Tamils hold fire to ruling coalition in Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera, left, and US Secretary of State John Kerry. Source: AFP
SRI Lanka’s new government has appealed to the UN to delay a report into atrocities committed during its civil war, days after a key political ally accused successive governments of Tamil genocide and called for a speedy probe from the world body.
The Australian-Amanda Hodge-THE AUSTRALIAN-FEBRUARY 14, 2015
The Tamil National Alliance-dominated Northern Provincial Council passed the incendiary resolution on Tuesday, defending the move by saying the country needed to understand its past to build a harmonious future.
The former war-torn region’s chief minister, Canagasabapathy Viswalingam Wigneswaran, told The Weekend Australian the 11-page document was intended to “educate our Sinhalese brothers and sisters” on the history of Tamil persecution in Sri Lanka.
“We need to explain to our friends in the present government, ‘This is what your predecessors did. Do not go the same way as them’, so they can take that into consideration with their policies,” he said.
The move highlights the challenges facing the government, a coalition of almost 40 parties from across the political and religious spectrum that came together last month to defeat Mahinda Rajapaksa after 10 years in power.
The new administration of President Maithripala Sirisena, Mr Rajapaksa’s former health minister, has promised to reunite the country and conduct an independent investigation into allegations of war crimes by the Tamil Tigers and government forces. Both sides are accused of killing civilians, with the UN estimating as many as 40,000 were killed in the final phase of the war that ended in May 2009.
The UN launched a fresh study last year, to be released next month, after criticising the Rajapaksa government’s Lessons Learned and Reconciliation Commission for lacking “tangible results”. Mr Rajapaksa refused to allow UN investigators into the country, insisting only Sri Lankans could conduct such an inquiry.
In a speech this week to Washington’s Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera said more time was needed to set up mechanisms to deal with any recommendations from the new report.
“Unlike the previous government, we are not in a state of denial saying that violations have not happened,” he said.
“We believe such violations have happened. We are ready to ensure that those who have violated human rights in Sri Lanka will be brought to justice through such a mechanism.”
In the month since its shock election victory, the new government has embarked on a 100-day reform agenda to reverse the anti-democratic policies of the Rajapaksa government.
It has already reinstated sacked chief justice Shirani Badaranayake, impeached for refusing to support a law granting greater powers to the president’s brother, replaced contro-versial ex-military northern governor GA Chadrasiri with a respected diplomat, and this week promised to hand back an initial 400ha of an estimated 2600ha of Tamil-owned land seized by the military during the three-decade long conflict.
It is also in the process of winding back extraordinary presidential powers.
Professor Wigneswaran said his council was concerned at recent public assurances that there would be no demilitarisation of the north — a priority for the Tamil community.
“Our people have a lot of expectations and on the ground very little is being done,” he said.
“We want the international community to be aware there has been a continuous process of decimation of our people.”
The document details episodes of violence and oppression, dating from the 1956 Sinhala Only Act to the brutal final phase of the war.
