captured from the retreating Tamil Tigers. During carefully managed tours to the front line, foreign journalists were taken to inspect neat rows of Kalashnikovs, missiles, landmines and artillery cannon.
A battle tank was the most impressive trophy; the most chilling a small wardrobe of suicide jackets. Photographs found with dead rebels showed proud young cadres standing with the reclusive Tamil Tiger supremo, Velupillai Prabhakaran. One fighter had a printed card commemorating Prabhakaran’s last birthday in November 2008. More
Foreign Policy – Sri Lanka’s Vindictive Peace
by Soma Ilangovan
Last May, Sri Lankan soldiers captured the final piece of land held by the separatist Tamil Tigers, killing hundreds of rebel fighters, including the group’s leader, and definitively ending a 26-year civil war that claimed as many as 100,000 lives.
On May 19, the first anniversary of the war’s end, however, there is little to celebrate. As many as 93,000 Tamils remain in detention camps and transit centers, while 11,700 more (of which 550 are children) are being held as ex-combatants without charges, denied access to an attorney or their families. Conditions in the camps and prisons are appalling, with human rights groups documenting cases of torture and rape, in addition to poor housing, health, sanitation, and education facilities.
This is not what peace is supposed to look like. And the centers and camps are only the most visible symptom of the Sri Lankan government’s apparent disinterest in genuine reconciliation. Far from ending the root conflict, the end of fighting has left the island as ethnically divided as ever, undermining the prospects for a durable peace and regional stability. In many ways, Sri Lanka has simply traded the horror of war for conflict of another, more tedious, continuous sort: a two-tiered society in which Tamils are kept at the bottom. More
The Australian – Report damns Tamil returns
A DAMNING international report rejects the Rudd government’s assertion that it is now safe for Tamil asylum-seekers to return home and says that tens of thousands of unarmed Tamil civilians were killed in the final months of Sri Lanka’s civil war – a toll far higher than previous estimates.
And it urges several countries including Australia not to deport suspected former Tamil Tiger fighters, saying that would put their lives in danger.
The report by the International Crisis Group alleges after an eight-month war crimes investigation that industrial-scale slaughter of civilians by the Sri Lankan government included targeting of hospitals, safe havens and foreign aid groups to remove foreign observers and crush the Tamil Tigers (LTTE).
The Sri Lankan government had a long history of intimidation of critics and those with knowledge of atrocities, said the ICG, a major Brussels-based conflict resolution group funded by several governments.
The report includes a specific recommendation to Australia, Canada, the US, Britain, France and the EU that they: “Do not extradite LTTE suspects to Sri Lanka unless guarantees of humane treatment and fair trials are in place.”
Business Week – Sri Lanka War Abuses Killed Thousands, Group Says
Indian Express – US-based rights group claims Lankan forces killed civilians
Financial Times - Pressure on Sri Lanka for war crimes probe
The New York Times – Sri Lanka Forces Blamed for Most Civilian Deaths
by Lydia Polgreen
Tens of thousands of Tamil civilians died in the last, bloody months of Sri Lanka’s civil war, the International Crisis Group said in an investigative report to be released Monday, most of them as a result of government shelling of areas that were supposed to be safe zones.
The report, which cites witness testimony, satellite images, documents and other evidence, calls for a wide-reaching international investigation into what it calls atrocities committed in the last months of the Sri Lankan government’s war against the Tamil Tiger insurgency.
The war ended a year ago, when the Tigers’ top leadership was killed on a narrow strand of beach in northeastern Sri Lanka, capping a two-decade armed struggle by a group that pioneered some of the ugliest insurgent tactics in the world, including female suicide bombers and child soldiers.
Because the government barred independent journalists and most humanitarian workers from the war zone, the death toll of the final months of fighting, when at least 300,000 Tamil civilians were pinned down on a beach, caught between the rebels and government forces, is not known. More
SRI LANKA: Indigenous insensitivity and the reconciliation commission
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AHRC-STM-075-2010
May 14, 2010
A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission
SRI LANKA: Indigenous insensitivity and the reconciliation commission
The BBC Sinhala Service reported today of a press conference held by the Minister of Media, Keheliya Rambukwella. At this press conference he was questioned on the announcement by the government about a commission for reconciliation and lessons learned. He was questioned as to whether the commission will be something like the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa.
The Minister’s answer was that the South African experience and the bringing of Norway as mediators and the like are all alien experiences to Sri Lanka. He said that, in this particular instance, the government will look to an indigenous approach, something home grown, something of Sri Lanka’s own to the issue of reconciliation and lessons learned in terms of the recent conflict.
As this is the position of the government it is worth examining the indigenous approaches to truth and reconciliation to the Sri Lankan context. From various approaches through government commissions there is overwhelming agreement that all the commissions appointed so far, have failed to address the serious questions that have been affecting Sri Lanka in the conflicts in the recent past. The commissions have been condemned by international organisations such as Amnesty International as well as by local human rights groups who have published extensive reports and analysis on the workings of these commissions.
From the point of view of mandate as well as the selection of the commissioners and the work they have carried out, it is not difficult to form an opinion that these commissions were not meant, first of all to engage in a genuine investigation to find the truth of what has happened, or to address the problems of law and morality concerned. They did not deal with the ways to avoid the possibility of the recurrence of similar incidents in the future.
In fact, all such commissions to date have been exercises of denial. Their purpose was to create confusion in the minds of the people at times when the people are seriously expressing concerns about the problems that are a result of these conflicts such as forced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, torture, abuse of power, illegal arrest and detention and many other forms of arbitrary use of power which has caused enormous suffering to the people.
Therefore any repetition of the immediate past in terms of truth and reconciliation would be to repeat the traditions of denial, instead of trying to achieve anything positive. Then we should go back and ask as to whether there are / local traditions of truth telling in the midst of conflicts. I think it is not difficult at all to answer that question.
Sri Lanka’s ancient tradition is set on a caste based social structure. The political scientist and the sociologist all agree that the centuries of social organisation of Sri Lanka was based on the hierarchical model of caste. Caste does not recognise the equality of human beings and is based on the legal premise of disproportionate punishment for different categories of persons. While any crime against the upper layer is considered the most heinous, any violence to the lower layers of society are not considered crimes at all. Such was the caste doctrines in India and such was the doctrines that have been deeply entrenched in the Sri Lankan psyche. The country does not have tradition of truth telling and seeking reconciliation after periods of crises.
Some may argue that the religion of Sri Lanka is Buddhist and Buddhism has a rich tradition of truth and reconciliation. That Buddhism has that tradition is undeniable. It is one of the greatest traditions in terms of seeking truth and reconciliation.
However, this is not the living tradition of Sri Lanka in terms of social relationships. Even the monks themselves are divided into castes and the deeply entrenched tradition of cast remains in the Sinhala and Tamil communities. Therefore in the living reality of Sri Lanka, there has never been a time since the Polonnaruwa period at least, when there was a tradition truth seeking and reconciliation.
Therefore talking of a commission in indigenous terms is clearly dangerous. The first time this was introduced into the political discussion in Sri Lanka was in the 1972 Constitution and it was called an autochthonous constitution. What was this indigenous, autochthonous constitution? It displaced the supremacy of the parliament. In fact, this constitution destroyed whatever had been built in terms of freedom of expression and the duty of the judiciary to protect the individual from the arbitrary actions of the state.
That indigenous tradition was continued in the 1978 Constitution. This created the indigenous dictator. Sri Lanka abandoned the liberal democratic constitutional model altogether. The separation of power concept was given up in favour of the absolute power of the executive president. After that came the undermining of the judiciary on an unprecedented scale and also the undermining of the parliament. All these are aspects on which enough has been written in detail and the purpose of this statement is not to go into the details of that discourse. But the fact that this indigenous tradition is a tradition of dictatorship and authoritarianism and the suppression of the rights of the individuals is quite clear.
The problem that Sri Lanka faces is one of an indigenous tradition of the total suppression of people which has been the cause of the violations that Sri Lanka is trying to deal with now. The development of the indigenous tradition of suppression also provoked the indigenous traditions of rebel movements which also resorted to the most barbaric modes of violence. Both in the south in terms of the JVP rebellions and in the north in the Tamil movements culminating in the liberation tiger movement saw, the barbaric use of violence. Thus the indigenous traditions of the state using barbarous violence and the local rebels using also using violence are what the country has seen in the past.
What the Minister’s statement clearly indicates is that this commission is going to be a farce. It is going to be a repetition of the traditions of denial, the suppression of truth and trying to strengthen the local suppression that has been going on with the help of the people who are willing to support that tradition. Therefore it will not be a surprise that the so-called commissioners would be those who have a long record of being engaged in the suppression of all attempts of people to seek justice and find ways of dealing with a barbarous, indigenous past.
Please also see:
SRI LANKA: The Asian Human Rights Commission cautiously welcomes the move for the appointment of a commission for truth and reconciliation
http://www.ahrchk.net/statements/mainfile.php/2010statements/2531/
SRI LANKA: A new commission for restorative justice to deal with difficult past practices of abuse and violence
http://www.ahrchk.net/statements/mainfile.php/2010statements/2533/
SRI LANKA: How genuine will be the proposed Commission for Reconciliation?
http://www.ahrchk.net/statements/mainfile.php/2010statements/2534/
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About AHRC: The Asian Human Rights Commission is a regional non-governmental organisation monitoring and lobbying human rights issues in Asia. The Hong Kong-based group was founded in 1984.
Posted on 2010-05-14
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