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"Sri Lanka is as flexible as it is
firm, it is as firm as it is flexible": Ambassador Dayan Jayatilleka
The Permanent Mission of Sri Lanka to
the United Nations Office at Geneva
11th December 2007
Remarks by H.E. Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka to the
resumed Sixth Session of the Human Right Council on 11 December 2007
Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative and Ambassador to the UN in Geneva,
Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka in responding to the statement by Ms. Louise Arbour
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights on the second day of the Resumed
Sixth Session of the Human Rights Council, said "our negotiations
with the OHCHR and international bodies will always be informed by a
determination that national institutions and national processes shall
be supplemented and supported by international assistance, but shall
never be supplanted or substituted by the non-national".
Ms. Louise Arbour who visited Afghanistan, Brazil, Ireland and Sri
Lanka following the last session of the Human Rights Council in September
2007, referred to Sri Lanka during the initial part of her statement
on her country visits.
Full transcript of the response by H.E. Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka:
" Thank you, Mr. President, Madam High Commissioner. At the outset,
I wish to associate myself fully and deeply with the sentiment of solidarity
that you Mr. President extended to our colleague, Ambassador Idriss
Jazaïry, on the occasion of the terrorist attacks taking place
in his county.
That tragic incident brings forth the context in which the discussion
on human rights in Sri Lanka takes place. Just a week ago, there were
three such terrorist attacks in Sri Lanka. By terrorist attacks, I mean
attacks wittingly, knowingly aimed at civilian targets. The first, in
the morning, was on an ethnic Tamil Minister. It was by a polio-handicapped
suicide bomber and the Minister in question was our Minister of Social
Services and Social Welfare who had signed Sri Lanka up to the UN Convention
on the Rights of the Disabled.
By evening, there was an attack on a shopping center with no political
or military target in the vicinity. This was followed within days by
the attack on a bus, a civilian bus, which killed 15 civilians. This
is not collateral damage Mr. President, these are attacks wittingly
targeted at unarmed innocent noncombatant civilians.
We, as a country, are no less determined to root out terrorism than
is any country represented in this assembly today. We, Mr. President,
are as committed to vanquishing the secessionist cause which that terrorism
serves, as great presidents such as Abraham Lincoln were when separatist
challenges faced them in their own country.
So, it is in that historical context that our discussion on human rights
takes place. Sri Lanka, Mr. President, is as flexible as it is firm,
it is as firm as it is flexible on the matter of engagement with international
mechanisms in the promotion and safeguarding of human rights. We are
engaged in negotiations with the OHCHR and as the High Commissioner
has correctly said, although we have not reached any agreement, we have
been discussing a variety of models of cooperation.
This discussion, Mr. President, is informed by our consistent policy
and that consistent policy has two components: the first is the primacy
of the national, the second is international scrutiny, support and assistance.
Tomorrow Dr. Walter Kälin, the Representative of the Secretary
General on Internally Displaced Persons will begin his visit to Sri
Lanka's Eastern Province. We have agreed in principle to a visit by
Mr. Santiago Corcuera, Chairperson-Rapporteur of the United Nations
Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, sooner rather
than later next year. We remain open to scrutiny by all the core treaty
monitoring mechanisms to which we have subscribed.
This cooperation, continues Mr. President. However, we are also justly
proud of our national institutions. In the immediate aftermath of the
suicide bombings that I mentioned, the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka ruled
that roadblocks and check points in Colombo, the metropolis, have to
be dismantled temporarily because they are not fully in keeping with
human rights and fundamental liberties. That is the extent of the independence
of our judiciary, Mr. President, and of that we are justly proud.
Therefore, our negotiations with the OHCHR and international bodies
will always be informed by a determination that national institutions
and national processes shall be supplemented and supported by international
assistance, but shall never be supplanted or substituted by the non-national.
Thank you".
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