Unite against possible war crimes probe: MR

Former President Mahinda Rajapaksa vamped up his familiar nationalist rhetoric yesterday by insisting the military would be “betrayed” by the investigation into the last phase of the war and expressed disappointment over members of his party supporting the UNP stance for reconciliation.

Releasing a statement he said people should once again be reminded about what exactly has been undertaken by accepting this resolution.

“In operative paragraphs 1, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 12, the present government has accepted the report of the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights which said that war crimes including the killing of civilians, torture, and the deliberate starvation of people had been committed by our armed forces and they have agreed to set up a war crimes tribunal manned by foreign judges, prosecutors and investigators and funded directly from overseas to try our war heroes for these alleged crimes.”

He also alleged that the Government has agreed to remove, through administrative action, members of the armed forces who are suspected of having committed war crimes but against whom there isn’t enough evidence to place before the war crimes tribunal. He also criticised efforts at law reforms including repealing the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act.

  It should be borne in mind that the OHCHR that has come in for heavy criticism by the UN Human Rights Council itself. The UNHRC passes every year (with more than a two thirds majority) a resolution calling upon the OHCHR to end the domination of that office by Westerners and to reduce its dependency on Western funds. The government has thus agreed to place Sri Lanka under the supervision of an institution that is facing criticism by the UNHRC itself for its Western bias, the statement said.

 The statement went onto say that having accepted the Geneva resolution; the government is now adopting various strategies to convince the public that it will not be harmful to the country.

 We saw the President and Prime Minister in recent days expressing to the international media what seemed to be contradictory views on the participation of foreign judges in the proposed war crimes mechanism. But this was just a drama for public consumption.  It became clear from the President’s Independence Day speech that there is no difference in the stands taken by him and the Prime Minister on the Geneva resolution. 

 Rajapaksa went onto say the war was won by an SLFP government led by himself and as such it is a matter of profound regret to him that his party has been subordinated by the UN, which in his view tried to sabotage the war effort at every turn. 

 “However, I am profoundly saddened to see that a section SLFP has also joined the UNP in this great betrayal. The UNP may be deriving a great deal of satisfaction by thus getting a section of the SLFP which won the war to underwrite every traitorous they commit. I call upon the people of Sri Lanka to unite and resist this attempt by the government to betray the country and our war heroes.”