transcurrents

Sri Lanka Govt response to UN Human Rights Commissioner

December 11th, 2007

“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 Jazairy, 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 Kalin, 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”.

[Full Text of Remarks by H.E. Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka, Ambassador/Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations Office at Geneva, to the resumed Sixth Session of the Human Right Council on 11 December 2007]

Entry Filed under: Press Statement