THE GENEVA RESOLUTION AND POLITICS: A NOTE OF CAUTION
- - on 10/10/2015
The recent Human Rights Council resolution on Sri Lanka is a remarkable document. Crafted in the immediate aftermath of the devastating OISL Report on Sri Lanka whose central recommendation was that a ‘special hybrid court’ be established in Sri Lanka, and despite some hiccups during negotiations, a resolution eventually acceptable to a wide range of parties found uncontested passage through the Council. The government’s eventual co-sponsorship of the resolution signaled their full acceptance of its language. In exchange for its support, the Sri Lankan government was rewarded with text that congratulated it, and approvingly recognized many of its voluntary commitments. Moreover, the resolution offered the government the interpretive space to claim to its domestic audience that it had overcome a challenging trial in Geneva. On the Tamil side of the equation, the moderates of the Tamil National Alliance who roundly defeated their extremist opponents in recent elections also welcomed the resolution on account of the strength of its content.
