On The Situation In The North & East: An Open Letter To UN HR Chief

By Brian Senewiratne –July 12, 2015

Dr. Brian Senewiratne

12-Jul-15
His Excellency Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Palais des Nations
CH-1211 Geneva 10,
Switzerland

Excellency,

Sri Lanka: The situation in the North and East

I am a Sinhalese from the majority community in Sri Lanka. My cousin, Chandrika Kumaratunga was a former President. I am one of a very few Sinhalese, in or outside Sri Lanka, to campaign for the cause of the Tamil people to live with equality, dignity and safety in the country of their birth. I have done so since 1948 when a million Plantation Tamils (one seventh of the total population of the country at that time) were disenfranchised and decitizenised in one of the most outrageous acts of political savagery in any country..

In 1956 I strongly opposed the discrimination against the Indigenous Tamils when my uncle, Prime Minister S.W.R.D Bandaranaike, changed the Official Language from English to Sinhalese only.

In 1972, then as a Senior Lecturer in Medicine in Sri Lanka, I strongly objected to Prime Minister Sirima Bandaranaike, my aunt, when she set the bar higher for Tamil students to enter the University because it was clearly discriminatory. I was witness to this discrimination

Over the next 4 decades I have addressed scores of meetings across the world to highlight the deteriorating human rights of the Tamil people. The back cover of my recently published book Sexual Violence of Tamils by the Armed Forces which I enclose, gives more details.

I also enclose one of the nine dvds recorded by me, “Sri Lanka. Genocide, Crimes against Humanity, Violation of International Law” which details the war crimes committed which have to be investigated.

I am very concerned about the plight of the Tamils in the North and East despite a change of Government in Sri Lanka from Mahinda Rajapaksa to Maithripala Sirisena on 8 January 2015. Although this has resulted in major changes in the Sinhalese South, I am far from convinced that it has made the slightest difference to the Tamils in the North and East – the homeland of the Tamils.

To summarise my concerns:                   Read More