Hidden from view, Sri Lanka is trampling over the rights of its Tamil population

The government has been trying its best to silence the country’s remaining Tamils without drawing the world’s attention

EDWARD MORTIMER-Monday 11 August 2014
With all the horrors taking place in Gaza, Ukraine, Iraq, and Syria, Sri Lanka has understandably fallen off the international radar. However, what you must know is that this suits Sri Lanka’s President, Mahinda Rajapaksa, just fine.

Yet the brutal methods he has used to defeat the Tamil Tigers — which ignore the cost of civilian casualties and frequently trample on human rights — are very similar to the ones used by those currently fighting in the spotlight. They are even being admired from afar: within the last two months army and police officers in Nigeria and Pakistan have expressed interest in learning from Sri Lanka’s example.

When the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting was held in Sri Lanka last November, it brought much unwelcome publicity, and led to an international investigation of war crimes being set up by the UN Human Rights Council. That decision was obviously a victory for the government’s critics. Yet the government behaved almost as if that was what it wanted, making a series of overt and heavy-handed attempts to silence dissent at home even while the Council was in session in Geneva.

READ MORE:
THE UK NEEDS TO STOP SELLING ARMS TO ISRAEL AND OPEN ITS EYES TO THE SUFFERING CAUSED BY INACTION  

In particular, at least 60 Tamils, mainly women, were arrested in and around the northern town of Kilinochchi, which had been the Tigers’ de facto capital during the war. Two well-known Catholic activists, Ruki Fernando and Father Praveen Mahesan, went to investigate these arrests, and were themselves arrested as part of a massive security clampdown.

This led to a significant but brief international outcry: brief because Fernando and Mahesan were released unharmed after two days, followed by many (but not all) of the other detainees. Two days later, however, both were banned from leaving the country or speaking to the media. They were also forced to hand over their mobile phones and personal computers, and Fernando was roughly confronted by armed police in a Colombo street.

This time there was no international outcry, indeed no publicity at all, because friends of the pair were afraid any public move might put them in greater danger. Nor has there been any sustained campaign on behalf of the other Tamil detainees.

Sri Lanka: Heading Towards Systematic Stratocracy

By Kishok Jeyachandran -August 12, 2014

Kishok Jeyachandran

Five years on from the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka, the international community’s patience with the government in investigating gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law is exhausted.

It comes almost five years after the end of Sri Lanka’s protracted and bloody civil war—a conflict that saw the death of tens of thousands of civilians and the ‘disappearance’ of thousands more. And it comes because no one has been held accountable for any of the gross human rights abuses and serious violations of international humanitarian law committed by both sides to the conflict.

The final phase of the war was a bloodbath. As the brutal, secessionist Tamil Tigers were pushed back into a rapidly shrinking pocket of territory in the north-east, they forced more than a quarter of a million civilians to move with them and essentially serve as forced laborers and human shields. Ignoring the human misery, Sri Lankan troops launched indiscriminate attacks. More than 20,000 and maybe up to 40,000, civilians were killed in the last months of fighting and even more were injured.

Hoping to silence the ensuing domestic and international outcry, the Sri Lankan government established a Lessons Learned Reconciliation Commission (LLRC). The commission was not designed to bring accountability and its mandate, membership and conduct were all faulted. But the LLRC did conclude that the state was obliged to investigate more fully the circumstances under which violations of human rights law and the laws of war could have occurred and where such investigations uncovered wrongful conduct to prosecute the wrongdoers. It warned that a transparent legal process and strict adherence to the rule of law were prerequisites of peace and stability.

                                                                       Read More                                                       

Colombo schemes Sinhala colony at Saiva Shrine of Kanniyaa Hot Wells

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 August 2014, 13:36 GMT]
After illegally occupying the Hot Wells, a Saiva sacred site in the traditional Tamil village of Kanniyaa in the Uppu-ve’li division of the Trincomalee district, and after constructing a Buddhist Shrine at the locality, the genocidal State of Sri Lanka is now ‘developing’ a new road to connect the traditional Hindu shrine with a remote Sinhala settlement, abandoning the already existing road that links the village wtih Jaffna – Anuradhapura Road. The Colombo government is also scheming a large Sinhala colonization project along the new road in thousands of acres of public lands in the occupied country of Eezham Tamils, informed Tamil civil sources in Trincomalee told TamilNet. 

The new road will also make the traveling difficult for the Tamil residents as they will have to travel 4 kilo meters to access their facilities, compared to the old 1 km route, the sources further said. 

Seven springs, each with varying temperature, are situated close to each other at Kanniya. The local people believe that the hot wells have healing powers.

The local Saiva myths associate the place with pre-Buddhist times of the King Ravana of the Ramayana epic. 

For centuries, the Hindu population of the region used to come to this site to perform rituals to the deceased and ancestors like the Hindus in India go to Gaya and Varanasi.

A Saiva temple for Pi’l’laiyaar situated at the site and the associated mutt (resting place for pilgrims) were destroyed during anti-Tamil pogroms.

The Buddhist shrine, which has been recently built at the precincts of Kanniya Hot Wells in a a fifteen-acre land has been has a signboard giving the name of the place of worship as ‘Unuthiya Lin Rajamaha Viharaya’, meaning the ‘Royal Great Temple of the Hotwater Wells’. 

The term ‘Viharaya’ used in the board implies that a Buddhist Sangha (monastery) has been established there.

SL response to UN Inquiry shows hollowness of its HR commitments

By Ranga Jayasuriya-12/08/2014 
The current government behaves as if Sri Lanka is the only country in the world to be investigated, by the UN human rights body, over the allegations of war crime and crimes against humanity. That is however not the case. (Israel is facing a fresh UNHRC inquiry into alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in its recent military bombardment of Gaza. Earlier, both Israel and Hamas were accused by the UNHRC appointed UN fact finding mission in Gaza of targeting civilians during the 2009 Gaza war.)

What is however unique about Sri Lanka is its insular reaction to the UN inquiry, which is driven by deep seated paranoia of the ruling establishment. Israel itself refused to cooperate with the UN fact finding mission on the Gaza conflict and rejected the Goldstone report, named after the head of the panel, former President of Constitutional Court of South Africa, Richard Goldstone. However, no country, save veritable international pariahs, such as North Korea, has gone to the extreme lengths, as the incumbent government in Colombo has done, to prevent its citizens from cooperating with a UN inquiry.

The UN probe has now begun and the interviews with witnesses over the phone and Skype would commence after the 12-member investigation team, led by Sandra Beidas, sort out its paper work. The three-member panel is headed by Silvia Cartwright, former Governor General and High Court Judge of New Zealand and includes Nobel peace laureate and former Finish President Martti Ahtisaari and Asma Jehangir, former President of Pakistan’s Supreme Court Bar Association.

Government’s threats of legal action
In Colombo, paranoia and arrogance have defined the government’s reaction to the UN inquiry. Government’s threats of legal action and potential repercussions by the military forces are bound to dissuade a large swath of Wanni Tamils, the main witnesses to the humanitarian tragedy, from testifying before the panel. It could also drive cooperation from the determined members of the community into the underground and beneath the military radars. However, the fact of the matter is that evidence collected under such restrictions is bound to be overwhelmingly against the government, making its position further vulnerable.

Last week, the Tamil National Alliance offered to serve as a conduit for the witnesses who wish to share evidence with the panel. TNA MP M.A. Sumanthiran recently told crowds in Jaffna that those who wish to testify could submit evidence through the TNA. He said arrangements could be worked out to convey evidence to the war crime inquiry. However, without a large scale mobilization by the TNA or the TNA controlled Northern Provincial Council, input from the Wanni would likely to be minimal due to prevailing security concerns.

All that would lead the Diaspora elements to disproportionately influence the panel. The government ban would also keep away government allied groups, such as the EPDP and the families of missing security personnel from testifying before the inquiry. The government appears to be trying to starve the UN panel of credible information. However, the sponsors of the resolution, the US and EU are in possession of a wealth of information, including satellite imagery of the final phase of the conflict and the UN Headquarters received daily updates of casualties during the height of war from its local agencies.

However, the government continues with a misplaced strategy to sabotage and disrupt the civil society cooperation with the panel.

Earlier, Keheliya Rambukwella, the Cabinet spokesman, threatened legal action against those testifying before the UN inquiry. Last week, a meeting held in Colombo by the Right to Life Human Rights Centre in involving families of disappeared persons from the North was disrupted by pro-government demonstrators. The representatives of the European foreign missions were also invited to the meeting, which was disrupted by another NGO called “Parent collective of Disappeared Persons.”

Disruptions taking place
The orchestration of counter- demonstrations against civil society events has become part of the government strategy, aimed at curtailing whatever local cooperation with the UN inquiry. On most occasions, police tend to take the side of the government allied protestors, ordering the organizers to abandon their programmes. The intelligence agencies are monitoring the civil society organizations and on many occasions, its agents have mobilized crowds against civil society events. A series of media and civil society events were disrupted in recent weeks, including a recent media workshop for the Jaffna journalists.

However, government’s conduct has proved to be counterproductive and has only aggravated its plight.
Last week, after the meeting of the families of the disappeared Tamils was disrupted, the government blamed the victims. The external affairs ministry also accused the foreign missions of ‘targeting one particular community in the country, leading to the emergence of a pattern of potentially volatile situations and giving rise to the perpetuation of mistrust amongst communities at a sensitive juncture in the country’s history.’ However, issuing a statement, the US embassy hit back, condemning the disruption of the meeting and urging the government to enforce the rule of law and permit all citizens to exercise their most basic human rights, including freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. The embassies of France, Germany UK & Switzerland also issued a joint statement urging the Sri Lankan government to “ensure and respect freedom of assembly and expression.”

The government has succeeded in clamping down on the flow of information on those frequent violations of freedom of expression and assembly, largely by coaxing and coercing a large segment of mainstream media to practice self censorship on these incidents. This has kept the average local folks oblivious to the increasingly suffocating environment they are condemned to live. However, those who matter in the foreign missions, whose input to their foreign ministries would shape the nature of the future international intervention in Sri Lanka, have their eyes wide open. They are closely watching.

The Sri Lankan Government is exposing to them, the hollowness of its commitment to human rights.
[Photo: Govt backed anti UN protest in sri Lanka]

Turncoats Of LTTE & Traitors In Media

| by Pearl Thevanayagam

(August 11, 2014, Bradford UK, Sri Lanka Guardian) The former procurer of LTTE weapons Kumaran Pathmanathan is now a benevolent custodian of an orphanage in Wanni and is succoured by none other than Gotabhaya Rajapaksa. Hearts bleed at the thought of this terrorist turned humanitarian.

Turncoats of LTTE & Traitors in Media by Thavam

Prioritising Truth in Post-War Sri Lanka

“How do we keep the past alive without becoming its prisoner? How do we forget it without risking its repetition in the future?”

• by Bhavani Fonseka 
• - on 08/12/2014
• • 
    

Ariel Dorfman, ‘Death and the Maiden’ -

The Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman poses these questions in his play Death and the Maiden after witnessing massive human rights violations in his home country and alludes to a delicate balance needed in terms of the past, present and future. The Chilean National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation documented violations and published a report which recognised past events. Subsequent action in Chile held to account perpetrators and introduced much needed reform. The delicate balance was achieved in Chile through several state and non-state initiatives. Truth telling was a critical part of it.

Prioritising Truth in Post-War Sri Lanka by Thavam

Closed-door talks with Ramaphosa was about coal?

Tuesday, 12 August 2014

The president held a one-to-one discussion, without any official present, with South African deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa during his recent visit to Sri Lanka, the media reported. However, not a single media institution could say as to what they had discussed at this closed-door meeting. Instead, what they did was to speculate, that they had discussed the ethnic issue in Sri Lanka.

However, the matters they had discussed are now being revealed one by one.

Cyril Ramaphosa is a wealthy South African businessman. After the African National Congress (ANC) gained power in 1994, the Nelson Mandela government gave Ramaphosa’s businesses, especially mining, every state backing to end the trade monopoly enjoyed until then by the whites. Ramaphosa is the executive chairman of Shanduka Group of South Africa and also the leading investor in the resources sector, energy sector, real estate, banking, insurance, and telecoms (SEACOM).

The wealthiest person in South Africa, his assets are worth 675 million US dollars, according to Forbes.

It is now revealed that Ramaphosa had given the order for the notorious Marikana massacre, in which 34 mine workers were murdered and 78 others wounded on 16 August 2012. Ramaphosa is also the best friend of one of the most corrupt presidents, Jacob Zuma, who was jeered at by the South African people at the funeral of Nelson Mandela.

Due to the close ties the South African government is having with the Global Tamil Fourm, the most powerful Tamil Diaspora organization, president Mahinda Rajapaksa is plotting, through Ramaphosa, to influence the Tamil Diaspora through the South African government, to ensure that the Tamil people boycott the next presidential election.

The president has implemented this conspiracy by granting the coal supplying tender to Swiss Singapore Overseas Enterprises, a Singaporean company having connections with Ramaphosa, by not submitting to the technical committee the tender by Nobel Resources, owned by Ravi Wijeratne and which had up to then supplied coal to Sri Lanka.

Losing Battles but Winning Wars: How the Sri Lankan Government is Crushing Dissent

Jean-Marc Ferré/UN Photo

By Fred Carver | August 9, 2014

To many external observers the Government of Sri Lanka appeared to lose the plot somewhat during the recent UN Human Rights Council (HRC) session. A series of overt and heavy handed attempts to silence dissent, even as the session was discussing a resolution censuring Sri Lanka, appeared to illustrate precisely the point that Sri Lanka’s critics were making and guarantee the passing of a resolution calling for an international investigation in to war crimes committed in Sri Lanka.

However, it is my view that these actions were not simply strategic errors on the part of the government, nor evidence of their indifference or imperviousness to the impact they were having in Geneva. Instead, the Government of Sri Lanka’s actions should be considered as a deliberate part of a long-term strategic plan. These actions gained them considerable ground in their long term objectives of pacifying the Tamil majority areas of Sri Lanka by force, silencing internal dissent, and building a lasting regime with the Rajapaksa family at its apex – in return for which, the loss of the HRC resolution was considered a price worth paying.

My thesis is that the Government of Sri Lanka, or sections within the ruling family, conceded that the resolution could not be prevented but nevertheless felt that the success of the resolution was damaging their interests. They therefore set out to ensure that it could never happen again, and that the potential positive impacts of the resolution would be negated.

To read the report click here.

Losing Battles but Winning Wars How the Sri Lankan Government Is by Thavam

27 intelligence officers following BASL president without his knowledge

SLB–12/08/2014  
Western Province Senior DIG Anura Senanayake told court on 11 August that 27 intelligence officers have been deployed to ensure the security of BASL president Mr. Upul Jayasuriya without revealing their identity, Asian Mirror reported.

Lawyers who appeared on behalf of Jayasuriya told that the Police should reveal their identity to clear misunderstandings over the matter. Earlier Mr. Jayasuriya had objected to DIG Anura Senanayake being in charge of the investigation in threats to Mr. Jayasuriya.

DIG Anura Senanayake is known for his pro Rajapaksa stances, told court that he he could easily be able to secure over 300,000 preferential votes from the Colombo district if he contested an election, reported theDaily Mirror. Further he told the court that the people would also endorse him to serve the Police Department even for 100 years if he lived to reach that age.

Anura Senanayake is certain he can poll 

300,000 votes if he contests!

Tuesday, 12 August 2014 

“I am a very popular person among the Colombo people. If I contest, I can very easily obtain 300,000 votes. I am a person like that but, the president of the Bar Association says he cannot trust me. I am very sorry that Mr. Upul Jayasuriya has thought very lowly about me,” said DIG in charge of Colombo Anura Senanayake at no: 01 courtroom to Coombo chief magistrate Gihan Pilapitiya today (11).

He said so while making a lengthy speech, to the laughter of the lawyers, before the magistrate in response to notice issued to him to appear before the court. Thumping the desk before him, the DIG said further before the chief magistrate,

“I am experienced in court matters. Magistrate courts, high courts, appeal courts, supreme courts all are familiar to me. These lawyers, judges all know how much I am committed to my work. I am very sad when there are charges that a person like me cannot be trusted. I admit that a motorcycle had ambushed Mr. Upul Jayasuriya’s vehicle. I deployed 26 of my best men to investigate. I will somehow arrest those responsible and produce theme before court. When the Bar Association charged that they cannot trust me, I felt sad, wrote a two page letter to the IGP and withdrew from the case.”

At this juncture, presidents counsel Thilak Marapana and Srinath Perera, who represent the interests of the BASL president, said that without beating around the bush, that what they want is the deployment of two policemen for Mr. Jayasuriya’s security. Rejecting that request, Anura Senanayake said that he cannot do that, but it was up to law and order ministry secretary Nanda Mallawarachchi to do so. Since he is overseas at present, the senior DIG said, he could not say for certain how long it would take to provide that protection.

Specail thanks - BASL secretary, Attorney at Law  Ajith Pathirana

USD 350 Mn. Mattala airport caters to only 50 passengers a day – UNP

With that amount rail tracks could have been built for the benefit of 40,000 commuters a day

by Zacki Jabbar-August 12, 2014

The government had spent USD 350 million on the first stage of the Mattala International Airport(MIA) which serviced fewer than 50 passengers a day, but it had failed to raise the same amount of funds needed for laying an additional railway line  for the benefit of around 40,000 commuters on the costal and main lines during peak hours, the UNP charged yesterday.

Parliamentarian R. Yogarajan,  who was part of a five-member team of UNP MPs who visited the Panadura Railway station yesterday to assess the difficulties faced by  passengers told The Island that according to the Additional GMR Amitha Donawela and other senior Railway Department officials whom they had met at the end of their fact finding mission, a third line was required to service around 40,000 commuters during peak hours on both the coastal and  main lines from Colombo to Kalutara and beyond and Colombo to Gampaha and beyond.

The UNP team comprised MPs Ajith P. Perera, Eran Wickrememeratne, Harsha de Silva, Ajith Manapperuma and R. Yogarajan.

According to the officials a third track would cost around USD 350 million, Yogarajan said asking why the Rajapaksa government could not find the funds to provide a proper transport service, But, it no qualms in getting into debt to construct prestige projects as opposed to people friendly projects, the UNP MP said.

"Ajith Perera, Eran and I travelled in the Class III compartment of one train, while Harsha and Ajith Manapperuma boarded another, since all of us were unable to get into the same train due to congestion that it was difficult to find even standing space. I had to travel on the footboard for about two kilometres before managing to move in with the greatest difficulty. I also observed the saree of a female passenger who was standing on the footboard coming off and a male passenger next holding on to the falling saree and helping tuck it into her skirt. This is the plight of those who travel in our congested trains during peak hours."

Yogarajan said that they had also observed that the toilets at the Panadura Railway Station had no ventilation, no lights and was in a filthy condition, making it impossible to be used.

The officials had, he noted, explained that they were unable to even increase the number of compartments in the trains as a short term measure due to an acute shortage of funds.

The General Manager of Railways was expected to meet them but on reaching the Ministry premises they were informed that he had fallen from the steps yesterday and had been admitted to hospital, Yogarajan said. "The officials were clueless of our visit. But, a group of casual employees were standing outside and hooting and shouting slogans against us. We gathered that those taking part in the demonstration had been told that unless they protested, they would not be confirmed in service."

video: No relief from government – Badulla ‘People’s Voice’

TUESDAY, 12 AUGUST 2014 14:
They have not received any relief from thegovernment or NGOs say people in Rideemaliyadda area in Badulla. They say news regarding the drought in Anurdhapura, 
Polonnaruwa and Hambantota areas are published in the media but the suffering people in Badulla are confronted with is never highlighted by any media institution.

This is how they expressed the difficulty they undergo to find drinking water.

Nirupama gets 3 bowsers of water while Colombo is parched

Sri Lankan tribe spurns government sponsorship
Members of Sri Lanka's indigenous Vedda community celebrate the International Day of the World's Indigenous People in Dambana.


August 12, 2014

The leaders of Sri Lanka's indigenous Vedda people have rejected sponsorship for its annual celebration, telling the government to use the money instead to educate children and to feed its people.

The community gathered in Dambana on Saturday to celebrate the International Day of the World's Indigenous People. In past years, the celebration has been sponsored by the government, but the clan chose to turn down its subsidy this year.

Vedda Chieftain Uruwarigaye Wanniyala Eththo told reporters that the state funds spent on the ceremony could better be used for community development projects and the education of underprivileged children.

"I felt it is a waste and therefore did not accept any funds from the government," Wanniyala told Sri Lanka's The Nation newspaper.

Wanniyala said the biggest issue facing the Veddas - who are among the oldest indigenous communities in Sri Lanka - is the loss of their ancestral lands.

The community has frequently clashed with the government over the use of forest land. An agreement to allow the Veddas limited use of the forests for hunting has not been implemented successfully, the chieftain said.
"We have lost our traditional way of living. We are a community that used to move from one forest to another but now we have to stay in one place," he said.

Wanniyala said that as its cultural identity has been stripped away, the majority of Veddans live in extreme poverty and survive off odd jobs and charity. There are about 500,000 Veddans in Sri Lanka, he said.

"The forest is part and parcel of our lives. The forest was the home, school, temple, hospital and everything," community member Wanniyala Eththo told ucanews.com. "When we were young we went to the forests with our fathers and learned about the land. But today our children are not allowed into the forest since laws have been imposed against entering it.

"The only living example for our country's history is the indigenous community. No government has thought about this. This will lead to the fast extinction of our community," he said.

Cultural and Art Affairs Minister T.B. Ekanayake told ucanews.com that the government was willing to reallocate money meant for the celebration to community development projects and was waiting to hear from Vedda leaders.

Kamala Atharagalla, a researcher on indigenous communities in Sri Lanka, said it was important for the government to preserve the Vedda's cultural identity.

"It is important that their language be protected and at least taught in the schools where the children from this community attend," she said.

Drought & famine only for the underprivileged .

TUESDAY, 12 AUGUST 2014 20:31There is a danger of water sources getting dried up due to the drought experienced in several areas including Badulla, Monaragala, Kurunegala, Puttalam, Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa. As a result the people in the areas are severely inconvenienced and they find it difficult to carry out their daily chores.

The campaign to the Uva Provincial Council election has commenced meanwhile and the drought has become a main topic of the politicians.

However,it is a misery for the public but is not of any concern for the privilege. The photograph show masses in the areas waiting for a water bowser

Photograph courtesy 'Ada'

Tsunami aid was over-billed, court rules

Aug 11, 2014 

A P.E.I. company over-billed and misled the Canadian government while working on a multi-million dollar contract overseas to provide aid to Sri Lanka after the 2004 tsunami, the P.E.I. Supreme Court has ruled.

'Its representations were purposefully misleading'- Justice Gordon Campbell

The Canadian Agro Sustainability Partnership won a contract from the Canadian International Development Agency to provide aid to Sri Lanka after the tsunami.

CASP is an umbrella group representing about 50 Island firms and organizations on a not-for-profit basis, headed up by Doug MacArthur. In 2006 MacArthur told CBC News that rebuilding efforts in Sri Lanka offered great opportunities for P.E.I. companies.

CASP's contract with CIDA, was worth $3 million. But a 2007 audit found CASP was marking up salaries of its field staff by multiples of up to 10, and charging those amounts to CIDA.

The audit disallowed $1.4 million in CASP billings and that figure was later revised down to $750,000. After CIDA suspended payments in January 2008, CASP filed a lawsuit for lost revenue for the Sri Lankawork and for other CIDA contracts in China and Ukraine from whichCASP claimed it was shut out.

MacArthur told the court that payroll mark-ups are standard business practice.

In his 115-page written decision Justice Gordon Campbell wrote, "CASPwas not only less than forthcoming [to CIDA] … its representations were purposefully misleading … and failed to give full, frank and honest disclosure."

He ordered CASP to pay back $245,526.41, plus interest and court costs.

Campbell noted that CASP did good humanitarian work in Sri Lanka.  According to the company's website, CASP has recently completed work in Russia and has current projects in Eastern Europe.

MacArthur declined the opportunity to make a comment to CBC News, but said CASP will have a statement to make in the future.

Gaza war, Israeli military operations & protracted occupation

By Navi Pillay-12/08/2014   
The hostilities between Israel and Hamas, and other armed groups in Gaza, have raged now for almost a month, causing immeasurable suffering and damage. The current tenuous ceasefire offers a critical chance for the parties to move from violence to peace.

Casualties

Alongside others in the international community, I have repeatedly stated to all parties that civilians must not be targeted, and must be protected. Yet, as of 5 August, some 1,350 civilian Palestinians, including more than 400 children, had been killed, and thousands injured, since the launch of the Israeli military operation on the night of 7 July. For Palestinian civilians caught in the midst of the hostilities, there is little protection or refuge to be found.

Israeli civilians face a barrage of rockets and mortars launched from Gaza, causing fear and insecurity. Since 7 July, three civilians have been killed in Israel and dozens more wounded.

International law

I have consistently condemned the indiscriminate rocket fire from Gaza into Israel, and I have been equally clear that military assets should not be located in densely populated areas. However, I reiterate that actions by one party do not absolve the other party of its obligations under international law.

International law requires application of the principles of distinction between civilians and combatants, and between civilian objects and military objectives; proportionality; and precautions in attack. Any attacks in violation of these principles, on civilians, homes, schools and hospitals, must be condemned, and may amount to war crimes.

Context of occupation

The current conflict in Gaza cannot accurately be viewed in isolation from repeated Israeli military operations in Gaza, or from the protracted occupation.

In 1967, Security Council resolution 242 affirmed that fulfilment of the principles of the United Nations Charter requires the withdrawal of Israel’s armed forces from territories occupied, and a just settlement of the refugee problem.

That resolution – like many subsequent resolutions relating to the Occupied Palestinian Territory – has been ignored. Many of those trapped in Gaza today are refugees and their descendants. Repeated hostilities, occupation, the suffocating effects of the illegal blockade in place since 2007 and of the access restricted areas imposed by Israel, have made life in Gaza virtually unsustainable.

The severe effects of the occupation in Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, on human rights, including the right to self-determination, must be addressed.

Humanitarian situation

The humanitarian situation in Gaza is at breaking point. Thousands of homes have been destroyed and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been displaced. People need water, food, shelter, electricity, and above all safety. However, hospitals and ambulances, schools, including even United Nations premises, have not been protected in this conflict.

Hospitals, and personnel engaged in searching for, transporting and caring for wounded and sick civilians, must be safeguarded. The very specific protective status of these locations must be respected at all times. In addition, civilian objects such as homes and schools are prima facie not legitimate targets, and all necessary precautions should be taken to protect civilian lives.

Accountability

It is a terrible failure for humanity not to act to avert yet another devastating crisis in Gaza – one that has now superseded, in casualties and duration, the Israeli military operations of 2008/2009. The need for investigation and accountability raised then, and after the 2012 military operation, have not been met. A lasting solution to this protracted conflict must be found.

The Commission of Inquiry established by the Human Rights Council last month will help to establish clarity regarding acts committed by all parties, thus beginning to address accountability issues related to the current hostilities in Gaza, as well as to the West Bank including East Jerusalem. Its conclusions and recommendations, which will be presented in March 2015, should be carefully considered and followed with appropriate action.

The 2009 Fact-Finding Mission on Gaza noted the need for the International Criminal Court to address the situation. Such a recommendation is still relevant today. The ICC’s role is to end impunity and render justice in cases where national authorities have been unable or unwilling to do so.

Conclusion

Mr. President,

Over the years there have been constant efforts to evade the binding nature of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory. But there can be no exceptions to these legal norms. They ensure that our societies maintain respect for common values and human dignity – indeed, human life.

There can be no true security without justice and respect for human rights. Adherence to international humanitarian law and international human rights law, and ensuring accountability for violations, are essential pre-requisites for any lasting peace.

For the sake of both Palestinians and Israelis, the parties to the conflict, the Security Council, the General Assembly and individual States must act to bring this dreadful conflict to an end. The Secretary General has strongly called for talks, to lay the groundwork for a durable ceasefire and for comprehensive negotiations on the underlying issues – including an end to the illegal blockade of Gaza and to almost five decades of occupation. This is indeed the only hope for peace.
[Photo:Pro-Palestinian protesters shout slogans and hold a protest in Israel]
[Speech delivered by Navi Pillay at the Informal Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly on the situation in Gaza/
6 August 2014]
OHCHR