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4th March 2013
Hon Navanetham Pillay
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Palais Wilson
52 rue des Paquis
CH- 1201
Geneva
Switzerland
Sri
Lanka: The ongoing violation of Human Rights of the Tamil people
for
the
22nd
Session of the UN Human Rights Council meeting (March 2013)
Hon High Commissioner,
I am a Sinhalese from the majority
community in Sri Lanka. who has campaigned for six decades (since
1948) for the right of the Tamil people to live with equality,
dignity, safety, and now to live at all, in the country of their
birth and the historical homelands of the Tamils (the North and
East).
I felt that as a Sinhalese, a cousin of
the former President Chandrika Kumaratunga, and someone who has left
Sri Lanka and has nothing to gain from getting involved, it is
important that I should express my concerns about the gross (and
progressive) violations of human rights, particularly of the Tamil
people, and the dismantling of democracy and the establishment of a
Totalitarian regime under President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his family.
I am a doctor of Medicine, not a
politician. I am a member of several organisations and while it would
not have been difficult to get permission from them to send you this
letter under their letter-head, I have opted not to do so but to send
it as an individual – someone who at a personal level is deeply
concerned with what is going on behind the closed and censored doors
of Sri Lanka.
Your Report
Before I set out my concerns, I must
express my gratitude to you and your staff for the outstanding
Submission made to the UN General Assembly, on 11 February, 2013:
“Report of the Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on advise and
technical assistance for the Government of Sri Lanka on promoting
reconciliation and accountability in Sri Lanka”.
This is the most comprehensive and
balanced Report I have ever read. It is abundantly clear that you and
your Office have a clear appreciation of the human rights (and other
issues) in Sri Lanka. The closing paragraph is particularly
important:
“The High Commissioner ……reaffirms
her long-standing call for an independent and credible investigation
into alleged violations of international human rights and
humanitarian law, which could also monitor any domestic
accountability process”.
Immediate admission of AI, HRW, ICG
The only recommendation that I would
have strongly suggested is for the immediate admission of
internationally credible human rights organisations – Amnesty
International (AI), Human Rights Watch (HRW), and the Brussels-based
International Crisis Group (ICG). If, as the Government of Sri Lanka
(GoSL) and its President Mahinda Rajapaksa claim, that the Tamil
people in the North and East have been ‘rescued’ and
‘successfully rehabilitated’, there can be no justification for
the continuing exclusion of these internationally credible
organisations (one of them a Nobel Laureate), from the North and
East, indeed from the entire country. The GoSL cannot have it both
ways.
Half-truths, untruths and downright
lies
One of the problems with the GoSL,
including their Ambassadors, is that what they say are haf-truths,
untruths or blatant lies. This was stated in diplomatic language by
even the Report of the Secretary-General’s Panel of Experts on
Accountability in Sri Lanka (31 March 2011) (UNSG’s Panel):
“The Panel’s determination of
credible allegations reveals a very different version of the final
stages of the war than that maintained to this day by the Government
of Sri Lanka. The Government says it pursued a “humanitarian rescue
operation” with a policy of “zero civilian casualties.” In
stark contrast, the Panel found credible allegations, which if
proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of
international humanitarian law and international human rights law…..”
Roads have been opened, development is
occurring, houses are being built and business is booming. There is
no doubt about that. The question is “Who are the
beneficiaries?” “What is the human rights situation of the people
in the area – the Tamils and Muslims?”
The answer (which will not be
forthcoming from the GoSL) is that the beneficiaries are the Sri
Lankan military, the Government, big business in the Sinhalese South
and foreign investors, and President Rajapaksa’s friends and
family.
As for the people in the area, the
legitimate residents, their human rights situation is worse than it
has ever been. They have lost their land, homes, jobs, and above all,
their security. Their basic human rights have been violated and
are being violated as never before.
The UNSG’s Panel uses the word
“Extermination” (p 68). They go on to justify this.
“Under the ICC Statute,
extermination includes “intentional infliction of conditions of
life, inter alia the deprivation of access to food and medicine,
calculated to bring about the destruction of part of a population”
(Art. 7(2)(b)). The part of the population subject to extermination
has to be “numerically significant”.
The Article referred to:
“The credible allegations support
a finding of the crime against humanity of extermination insofar as
the 127 ICC Statute states that “for the purposes of this State or
organizational policy to commit such attack.” The element of a
state policy is
generally not required in customary
international law, although, in the case of Sri Lanka, the
allegations are of such a nature to be able to infer a State or
organizational policy.
If “extermination” is what has gone
on (and from Reports from the area, is going on today), then there is
an absolute requirement for the application of the “UN
Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) because people are not being
protected. If it is not, then R2P becomes a farce, mere words with no
meaning.
The Reports from the area I refer to
are from Church leaders, people of standing, elected representatives
of the Tamil people and internationally credible human rights groups,
among them a Nobel Prize winner.
The outstanding and outspoken Bishop of
Mannar, the Most Rev Dr Rayappu Joseph and his clergy have stated
that if the GoSL is allowed more time (which it was by the UNHRC
meeting in March 2012), to do what it is doing, the Tamils “will
cease to exist as a people”.
The crucial question
The crucial question that the GoSL must
be asked, and for which an answer demanded is, “If the Tamil
people have been ‘rescued from terrorism’, and have been
‘successfully rehabilitated’, what is the justification for
continuing to exclude AI, HRW and ICG, from the area?”
The answer, which will not come from
the GoSL, is that if these veteran human rights organisations are
allowed into the area, they will report on the serious and continuing
violation of human rights of the civilians, which has now reached
crisis levels.
Negotiating with the Rajapaksa
regime
It is abundantly clear that it is
simply not possible to negotiate with the Rajapaksa regime. They, in
particular President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his all powerful brother,
Gotabaya Rajapaksa, have decided that Sri Lanka will be a
Sinhala-Buddhist country. Everything they have done since being
elected to power in November 2005 has confirmed this. This is not
going to change in the foreseeable future unless, as the
Christian clergy have put it in a letter to the UN HRC on 18th
February 2013, there is “a strong and action-orientated
resolution on Sri Lanka at the 22nd session
of the UN Human Rights Council”.
History has repeatedly shown that it is
not possible to negotiate with tyrants and Totalitarian regimes. This
is even more so today when such regimes are backed by superpowers,
China, and even India (Delhi), in the case of the Sri Lankan regime.
This is not an opinion to be debated
but a fact to be faced and addressed. It is a fact confirmed by
overwhelming evidence, not least from the UN Secretary General’s
Panel of Experts Report, and several Reports from internationally
credible organisations such as AI, HRW, ICG, and by those on the
ground in the Tamil North and East, in particular, the Most Rev Dr
Rayappu Joseph, the Catholic Bishop of Mannar in the Tamil North
East, (Tamil) Civil Society and the Commission for Justice and Peace
of the Catholic Diocese of Jaffna (Patron - the Bishop of Jaffna).
If the UN Human Rights Council (UN HRC)
wants to address this serious problem which is of national and
international concern, this fact – that it is not possible to
negotiate with a Totalitarian regime – it will have to be based on
this fact. To do otherwise is to become part of the problem rather
than part of the solution. It will not only damage the UN HRC but
also Sri Lanka, in general, the Tamils in particular.
Of serious concern is that if Sri Lanka
is allowed to get away with it (as has happened so far), ruthless
regimes in other countries will take this as a ‘role model’ and
do likewise. Unfortunately, this is already happening, mainly because
there are no penalties when even gross violation of human rights,
human rights and humanitarian law, and international law, have
occurred and are still occurring. There is evidence that this
is already happening.
I am therefore urging the UN HRC to
act, rather than pass Resolutions which will be treated with absolute
contempt by the GoSL. The violation of these Resolutions must carry
deterrent penalties. Every major human rights body, AI in particular,
has repeatedly stressed the absolute need for this. Professor Francis
Boyle, Professor of International Law, University of Illinois College
of Law in the USA, who has a impressive record in addressing problems
such as the one in Sri Lanka, has made his concerns known for years.
Geoffrey Robertson QC, London, a world authority on Human Rights and
Crimes against Humanity, has just called for firm action to be taken
against Sri Lanka.
Robertson, a former Australian and now
a leading a leading barrister in London, wants Australia and other
Commonwealth countries to boycott a Commonwealth Heads of Government
meeting in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, in November 2013. In a
written Report to England’s Bar Human Rights Committee, he stated:
“Governments which respect the
rule of law should not attend. Nor should the Queen or any royal
family member provide a photo-opportunity for President Mahinda
Rajapaksa. Royal seals of approval serve the propaganda interests of
people like this and no-shows by powerful nations would signal the
unacceptability of their behaviour”.
Speaking at the Report’s launch, Mr
Robertson said the “fabricated charges” against the Chief
Justice were heard by government ministers in a secret star chamber
with witnesses bullied and brow beaten.
He wants the 117 MPs who voted for
impeachment and the seven ministers who declared the Chief Justice
guilty, banned from visiting Britain or any other Commonwealth
countries, and their foreign bank accounts frozen.
“These identifiable people are
collectively responsible for the unlawful attack on the rule of law
and unless made to suffer for it, others will do the same dirty work”
Having met and discussed the human
rights situation in Sri Lanka with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a Nobel
Prize winner, I know that he too is deeply concerned, a concern which
he has publicly expressed many times on several occasions.
The UN HRC and its members simply
cannot ignore these mounting concerns of internationally credible
organisations and people. To do so would be to seriously compromise
the standing of the UN HRC and make it a meaningless organisation.
The voice of the Tamil people
There is overwhelming evidence that
what the GoSL claims as to what is going on in post-war Sri Lanka is
simply untrue. The ‘Technical Mission’ sent from your office that
visited Sri Lanka (13-21 September, 2012) and met with a wide range
of people in different parts of the country, confirmed this.
It is a matter of considerable regret
that the one person who could have apprised the Technical Mission of
the serious humanitarian problems facing the Tamil people, the Most
Rev Dr Rayappu Joseph, Bishop of Mannar, was not visited. Indeed, of
all the areas visited, Mannar, an important place that should have
been visited, was not.
This serious omission has been
partially corrected by the Most Rev Dr Rayappu Joseph and 132 men and
women Christian clergy from different churches in the North and East
of Sri Lanka sending a letter (18th February 2013) to The
President and all members of the UN Human Rights Council:-
“Call for a strong and
action-orientated resolution on Sri Lanka at the 22nd
session of the UN Human Rights Council”.
Impressive as it is, with some 133
Christian clergy signing this letter, there would have been more. Two
sentences are particularly worrying, and clearly show
the level of intimidation in Sri
Lanka:-
“In the last
year, those criticising and challenging the government in peaceful
ways including by engagement with the UN, have been assaulted,
questioned, arrested, threatened, discredited and intimidated by
government ministers, officials, military and police. Victims include
some of us and fellow clergy who are not signing this letter
due to fear of reprisals”.
This, with the attached letter sent by
the Bishop of Mannar to President Rajapaksa (20th August 2012):
“ Reconciliation, human rights
and humanitarian concerns in the Mannar Diocese (Mannar and Vavuniya
districts)”
which deals with the ground situation
in detail, and makes some very constructive actions that could be
taken to address the current concerns and problems, is more powerful
than anything that has come out of Sri Lanka. The members of the UN
Human Rights Council cannot say that they are unaware of what is
going on in the Tamil areas.
While this letter by the Bishop of
Mannar to the Sri Lankan President deals with the Mannar Diocese, I
am well-aware that it applies to the entire Tamil North and East.
This is confirmed by a letter from the
Commission for Justice and Peace of the Catholic Diocese of
Jaffna, (10.01.2013) sent to The President and Members,
Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Sri Lanka who went to the North to
find out the situation there, and to see for themselves the real
difficulties and anxieties of the people there.
It was written by the Director/
Chairman Rev Fr S.V.B. Mangalarajah (the Patron being Rt Rev Dr
Thomas Savundranayagam, th Roman Catholic Bishop of Jaffna), and sent
from Bishop’s House, Jaffna.
It confirms what the Most Rev Dr
Rayappu Joseph said about the Diocese of Mannar.
All of these Church leaders cannot be
lying or painting a picture that is inaccurate or untrue. It is much
more likely that it is the GoSL which is not known for its honesty
(eg the absurd claim made to this day that “Not a single
civilian was killed”). This is despite overwhelming evidence to
the contrary, not least in the 200 page Report of three
internationally credible lawyers appointed by the UN Secretary
General, Ban Ki-moon, which I have already cited. With claims such as
this made by the GoSL, there are serious issues with the credibility
of its claims.
It is this complete lack of credibility
that makes an international independent investigation into war crimes
mandatory. So also is the absolute need for the immediate admission
of internationally credible human rights groups into the Tamil areas.
I am certain that
you are well-aware of all this but the question is whether the rest
of the UN Human Rights Council members appreciate (or want to
appreciate) this, and more importantly, whether any of this will make
the slightest difference to the way they deal with Sri Lanka – by
passing “a
strong and action-orientated resolution on Sri Lanka at the
22nd session”. If it does not, the
credibility of the UN Human Rights Council will decrease even
further, in addition to the Tamil people ceasing to exist as a
people.
The UN HRC
I am seriously concerned as to what
will happen at the 22nd session of the Human Rights
Council in March 2013. I am as concerned as I was before the 19th
sessions a year ago, and the pathetically weak resolution that was
passed which gave the GoSL time to go on doing what it has done to
the Tamil people in the North and East since the end of the armed
conflict. The humanitarian situation is, if anything, worse, Two
comments made by the Christian clergy in their letter of 18th
February 2013 which I have quoted, are most certainly true:
- Referring to the weak resolution adopted at the 19th session of the Council (March 2012) : “….we have seen…..a total lack of political will on the part of the government to implement recommendations therein, such as the call for investigations into allegations of international law during the final stages of the conflict and cooperation with the UN Special Procedures, as evident by the lack of response to requests for country visits by 8 thematic UN Special Procedures for a number of years.
- “We fear that at the pace these oppressive methods are carried out after the war, our identity as a people will be destroyed in the near future”. I would say that that is genocide of the Tamil people. I use this term after careful thought and in accordance with definition of Genocide in the UN Genocide Convention.
LLRC
I am not going to deal with so-called
“Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission” because your
Report has done so. However, in view of the extremely worrying trust
that the UN HRC seems to have in this farce, giving the GoSL more and
more time to implement even the minimally constructive suggestions
made in the LLRC report. All I will do is to say that it is obvious
that the GoSL will not implement this, and expecting it to do so is
to simply give more time to continue the slow killing of the Tamils
and making them non-people.
The GoSL has not learnt any ‘Lessons’.
Alarmingly, the ‘Lessons Learnt’ is that it is possible for a
Government to get away with mass murder and its Armed Forces to
behave like an Army of occupation and treat the people in the area
(Tamils) as the spoils of war.
As for ‘Reconciliation’, this will
not happen with the triumphalism of the GoSL, and the determination
of the Rajapaksa junta to make Sri Lanka into a Sinhala-Buddhist
nation where there is no place for non-Sinhalese and non-Buddhists –
whatever the rhetoric.
In an attempt to give this farcical
LLRC credibility, the GoSL invited AI, HRW and ICG to appear before
it. They refused to do so and gave the reasons for their refusal.
They said that it does not meet the minimal international standards
for Commissions of inquiry:-
“There is little to be gained by
appearing before such a fundamentally flawed commission.
Accountability for war crimes in Sri Lanka demands an independent
international investigation. Thousands of civilians were killed in
the last few months of the war as a result of gross violations of
international law…..The Commission os nothing more than a cynical
attempt by Sri Lanka to avoid serious inquiry that would bring
genuine accountability”
AI went further:-
“Amnesty International urges the
international community not to be deceived that the LLRC – the
latest of a series of a long line of failed domestic mechanisms in
Sri Lanka – will deliver justice, truth and reparations”.
AI called on the UN to immediately
establish an independent, international investigation and went on to
state why this was needed.
Despite this clear statement by a Nobel
Prize winning organisation, nothing has been done.
The current situation
I have no doubt that
you know full well what is going on. The question is whether others
who are in the UN Human Rights Council, who
will vote, do so (or even want to know). Nonetheless, I will set this
out in the briefest outline.
The agenda of the Sri
Lankan government
The agenda of
the Rajapaksa regime is to make Sri Lanka into a Sinhala-Buddhist
country, to destroy the reality of a Tamil North and East, change the
demography of the country so that the Tamils are a minority even in
the North and East (the homeland of the Tamils), prohibit any
questioning of what is going on, muzzle the media, intimidate the
judiciary, manipulate the Constitution, legally or illegally, sell
the country to China, India and the International Monetary Fund, and
anyone else who wants to buy large areas of the country, especially
in the Tamil areas, and to remain in power forever.
If this means
rigging elections, bribing, buying, banning or murdering political
opponents, or civil society, including human rights activists, or
making them ‘disappear’, the regime is more than willing to do
so. If this means turning the guns on opponents, be they Tamil,
Sinhalese or Muslims, they are ready to do so.
The GoSL believes
that the international community, the UN, UN HRC, and other
international organization or human rights organizations can be
ignored. There are no consequences, should why should they worry?
That is a failure of the UN and the UNHRC which must be addressed,
given the arrogance of these murderous regimes.
Those who oppose
what the Rajapaksa junta is doing are
called traitors, and dealt with as such. Those outside Sri Lanka are
labeled either ‘Tamil Tiger terrorists’ (irrespective of their
ethnicity) or are accused of ‘ganging up’ to ‘punish’ Sri
Lanka and destroy the ‘remarkable progress’ made by the GoSL.
A country with two
Presidents
It is important to
realize that Sri Lanka effectively has two Presidents. Mahinda
Rajapaksa, the elected de jure
President, and his brother Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the so-called ‘Defense
Secretary’, who is the de facto
President, an unelected man who is certainly the most powerful and
feared man in Sri Lanka – not without reason.
A single example (of
many) will suffice. With mounting international pressure to devolve
some power to the Tamil areas, ‘President’ Mahinda Rajapaksa
initiated the All Party Representative Conference (APRC) to look into
constitutional political reform,
The APRC limped on from
2006-2009 and submitted a Report. It was never published. It was
buried.
With increasing
pressure, particularly from India (Delhi pressured by Tamil Nadu),
‘President’ Rajapaksa initiated yet another Committee – to look
into a constitutional settlement (that had just been done by the
APRC).
In stepped the de
facto President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa. On
16 August 2012, in an interview to India’s Headlines
Today TV, he said, “The
existing Constitution is more than enough ……Devolution-wise I
think we have done enough. I don’t think there is a necessity to go
beyond that”. The devolution
promised by ‘President’ Mahinda Rajapaksa stopped right there.
It is clearly
important for international bodies including the UNHRC to realize
this since whatever promises that ‘President’ Rajapaksa makes,
are meaningless. If it is opposed by the so-called ‘Defence
Secretary’, it cannot and will not be delivered. This unelected
man, a former military officer who left Sri Lanka for greener
pastures in the USA (and became a US citizen) returned to Sri Lanka
when his brother was up for election as President. He was appointed
“Defence Secretary” but is effectively running the country and
has more power and less accountability than anyone else in Sri Lanka.
He can block or veto anything that the ‘President’, the
Government or Parliament decides. This is the reality which if not
appreciated by the outside world, including the UN HRC, nonsense
decisions will be made and Resolutions passed, which achieve nothing.
Recently Gotabaya
Rajapaksa called the Editor-in-Chief of a
major newspaper “a pig who eats shit!
Shit! Shit! A f……g shit”. He went
on to call for her murder, “People
hate you. They will kill you”. Wisely
she fled the country and did not wait for the inevitable – the
murder in broad daylight of her predecessor, Lasantha Wickrematunga,
owner-editor of the paper who was murdered in broad daylight in a
suburban street in Colombo when he was on his way to work.
As for the language
used by Gotabaya Rajapaksa, there has never been such vituperative
and obscene language in interaction between a public servant and a
member of the public or a journalist. Public servants are bound by an
Establishment Code which contains norms and standards of conduct set
by the Public Service Commission. They are required by an oath of
office to confirm and abide by the Constitution of the country.
Violation of these calls for disciplinary action, interdiction,
resignation or termination. None of this applies to the ‘Defence
Secretary’ – the de facto
President.
Is all this relevant? Yes
it is, very much so. If this man, the so-called “Defence Secretary”
decides that there will be no devolution of power to the Tamils or
any change in the treatment of Tamils in the North and East, it will
not happen – UN HRC Resolutions or not. That is how things happen
in Sri Lanka under the Rajapaksa regime.
The Agenda of
the Rajapaksa junta
There is a clear
agenda which is not even thinly disguised. The junta does not think
it necessary to do so. It is:
1.
To establish a Sinhalese-Buddhist country
2.
To establish a Totalitarian regime under one family – the
Rajapkasas.
It
is a regime that tolerates no dissent. The opposing voice has been
silenced. There is violence unleash against even those who question
what is going on, let alone do anything about it. The Media are the
mouth-piece of the regime, and those who do not do so are silenced.
Since President Rajapaksa was elected (November 2005) some 35 media
workers have been killed or have ‘disappeared’. Scores have
(wisely) fled the country. ‘Reporters without Borders’ has stated
that Sri Lanka is one of the most dangerous countries for independent
journalists.
There
is rampant bribery and corruption all the way to the highest in the
land and his siblings and numerous relatives and stooges.
There
is a collapse of governance with hoodlums and thugs being part of the
delivery of governance.
The
legal system has collapsed. The Chief Justice has been interdicted
and replaced by a Rajapaksa ‘yes-man’.
The
Central Bank is under another. If despite overwhelming evidence to
the contrary, the economy is going very well (President Rajapaksa is
the Minister of Finance, among several other Ministries).
The
Police are the most corrupt in the world. Much of this has been
documented by AI.
3. To remain in power for
ever.
If
this means altering the Constitution (for example, the 18th
Amendment which gives the President even more power than the sweeping
power he already has, it will be done – and has been). The 18th
Amendment was rushed through the Courts and Parliament as an ‘Urgent
Bill’. MPs did not even have the time to read the Bill, let alone
debate it.
The
notorious ‘Prevention of Terrorism’(PTA) continues, indeed has
been enhanced, despite the Government’s claim that ‘terrorism’
has been crushed. The PTA is used to take into custody and hold
incommunicado for whatever time in undisclosed places. The PTA
over-rides the Constitution and the Laws of the land
The
PTA gives the power to the government and the armed forces to do what
they want to whomever they want with no restraints, consequences or
accountability.
It is
Government Terrorism, rather than a Prevention of Terrorism.
Anyone who questions
this is a ‘traitor’ and, almost by definition, a Tamil Tiger
‘Terrorist’,
irrespective of his ethnicity.
I will briefly
deal with some of these dangerous and serious actions.
1)
To make multiethnic, multicultural,
multilingual, multireligious Sri Lanka, into a Sinhalese-Buddhist
country.
The question is, “
What does one do with the Tamils – some 18% of the country, most of
whom are Hindu or Christian”. There are four options:
–
i)
Drive them out of the country.
More than a million have already been, and more
are leaving as
asylum seekers and refugees.
ii)
Make them ‘non-people’.
More than 250,000 Tamils in the North and East are
‘non-people’.
They do not count.
iii)
Make them ‘disappear’ or jail them
without charge or trial at undisclosed
locations for
ever.
Sri Lanka has the
highest rate of ‘involuntary
disappearances’ in the world. In 2008, Human Rights Watch published
a 221-page Report, “Sri Lanka, “Disappearances” by the Security
Forces, A National Crisis. ‘Recurring
Nightmare: State Responsibility for ‘Disappearances and
Abductions’”.
The situation has
got worse. Amnesty International, 2012,
Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR),
October-November 2012. Sri Lanka.
Reconciliation at a crossroads: Continuing impunity, detentions,
torture and enforced disappearances”.
Here is what the
Submission said: “Despite commitments
made by Sri Lanka during its first UPR to prevent, investigate,
prosecute and punish cases of enforced disappearances, Amnesty
International continues to receive reports of enforced
disappearances, including of activists protesting human rights
violations by the authorities”.
Asian
Human Rights Commission on 30 August 2012 (International Day of the
victims of Enforced Disappearances), published a report “Sri
Lanka: Enforced Disappearances have become a permanent weapon in the
arsenal of suppression of dissent”.
Sri Lanka now has
the highest number of unresolved disappearances reported to the UN
Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary ‘disappearances.
Repeated requests
(over many years) for the UN Special Rapporteur to visit Sri Lanka
have been ignored.
The 2012 Annual
Report of the Red Cross (ICRC) stated that ICRC was trying to trace
15,780 people (up to 30 December 2011). The vast majority were males.
1,404 were children, 754 women. Of them, only 136 (0.8%) have been
found.
The Sri Lankan
government says that no one has ‘disappeared’. They have ‘left
the country’. As such, there is no problem.
Amnesty
International in a Submission to the “Convention against Torture,
other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment”: Sri
Lanka: Briefing to Committee Against Torture”(October 2011)
stated:
“Perhaps the
most shocking aspect of the criminal
justice system is the overwhelmingly large number of charges which
are fabricated by the police on a daily basis”.
Asylum-seekers from
Sri Lanka who have been refused entry to other countries and have
been deported back to Sri Lanka have been tortured, killed, have
‘disappeared’, or harassed. The Bishop of Mannar, the Most Rev Dr
Rayappu Joseph in a recent appeal urged
Australian authorities not to send asylum seekers from Sri Lanka back
to Sri Lanka, because of what happens to them. The Australian
government boasts that in just the past six months, some 800 asylum
seekers from Sri Lanka (the vast majority Tamil males), have been
sent back, many of them without any proper assessment, which is a
violation of the UN Refugee Convention, signed and ratified by
Australia. The same is true of the UK.
iv)
Kill them. That is Genocide – defined
in the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of
Genocide, as “An act committed with
intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or
religious group”. In Sri Lanka, the
‘part’ is the Tamils who live in the North and East.
Bombing and shooting
are not the only ways to kill. The people (Tamils) are being
prevented from ‘survival activities’ – agriculture and fishing,
their homes, businesses, markets, hospitals and schools that had been
destroyed are not being rebuilt, and are simply being excluded fro
the work force. All of these are occurring in the Tamil North and
East, run by the (Sinhalese) Armed Forces, which runs the area like
an ‘Army of Occupation’, and does what it wants with no
accountability.
The “mass
killing”
of the Tamils prior to May 2009 (acute
genocide), has now been replaced by “slow
killing” (gradual genocide), or to
use the word of the UN Secretary General’s Panel of Experts,
“Extermination”. Both
acute genocide and gradual genocide are being conducted by the GoSL
without international witnesses. This is why it is imperative and
urgent to admit AI, HRW and ICG into the Tamil North and East.
It must also be
recognized that there are different types of Genocide. In addition to
the generally recognized ‘Physical genocide”,
there is Educational genocide, Cultural genocide, Economic genocide
and Religious genocide, which I would define as “The
intentional, backed by the act, of destroying in whole or in part the
education, culture, economy and religion, of an ethnic group –
the Tamils”. The GoSL is guilty of all of them, and has not been
held accountable.
2)
To establish a Totalitarian State under one family – a family
autocracy.
This is a gradually
deteriorating situation. A ‘Democracy’ (of sorts) has been taken
to a Presidential Dictatorship (the 1978 Constitution), to a
Politico-Military Fascist State after President Rajapaksa was
elected in November 2005, and now to a Totalitarian State under him,
his brothers, family and stooges. It is the Rajapaksas who matter, no
one else does.
3)
To rule for ever.
The clearest example
was the replacement of the 17th
Amendment to the Constitution by the 18th
Amendment, rushed through the Law Courts and Parliament, which gave
the President even more poers than the sweeping powers that he
already had. One of the President’s brothers, Basil Rajapaksa, has
openly talked of ‘a family dynasty’.
The Tamil people and
their human rights
I am concerned that
there will be few in the UN HRC meeting in Geneva (March 2013) to set
out the suffering of the Tamil people and challenge the downright
lies of the Sri Lankan government. There is certainly the possibility
of verbal, and even physical violence, being unleashed by the massive
Sri Lankan government delegation – one of the largest, if not the
largest from any country. You, Hon High Commissioner, were witness to
some of this at the 19th
session a year ago, and issued a warning that those who attended the
meeting were not to be harassed on their return to Sri Lanka.
However, this
warning was ignored and treated with absolute contempt. One of the
President’s Ministers threatened to ‘break the bones’ of those
who attended the UN HRC meeting and did not fly the Sri Lankan flag,
and support the blatant lies that were being peddled by the GoSL
delegation. No action was taken against him by the President or by
anyone else.
The realities on the
ground
- The Tamil North and East is under military control. The military are everywhere and involved in all activities – civilian, commercial, administrative, educational, religious, domestic, land issues – the lot. Nothing can be done without military approval. This will not change, whatever the rhetoric of the GoSL.
The
violation of human rights involves intimidation, abuse, including
rape, of the Tamils, illegal detention at undisclosed places,
detention without charge or trial, eviction from their lands, and
land grabs by the military, the government and its (Sinhlalese)
supporters.
‘Resettlement’
of the Tamils is a farce, as many, especially the Christian clergy in
the North and East have extensively documented.
The
Tamil people have no voice. Their political representatives, with few
exceptions, have gone silent, as so often happens in a Totalitarian
State/Dictatorship.
- The Tamils are the ‘spoils of war’. The attitude of the Sinhalese military and Police is “We can do what we want with them and their land. They have no say.” This attitude is endorsed by the GoSL. There is no reason why it should change since there are no penalties, nationally or internationally.
- ‘Sinhalisation’ of the Tamil areas – replacing the Tamils with Sinhalese (many of then ex-military). There will be no Tamil homeland. This is a demographic change that is being implemented by the GoSL which cannot be reversed. The more time the GoSL is given, the more complete will be this serious change which will make the Tamils a mionority even in the arte of their historical habitat.
- ‘Buddhist-isation’ of this (Hindu and Christian) area. Buddhism will be forced down their throats whether they want it or not. Buddhist temples are now springing up everywhere, in areas where there are no Buddhists. There is even a move to make conversion to Christianity illegal. The “Prevention of Forcible Conversion Bill” is being considered, and will probably be passed. In a country where 70% are Buddhists, Christianity is such a threat that it has to basically be outlawed. Who defines what ‘forcible’ is?
Hundreds
of Hindu temples and Christian churches that have been destroyed by
the government forces are not being repaired. They are being replaced
by Buddhist temples and Buddhist statues.
This
is now spreading to Muslim mosques which are being dismantled by
bigots among the Buddhist monks. The GoSL has done nothing about this
religious intolerance.
International games,
geopolitics and trade
Hon High Commissioner, I
am sure you know all this. I am setting it out for those who are
campaigning for the human rights of the Tamil people so that they
realize what forces are lined up against them. It is not just the
Rajapaksa regime, there is an international dimension.
As I have stated in
numerous publications, addresses, interviews and
dvd recordings, there are two wars in Sri Lanka.
- A war by the Sri Lankan government against the Tamils. It is wrongly claimed that this is (or was) a war to crush the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The LTTE was not the cause of the problem but the result. The cause was Sinhala-Buddhist ethnoreligious chauvinism and Sinhalese political opportunism to get the electoral support of the Sinhalese-Buddhist majority (70% of the country) to get elected to power or remain in power. It is political opportunism by a succession of Sinhalese politicians since 1956 (and even before). This fanaticism has ended in mass murder after President Rajapaksa got into office.
Crushing
the LTTE (with the military support of China, India and several other
countries) was presented to the world as nothing more than support
for George Bush’s ‘War on Terrorism’. It is a war against the
Tamil people to crush them into accepting Sri Lanka as a
Sinhala-Buddhist country.
- An international war – China against India against USA – for the control of the Indian Ocean. US Admiral Alfred Mahan, said a hundred years ago, “Whoever controls the Indian Ocean, dominates Asia”. There is no better geographical location to do this than Sri Lanka, astride the Indian Ocean.
Then
there is China’s “String of
Pearls”. This is China’s access to ports and airfields, develop
special diplomatic relationships, and modernize military forces that
extend from the South China Sea through the Strait of Malacca, across
the Indian Ocean, and on to the oil supply in the Persian Gulf.
Sri Lanka is one
of these “Pearls”. Hence China’s physical, military and
economic hold of
Sri Lanka. The Rajapaksa regime is more than happy to allow China to
do as she wants, in exchange for protection by China at the UN (and
elsewhere) of any investigation into war crimes against Sri Lanka.
The US
does not want China to control the Indian
Ocean, India wants
neither.
All are happy to take no action to ‘upset’ the Rajapaksa regime.
These
countries
cooperate with each other to keep the Rajapaksa regime happy, and
compete
with each other to get a foothold in Sri Lanka. A new word will have
to be
coined for this ‘cooperation and competition’ – “Co-petition”.
They could not
care about the human rights of the Tamils.
This is
what enables the GoSL to do what it wants nationally and
internationally, and why nothing has been done to act against a
barbaric,
murderous
regime, guilty of crimes against humanity and even genocide.
UN HRC
must make sure that this geopolitical agenda of these international
powers,
in particular, China, does not triumph over the human rights of the
Tamil
people, and over the crushing of democracy and the rule of law in Sri
Lanka by
a totalitarian regime determined to stay in power, legally or
illegally,
by
military force if necessary.
My position
I would, despite my
age, 81, have been prepared to come to Geneva to voice the plight of
a voiceless people – the Tamils - and the
brutally oppressive Government and its Armed Forces that have no
accountability, and do what they want to whoever they want. Financial
constraints have prevented me from coming to Geneva.
My own contribution has been minimal.
There is little I can do for the suffering people of Sri Lanka,
especially the Tamil people in the North and East, who are under the
heel of a brutal, repressive and murderous (Sinhalese) Military and
Police. All I can do is to address the massive disinformation
campaign of the GoSL. To this end I have recorded a dozen dvds, the
last of which is particularly important: Sri Lanka: Genocide,
Crimes against Humanity, Violation of International Law”. A
copy of this has already been sent to your office.
I am just about to release a booklet
which I know will be of concern to you, given your past record: An
Epidemic of Rape of Tamil Women and Girls by the Sri Lankan Armed
Forces and Police in the Tamil North and East.
Your role and the UN
HRC
I
hope that the few remaining voices for Human Rights – Amnesty
International, Human Rights Watch, International Crisis Group, and
last, but not least, yourself, will see justice delivered where
brutality and injustice prevails, and see an end to the escalating
human rights violations in Sri Lanka and the drift to a Totalitarian
State.
That said, I
am well-aware that given the structure and function of the UN Human
Rights Council, to say nothing of the United Nations itself, this
might be impossible.
Here is what
Geoffrey Robertson QC said in an interview
in London, when questioned about what action the UN Human Rights
Council will take on Sri Lanka:
“The Human Rights
Council is a highly politicised body. It is made up not of experts on
human rights, but of paltering diplomats. Europe only has seven seats
… We have countries like Russia and China obviously concerned to
keep their own internal problems down and away from international
oversight.”
As someone who has been
to the UN Human Rights Council and seen how it works, I think
Mr Robertson’s comments are justified. It is now up to you to
change this.
Yours sincerely
Brian Senewiratne
