SundayTimes
Acting UN special envoy to Burma, Vijay Nambiar, is facing calls from two Sri Lankan rights group to be included in an investigation into events which took place during the final stages of the military operations in Sri Lanka.
Acting UN special envoy to Burma, Vijay Nambiar, is facing calls from two Sri Lankan rights group to be included in an investigation into events which took place during the final stages of the military operations in Sri Lanka.
The charges were submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC) by the US-based Tamil’s Against Genocide (TAG) and the Swiss Council of Eelam Tamils (SCET). They refer to Nambiar’s time as the UN’s Chief of Staff when he was sent to Colombo to aid negotiations towards the end of the fighting.
The submission by the two groups, TAG and SCET, asks “whether VIJAY NAMBIAR was in fact an innocent neutral intermediary or in fact a co-perpetrator within the negotiation-related community.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon has however rejected calls for an inquiry into Nambiar, despite the Chief of Staff’s own assertion in May 2009 that, “As far as the UN is concerned, where there are grave and systematic violations of international humanitarian law , these are things which should be looked at by the international community, by the United Nations.”
This reluctance of senior members of the UN to investigate possible human rights violations will likely concern Burma observers, particularly given that Than Shwe visited Sri Lanka shortly before the incident and is alleged to have offered his Sri Lankan counterpart anti-insurgency “advice”.
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By: Mike Blanchfield, The Canadian Press
10/16/2011
OTTAWA - Sri Lanka says Canada is falling for terrorist "propaganda" with its newfound criticism of the Asian country's human-rights record and its demands for an international inquiry.
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Sri Lankan envoy fires back at Canada for backing calls for war crimes inquiry
By: Mike Blanchfield, The Canadian Press10/16/2011
OTTAWA - Sri Lanka says Canada is falling for terrorist "propaganda" with its newfound criticism of the Asian country's human-rights record and its demands for an international inquiry.
"We are not happy about the statements being made. … We want Canada to see the correct situation," High Commissioner Chitranganee Wagiswara told The Canadian Press in a recent interview.
Wagiswara's remarks are the first public rebuttal of the hard line the Conservatives have recently adopted against the Sri Lankan government.
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