7 Responses to “UN Resolutions meant to hound Western-targeted nations : Sri Lanka-Israel comparison”

1. Indrajith Says:
   March 12th, 2014 at 6:31 pm

   Some more valuable advise by a true son of Mother Lanka!

   THE DISCOURSE ON GENEVA – 2014GENEVA TRAP: Further steps private citizens can take to help the Motherland Dharshan Weerasekera The much-anticipated US-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka has now been tabled at the Human Rights Council and there are a few surprises, two in particular: First, it doesn’t call for international investigations, something that many people expected it to do; and second, so far only five countries have signed on to it — US, UK, Montenegro, Macedonia and Mauritius — a far cry from the solid bloc of Western countries that many felt would back the resolution from the very start. The content of the draft has set Eelamists around the world howling in protest, and scrambling to come up with ploys and gambits to try and toughen up the resolution. As part of these efforts, a letter has been sent to the UN, signed by Bishop Desmond Tutu, Bishop Rayappu Joseph, R. Sampanthan, C. V. Wigneswaran and a number of others, calling on the Human Rights Council to initiate a “Commission of Inquiry” on Sri Lanka. Among other things, the letter says, “We, concerned individuals and organizations from around the world, urge the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to use their March 2014 sessions to pass a resolution that will include a commitment to an independent investigation in the form of a Commission of Inquiry in Sri Lanka.” (“Tutu to UN: Sri Lanka needs healing, Mail and Guardian, March 5, 2014.)” Thankfully, the Council has so far shown no inclination to accept the above-mentioned types of advice. Of course, it goes without saying that any attempt by the Council to initiate “Commissions of Inquiry,” or for that matter any type of inquiry against a member without that member’s consent, and especially without giving that member a chance to respond officially, and on an equal footing with its critics, to allegations made against it, is a blatant violation of the Council’s own “Charter,” along with the UN Charter, and the Council is no doubt aware of this. Sri Lanka, however, is not out of the woods yet. The vote on the resolution is scheduled for the 27th, and a lot could happen before then. It is therefore crucial that Sri Lankans remain vigilant. With that in mind, I believe there are two counter-measures in particular that private citizens as well as organizations consisting of friends of Sri Lanka can take in the coming weeks to help protect this country’s interests, and keep the Eelamists off-balance and sweating. The two measures are: one, write letters to the UN, (similar to the one written by Mssrs. Tutu, Joseph, Sampanthan et al.) asking that Commissions of Inquiry be initiated within the Council itself, to probe possible malfeasance, including manufacture of evidence, obfuscating facts, and other irregularities, in the reports or materials on which the Human Rights High Commissioner has relied when calling for international investigations on Sri Lanka. Steps should then be taken to have these letters published in leading newspapers and journals, both local and foreign, so as to gain maximum publicity for them, just as Mssrs. Tutu, Joseph, et al., Sampanthan, have done with their own letter. And two, file petitions with Sri Lanka’s Appeals Court or Supreme Court (as applicable) asking the Court to compel the Government to initiate Commissions of Inquiry to probe possible incidents of ethnic-cleansing of Sinhalese and Muslims from the Northern Province, not just during the 30-year civil war when the LTTE was in de facto control of the region, but going back to Independence, if not earlier. Allow me to explain the two measures in a bit more detail. 1) Petitions to the Human Rights Council The High Commissioner’s report of February 24, 2014 (A/HRC/25/23) relies on two primary sources of “evidence” as the basis for its call for international war crimes investigations against Sri Lanka: The Secretary General’s Panel of Experts report of March 2011 (POE), and the Channel 4 videos. My idea that a letter or letters be handed over to the Human Rights Council requesting that the Council appoint Commissions of Inquiry to investigate irregularities, including possible manufacturing of evidence, deliberate obfuscation of facts, and so on, in the aforementioned sources. It should be emphasized that the POE, the Channel 4 videos, and any other “new evidence” the High Commissioner might have in her possession, has never been filed officially with the Council, and Sri Lanka has never been given a chance to respond to any such material officially. I shall, however, leave aside this glaring problem with the High Commissioner’s use of such materials, and focus instead on some secondary problems. I give below just two of these latter problems – one for the POE and one for the C4 videos—that I believe can, and should, be pursued by way of Commissions of Inquiry. a) POE report The POE levels three charges against the Government in respect of alleged violations of humanitarian law: indiscriminate shelling, shelling of hospitals, and depriving civilians in the conflict-zone of humanitarian aid. My focus here is on the shelling of hospitals. The POE relies on satellite photos in order to show bomb-damage, and thereby to “prove” that the alleged shelling happened. The POE identifies the hospitals by name, and also gives the exact dates on which the alleged shelling took place. Professor Gerald H. Peiris, the well-known and highly-regarded Sri Lankan scholar, as part of a personal and informal research project, has uncovered a startling discrepancy in the POE’s “evidence.” In an article, titled, “Encountering ‘Death Counts’ in the Final Phase of the Eelam War” published in The Island, he says that he examined satellite photos of the hospitals identified by the POE, photos taken before the dates the POE says the alleged shelling took place, and also photos taken immediately after those dates, and that those photos show no discernable damage to the locations in question. If he is correct, it means that the photos depicting damage used by the POE were not taken on the days when the POE says they were taken, and this raises the distinct possibility that the POE has deliberately manipulated the evidence. Professor Peiris admits that his attempts at sleuthing in regard to this particular matter are merely an “amateur exercise,” but offers the following conclusion, which is what is relevant for the present discussion: “While not claiming any expertise in the field of satellite image interpretation, the impression I gained from this amateur exercise of verification is that there is “credible evidence” to warrant an impartial inquiry into the credibility of the satellite image evidence cited in the Darusman Report (POE). I am, of course, conscious of the possibility that with the required expertise available to the government of Sri Lanka, the evidence claimed by the UNSG Panel of Experts has already been placed under careful scrutiny.” (The Island, February 7, 2014) My point is this: if, as Professor Peiris suggests, the Government with its extensive resources is well-placed to investigate the above matter more fully, how much better situated is the Human Rights Council, with the entire record of proceedings of the POE at its disposal, and access to far more extensive databases containing satellite images of the relevant period, to conduct such a probe? b) Channel 4 videos The primary problem with the Channel 4 videos is that, even if one were to suppose for a moment that the videos are authentic, it is not clear that the offences depicted in them can be used to ground a case for war crimes against the Government, as opposed, say, to individual offenders. In order to ground a case against the Government, it is necessary to establish “Command Responsibility,” and it is unclear this can be done in regard to the acts depicted in the videos. Some of the difficulties in trying to tie the acts depicted in the videos to the Government have been pointed out by one of the experts consulted by a UN Special Rapporteur—Mr. Philip Alston—in the latter’s quest to verify the authenticity of one of the videos. Jeff S. Spivack, the expert in question, an American forensic multimedia analyst, says this: “Of course, there is no way to confirm solely from this recording the identity of the potential victims or the shooters. Neither whether the shooters were actually Sri Lanka military members as opposed to Tamils dressed in Sri Lanka military uniforms, nor whether the potential victims were Tamils or instead innocent victims of another ethnic group can be determined from this recording. (“Appendix to Technical Note prepared by the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Philip Alston, in relation to the authenticity of the Channel 4 videotape.) So, that is an assessment made available to a UN Special Rapporteur, and we must presume that the High Commissioner has had access to such assessments all along. And yet, she has used the Channel 4 videos as one of the main pillars of her case for war crimes against the Government! I want to focus here, however, on a somewhat different problem that has been pointed out in regard to the videos. The Daily News of February 28, 2014, reports that Lord Naseby, the Conservative Peer, has made a statement in the British Parliament, where he says that the witnesses used in the Channel 4 videos are known to be LTTE operatives. The article says, “Conservative peer Lord Naseby has asserted that “conclusive evidence” had emerged, that so-called witnesses to alleged war crimes appearing in the Channel 4 videos were “fully paid-up members of the Tamil Tigers.” (“Channel 4 witnesses, known LTTE’ers-Lord Naseby,” Daily News, February 28, 2014) In my view, it is unreasonable to suppose that a person with the prestige and status of a Lord Naseby, a Peer of the Realm, a British aristocrat, will make a statement to the effect that Channel 4’s witnesses are LTTE stooges, unless he had very good evidence to back up his claims. If Lord Naseby has access to such evidence, there’s no reason that the High Commissioner should not have access to such evidence, or be unaware of the existence of such evidence, which raises the distinct possibility of deliberate malfeasance on her part in relying so heavily on the Channel 4 videos for her case against Sri Lanka. Again, this is a perfect subject for a Commission of Inquiry. 2) Petitions to Sri Lanka’s courts My idea is that Sri Lankan citizens petition the Appeals Court or the Supreme Court (invoking either writ jurisdiction or inherent jurisdiction, as applicable) to ask the Government to initiate Commissions of Inquiry into possible incidents of ethnic-cleansing of Sinhalese and Muslims from the Northern Province. One of the primary claims that the Eelamists and their friends are trying to perpetuate, particularly in Western countries, is that Sri Lanka’s Northern Province is under veritable “occupation” by Sinhala forces, i.e. that the Province is “militarized,” that Tamil lands are being systematically confiscated, and so on. For instance, in the High Commissioner’s report (A/HRC/25/23) there is repeated reference the Northern Province being “militarized,” that land in that province is being subjected to “compulsory acquisition,” and so on. Meanwhile, in an op-ed published in the New York Times a few days prior to the start of the present sessions of the Human Rights Council, Louise Arbour, the former Human Rights High Commissioner and I believe the current head of the International Crisis Group, says the following: “Since the government’s crushing defeat of the rebels, the predominantly Tamil northern province has been under de facto military occupation, with widespread reports of serious rights violations against the civilian population.” (“Let the UN unmask the criminals of Sri Lanka’s war,” New York Times, February 28, 2014.) To repeat, I feel there is a concerted effort by the Eelamists and their friends to portray the Northern Province as a region under “occupation.” Why? I believe there is only one reason for this, and that is to lay the groundwork for the Eelamists to demand “self-determination,” since “occupation” and subjugation by alien forces is one of the accepted criteria that can justify a demand for “self-determination” under international law. In my view, ethnic-cleansing can be considered under two heads: direct ethnic-cleansing, i.e. where an ethnic group is chased out of an area by explicit threat of death or other physical harm; and “constructive” ethnic-cleansing, i.e. where members of an ethnic group are driven out, “encouraged” to leave, by making their lives generally unpleasant and difficult. Naturally, this latter happens over an extended period of time. My point is this: If it can be established that Eelamists of the past, through acts of commission or omission as sketched above, have denuded the Northern Province of its Sinhalese and Muslim inhabitants, it will provide a very powerful legal argument to forestall any demand for “self-determination” by the present lot of Eelamists, because of the universally recognized legal principle that, in order to seek succor of the law, “one’s own hands must be clean.” So, to repeat, my idea is that Sri Lankan citizens ask the Government to initiate Commissions of Inquiry into these matters? With respect to direct ethnic-cleansing carried out in the Northern Province, the classic example is the LTTE’s expulsion of all Muslims from that Province in October 1990. (I shall turn to this in a moment.) With respect to constructive ethnic-cleansing, however, to my knowledge, (and I would be happy to be corrected), it is difficult to make a clear-cut case, at least with the information and analysis available at present. So, my question is this, “Why can’t the Government initiate a Commission of Inquiry into this matter to try and uncover the relevant facts, if they exist?” If such facts exist, they can be taken before the world, to unmask once and for all the true face of the present lot of Eelamists, along with the true nature of their “cause.” I shall, however, close by citing some observations made in a report by the International Crisis Group, about the expulsion of Muslims from the Northern Province in 1990, an incident of direct ethnic-cleansing about which there is absolutely no dispute. I believe it is essential that Sri Lankans continue to place such evidence before the world. If nothing else, it will hopefully remind foreign religious “leaders,” current, as well as former heads of the Human Rights Council, heads of international NGO’s purportedly dedicated to human rights, and others, who seem inclined to support the present batch of Eelamists, about the types of characters with whom they have chosen to join hands. Here’s what the relevant report of the International Crisis Group (a group, by the way, headed at present by none other than Louise Arbour!) says: “Without any warning, in the third week of October 1990, LTTE cadres went from village to village in the Northern Province, announcing over loudspeakers that Muslims had 48 hours to leave LTTE-held territory or face reprisals. In Jaffna, Muslims were given only two hours to leave, and permitted to take just 150 rupees ($1.40) with them. In other areas they fled with just their clothes, and a little money.” (Sri Lanka’s Muslims: Caught in the Cross-fire, Asia Report No. 134 – May 29, 2009, International Crisis Group, p.7) Dharshan Werasekera is an Attorney-at-Law. He is the author of, The UN’s relentless pursuit of Sri Lanka, and the need for effective counter-measures. – See more at: http://www.dailynews.lk/features/geneva-trap-further-steps-private-citizens-can-take-help-motherland#sthash.vuqBerdx.dpuf

2. Indrajith Says:
   March 12th, 2014 at 6:34 pm

   Another very important announce by HE the President of Sri Lanka, publisehd in the Island today!

   Muslim, Sinhala IDPs’ right to return to NP should be recognised – President
   March 12, 2014, 9:40 pm

   By Shamindra Ferdinando

   President Rajapaksa

   President Mahinda Rajapaksa early this week declared that since the vast majority of internally displaced Tamil people in the Northern Province had been resettled, it was now the responsibility of the government to resettle the Sinhalese and the Muslims chased away by the LTTE.

   President Rajapaksa emphasised that the right of all those evicted by terrorists at gunpoint more than 20 years ago to return should be recognised.

   The President was addressing a propaganda rally at Ratmalana Railway grounds on Monday (March 10) in support of those contesting the Colombo district on the UPFA ticket.

   In an obvious reference to the ongoing attempt to haul Sri Lanka before an international war crimes tribunal, President Rajapaksa said that the release of child soldiers had been conveniently forgotten. The government hadn’t received the appreciation it deserved for the swift release of child combatants, the President said, explaining the speedy rehabilitation and release of combatants.

   The President said that society would provide a conducive environment to those returning to civilian life better than detention facilities.

   President Rajapaksa said no one could undermine his administration as long as the people were with it.

   Jaffna Security Forces Commander, Major General Udaya Perera recently briefed Agnes Asekenye-Oonyu, Head of the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) on the situation at open welfare centres in Jaffna and the ongoing resettlement project.

   Maj. Gen. Perera told The Island that the LTTE had driven people of all three communities out of the Jaffna peninsula during the conflict. The Sinhalese were chased out in the 1980s, the Muslims in 1990 and the Tamils during Operation Riviresa, which regain Jaffna in late 1995. Although the peninsula was brought under government administration in 1996, those the LTTE had driven away had not been able to return, the Major General said.

   Major General Perera assured the UN official Sri Lanka’s commitment to resettle the war displaced as soon as possible.

   Defence Ministry sources told The Island that the return of about 30 Sinhala families to Navatkuly close to Jaffna had prompted the US Embassy to dispatch its political officer, Michael A. Ervin, to inquire into the circumstances under which they had arrived there. Sources said that the families residing at Navatkuly were among those forced to flee the peninsula at the onset of hostilities in the 1980s. According to the 1981 Census, there had been 19,334 Sinhalese in Northern Province, comprising the administrative districts of Jaffna, Mullaitivu, Kilinochchi, Vavuniya and Mannar. The majority of them had lived in the Jaffna peninsula and owned property at the time hostilities erupted.

   Ministry sources said that the natural growth of a particular community too, should be taken into consideration before resettlement of those driven out of the Northern Province got underway.

3. Ananda-USA Says:
   March 12th, 2014 at 10:40 pm

   The United States was also the PRIMARY BARRIER to early EMANCIPATION of the native population of South Africa from the from Apartheid Boer rule.

   EVERY TIME the issue was raised in International Fora, primarily at the UN, the United States exercised its VETO as a member of the UN Security Council to DEFEAT it and Protect the Apartheid South African Government, even as that regime frantically pursued a nuclear weapons program to acquire unassailable military power to perpetuate its hold on that country and its native people.

   These SHAMEFUL actions of the United States, that few seem to be aware of now, and fewer still hold the US responsible, delayed the downfall of the Apartheid system by perhaps FIFTY years.

   There were several reasons for that SHAMEFUL HYPOCRITICAL RACIST POLICY beyond pure racism in support of “white people” over “black people”: the military alliance to protect the maritime highway around the Cape of Good Hope, the economic base in Africa to perpetuate the exploitation of Africa’s invaluable natural resources, and most importantly, the access to minerals and ores critical to the US military industry, such as industrial diamonds and gold, chemical process catalysts such as platinum, chromium, and vanadium, and rich ores containing fissile isotopes of uranium and thorium used to manufacture not only nuclear weapons, but also fuel to power nuclear power plants.

   This support for Apartheid System in South Africa is a SHAMEFUL LEGACY of the United States that today preaches Human Rights and Democracy to the world, without a tinge of GUILT and REMORSE, even as it pursues its NeoColonialist agenda to extend its global hegemony.

4. Lorenzo Says:
   March 12th, 2014 at 10:55 pm

   As Israel has USA, we should get China to back us up.

   For that we have to allow China to have a MILITARY BASE in SL.

   Israel doesn’t get US help for nothing. NO FREE lunches.

   USA uses Israel to the maximum to DESTABILIZE the region. Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi, Lebanon, Iran, Dubai, Iraq, etc. are DESTABILIZED by Israel regularly.

   China will use SL to break up and destabilize Endia. WE MUST ALLOW it.

5. Lorenzo Says:
   March 12th, 2014 at 10:58 pm

   Indrajith,

   Yes. I too pasted it.

   MOST displaced Sinhalese from Jaffna are living in illegal places around the Ratmalana rail track. They live a very difficult life.

   MR is trying to fool them.

   Mark my word, MR will NEVER EVER resettle Sinhalese in JaFFna. He tells one thing to Sinhala voters and another to Endia.

6. Lorenzo Says:
   March 13th, 2014 at 2:49 am

   Remember the Endian diplomat Kabaragoya case?

   USA has DROPPED all charges against her and Endia and USA are in bed again!! As expected.

   Only fools believed it was a major US-Endia problem!

7. Indrajith Says:
   March 13th, 2014 at 8:03 am

   This is a good one, Lorenzo, I mean the name of the lady! Also some news for me.
   Yes, I too agree with what you say about MR. But we’ll keep some hope about it.

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