Opinion: US stand on Sri Lanka perverts

international justice

A protestor wears a mask of U.S. President Barack Obama, while holding a puppet of former Sri Lankan President
Mahinda Rajapaksa during a rally in 2013. Pic: AP.

By JS Tissainayagam Sep 08, 2015

AT the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva next

week, the US is to sponsor a resolution on war crimes in Sri Lanka, in collaboration
with the Colombo government. This is despite wide recognition that Sri Lankan leaders
are implicated in these war crimes.
The resolution is said to ask for a domestic process of accountability with international
technical assistance, which essentially means Sri Lanka will investigate itself. On a

visit to Sri Lanka with colleague Tom Malinowski, Assistant Secretary Nisha
Biswal said, We fundamentally support efforts to create a credible domestic process
for accountability and reconciliation.
Washingtons enthusiastic embrace of Colombo is a replay of its fervent support of
Naypyidaw as soon as Burma (Myanmar) announced moves to restore democracy
and human rights following the 2010 elections. Today the U.S. is criticised for its
premature approval of Burmas so-called transition to democracy.
Backing a domestic process of accountability in Sri Lanka is a reversal of the stand
taken by the US government in March 2014. Then, in deference to international
opinion and demands by Tamil victims of the mass atrocities perpetrated by both
government troops and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, the U.S.
agreed on a UNHRC resolution calling for an international process of accountability.
So why has the USs stance changed?
Washingtons stand on dealing with Colombo began undergoing a transformation
following the presidential elections of January 8. In that election, Mahinda Rajapakse
who is accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity by a UN panel of
experts, suffered a shock defeat by Maithripala Sirisena.
On August 17, Rajapakse made a bid to return to power by contesting elections to
parliament through the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA), but his party failed
to secure a majority. The electorate voted instead for the United National Front for
Good Governance (UNFGG), whose pro-U.S. leader Ranil Wickremesinghe is now
prime minister. Following this, a national government was formed comprising the
UNFGG and a group of UPFA members of parliament.

Sri Lanka Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. Pic: AP.

But the U.S. and the international community are misguided in believing that the two
elections and a national government have brought about enduring change that merits
Washington to collaborate with Colombo on the forthcoming resolution at the UNHRC.
This is because despite regime change there is little evidence that the new
government has either the capacity or the political will to domestically investigate, try
and punish perpetrators of international crimes.
This inadequacy is best seen in examining important institutions of state that will be
vital in determining if the process of accountability effectively delivers justice to the
victims: the military and the justice system.
Even as he campaigned for the presidency, Sirisena, who has admitted being acting
minister of defence when most of the LTTE leaders were killed, was insistent that
Rajapakse and the military leaders implicated in mass atrocities against Tamils would
not be brought before an international tribunal for war crimes.
Installed in power, the Sirisena government intervened directly to protect the status of
those in the military implicated in war crimes.
In 2013, a military Court of Inquiry (CoI) investigated the conduct of the military and
exonerated its personnel of any war crimes. Despite human rights activists
condemning an accused institution investigating itself, Sirisena appointed the man
who headed the militarys COI, Lieutenant General Crishantha Silva, as commander of
the Sri Lanka Army in February this year. In May Sirisena appointed Major General
Jagath Dias as chief of staff of the Army.Dias is accused of war crimes and had to
ignominiously leave Sri Lankas mission in Berlin as he faced charges in Europe.
Wickremesinghe has been no less emphatic in expressing similar reservations on an
international investigation. The parties forming the national government in parliament
which he heads are expected formally agree to a common position on protecting the
rights of war heroes who were responsible for liberating the country. This is expected
before the UNHRC meeting later this month.
A further display of a lack of political will of both Sirisena and Wickremesinghe is the
failure of the government professing to uphold the rule of law to prevent systematic
torture and rape of Tamils by the police and military. Violations during the Sirisena
presidency are recorded by International Centre for Truth and Justice Project (ITJP)
and Freedom from Torture.

Sri Lanka President Maithripala Sirisena. Pic: AP.

Sri Lankas justice system, which is vital if effective remedial justice is to be delivered
to the victims, is not neutral when prosecuting government officials accused of human
rights violations against the Tamils. The Attorney Generals Department has repeatedly
been criticised for this. The Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) continues to be on the
statute books despite successive governments claiming terrorism in Sri Lanka was
eradicated in 2009 with the defeat of the LTTE. Its draconian provisions continue to
permit torture and allow theillegal detention of political prisoners thereby condoning
impunity of the police and military.
Second, not only has Sri Lanka been reluctant to prosecute errant military and police
personnel accused of abuses against Tamils, it has also failed in cases involving the
militarys violations overseas. The standout example is 108 Sri Lankan peacekeepers
in Haiti accused of rape in 2007. Despite Colombo giving the international community
an undertaking that the perpetrators would be punished they remain free.
If the U.S.s model of a domestic process of accountability is to have acceptable
international legal standards and institutions to deliver meaningful justice to the
victims, it would need a systematic reform of the justice system. That is hard to
envisage in Sri Lankas judicial and legal culture today.
Whoever might be convinced by U.S. officials, Tamil victims of mass atrocities are not
among them. Their acts of protest against a domestic process of accountability include
a mass signature campaign. Unsurprisingly the police stopped this perfectly
democratic act of defiance.
Among Tamil political formations, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), the largest party in
parliament was equivocal in its call for international accountability: its election

manifesto is silent about it. Facing the wrath of the electorate it is now at sixes and
sevens, with some leaders saying the international investigation is over, others that
they will call for one if the report is hard-hitting, while another said they will accept
the domestic mechanism with international experts and still others joined the mass
signature campaign denouncing domestic accountability.
As in the case of Burma, in Sri Lanka too the U.S. is applauding superficial gains in
democracy and human rights to cover up more substantive advantages it has in
geopoliticsand commerce. In Burma there was a release of political prisoners and
some liberalisation of press laws, while in Sri Lanka there have been mild gestures to
Tamil sentiments such as releasing of some land held by the military and
the appointment of a civilian governor over a military one in the Tamil-majority
Northern Province.
But accountability for war crimes and crimes against humanity goes deeper than
gestures. It deals with fundamentals on how those enjoying state power are going to
deliver justice to a group traditionally seen as the other. In the minds of the victims
unless there is scrutiny by the international community of the process, it will be
perverted. And the U.S. by its endorsement of a domestic accountability process over
an international one has laid the cornerstone for the perversion of international justice.
Posted by Thavam