The 49th regular session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva, Switzerland, is starting today (28) and the country-specific update on Sri Lanka is due this week on Thursday (3 March). Therefore, it is imperative that the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) delegation led by Foreign Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris and the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UN OHCHR) led by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet – both sides warily surveying each antagonist in the midst of the diplomatic “fog of war” – find some much-needed rationality on the vexed questions before the sanctimonious council, on which they intend to lock horns and do battle with. If the two parties are earnest in their approach of seeking to find ways of resolving the question of human rights violations during the war between the GoSL and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), they need not look further than listening to Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) Opposition Parliamentarian Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, also the Army Commander who led the forces to the military conclusion of the war.
Speaking in Parliament last week, he did not mince words when it came to addressing the GoSL and Bachelet – but by the same token, also had sage words for them – which, if considered practically, provide a prescription for the situation at hand.
In no uncertain terms, Fonseka took the incumbent regime to task for not taking appropriate measures to save the country and its war heroes from the clutches of the allegations pertaining to human rights violations including war crimes levelled against the country.
“We must face these allegations bravely. It will not suffice to hide by lying and shouting that some such alleged acts were not committed. We must prove such before the world. These allegations are not against the frontline fighters but the path was paved for the levelling of these allegations due to the various wrongdoings engaged in by some who were not at the forefront of the battle but were towards the back or in the back, regarding which I too, at the time, had doubts and suspicions about.”
Invoking the “jus in bello” principle of international humanitarian law on the maintenance of the right conduct in war or fighting the war in a just manner, he noted that because the Government was not facing the said allegations, unfortunately, those who fought the war in a legal manner in keeping with the relevant international laws including the Geneva and Hague Conventions, Declarations, and Protocols have had to face unnecessary accusations. “Because of those who don’t know the reality and instead shed crocodile tears about the Geneva process, it is the war heroes who have become the aggrieved party.”
He followed up with a solution for the GoSL: “If there are one or two individuals who engaged in such wrongs, they can be looked into, they should be looked into, and they should definitely be punished at the domestic level, as there exists the possibility of them being hauled before war courts (likely a reference to the International Criminal Court), and also so that justice is done to the frontline war heroes whose good name must be protected.”
If the lack of effort and propensity for shadow boxing with the truth was what the GoSL came under fire for from Fonseka, the converse was true for Bachelet in terms of Fonseka’s criticism of her approach. With her, the issue for Fonseka is to do with the source of her information feed in terms of the tale of the two belligerents (the GoSL and the LTTE), and her lending an ear to only “one side of the story”.
“Madam Bachelet, we are not scared of you. Are you angry with us because we eradicated terrorism by eliminating the LTTE? It is said that you have obtained a lot of evidence (thousands). We must remind you that 99.9% of those who testified against the military are LTTE supporters or are representing them or those whose blessings are with them. The LTTE is a dastardly, terrorist organisation that murdered innocent people including civilians – Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims – and the Indian Prime Minister (Rajiv Gandhi), Tamil leaders, villagers, and worshipping devotees, by also using suicide cadres to kill including to attack places of worship, and choked mothers and babies in a cold-blooded manner, while also destroying economic centres. What you don’t know is that it is the food/meals and medicine of the military personnel that protected the Tamil people from the clutches of the LTTE. It is a blatant lie that Tamil people were massacred (‘killing fields’). If that happened, how would I get 50% more votes than those given to the Tamil National Alliance from the Tamil people of the North and the East at the Presidential Election held before even one year had elapsed since the end of the war? That itself proves that the Tamil people don’t believe that the military caused them to have grievances. ”
He concluded with a request to Bachelet: “Do justice to us; otherwise, you will be a disgrace to the decorum of your office (the UN OHCHR).”
Idealism sans pragmatism is merely wishful thinking at best and a recipe for disaster at worst.
The chauvinistic delusion that the current GoSL labours under, which is that certain military personnel did not engage in the kind of conduct that even Fonseka as the then Commander of the Army acknowledges, would have occurred, or simply put, having a blanket “no human rights violations were ever perpetrated by the governmental security forces” policy, is a form of willful blindness of the “lies agreed upon” kind, which has had the effect of pushing ourselves, as a nation, into a corner, and worse, has led Sri Lanka down the perilously slippery slope of isolation in the league of nations; whence, more similar privations await, if no attitudinal course correction of policy on the part of the Government is made or the latter is not disabused of the said fallacious and problematic notion. In fact, one could argue that not meting out justice to those with grievances such as journalist Prageeth Eknaligoda and his wife Sandhya, despite, as noted by Fonseka, there being ample evidence concerning the identities of the offenders behind his abduction, enforced disappearance, and/or killing, lends credence, credibility, and weight to the allegations of the same.
It is both factual and realistic, therefore, to acknowledge the sins of the past, deal with such in a just fashion, and in this regard, Fonseka himself will become part of any such investigation into human rights violations and will have to testify in his capacity as the Army Commander under whose watch some of these violations are alleged to have occurred and perhaps be held liable under the doctrine of command responsibility.
On the other side, Bachelet would do well to be mindful of the fact that LTTE’s mostly ideological sympathisers in the diasporas that make up the international community, who are major and powerful influencers in the UNHRC’s processes as far as Sri Lanka’s case is concerned, too are playing a political game that has little or no concern for the Tamil citizens of Sri Lanka, in which the latter are merely a disillusioned pawn or disaffected prop, or both. The military’s humanitarian role during the war too need not be subsumed by its bad apples and the horrors of the conflict, and this context too is a reality that Bachelet and her activist ilk should not be quick to dismiss. Fonseka’s Geneva prescription
28 Feb 2022
Fonseka’s Geneva prescription
28 Feb 2022
The 49th regular session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva, Switzerland, is starting today (28) and the country-specific update on Sri Lanka is due this week on Thursday (3 March). Therefore, it is imperative that the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) delegation led by Foreign Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris and the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UN OHCHR) led by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet – both sides warily surveying each antagonist in the midst of the diplomatic “fog of war” – find some much-needed rationality on the vexed questions before the sanctimonious council, on which they intend to lock horns and do battle with. If the two parties are earnest in their approach of seeking to find ways of resolving the question of human rights violations during the war between the GoSL and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), they need not look further than listening to Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) Opposition Parliamentarian Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, also the Army Commander who led the forces to the military conclusion of the war.
Speaking in Parliament last week, he did not mince words when it came to addressing the GoSL and Bachelet – but by the same token, also had sage words for them – which, if considered practically, provide a prescription for the situation at hand.
In no uncertain terms, Fonseka took the incumbent regime to task for not taking appropriate measures to save the country and its war heroes from the clutches of the allegations pertaining to human rights violations including war crimes levelled against the country.
“We must face these allegations bravely. It will not suffice to hide by lying and shouting that some such alleged acts were not committed. We must prove such before the world. These allegations are not against the frontline fighters but the path was paved for the levelling of these allegations due to the various wrongdoings engaged in by some who were not at the forefront of the battle but were towards the back or in the back, regarding which I too, at the time, had doubts and suspicions about.”
Invoking the “jus in bello” principle of international humanitarian law on the maintenance of the right conduct in war or fighting the war in a just manner, he noted that because the Government was not facing the said allegations, unfortunately, those who fought the war in a legal manner in keeping with the relevant international laws including the Geneva and Hague Conventions, Declarations, and Protocols have had to face unnecessary accusations. “Because of those who don’t know the reality and instead shed crocodile tears about the Geneva process, it is the war heroes who have become the aggrieved party.”
He followed up with a solution for the GoSL: “If there are one or two individuals who engaged in such wrongs, they can be looked into, they should be looked into, and they should definitely be punished at the domestic level, as there exists the possibility of them being hauled before war courts (likely a reference to the International Criminal Court), and also so that justice is done to the frontline war heroes whose good name must be protected.”
If the lack of effort and propensity for shadow boxing with the truth was what the GoSL came under fire for from Fonseka, the converse was true for Bachelet in terms of Fonseka’s criticism of her approach. With her, the issue for Fonseka is to do with the source of her information feed in terms of the tale of the two belligerents (the GoSL and the LTTE), and her lending an ear to only “one side of the story”.
“Madam Bachelet, we are not scared of you. Are you angry with us because we eradicated terrorism by eliminating the LTTE? It is said that you have obtained a lot of evidence (thousands). We must remind you that 99.9% of those who testified against the military are LTTE supporters or are representing them or those whose blessings are with them. The LTTE is a dastardly, terrorist organisation that murdered innocent people including civilians – Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims – and the Indian Prime Minister (Rajiv Gandhi), Tamil leaders, villagers, and worshipping devotees, by also using suicide cadres to kill including to attack places of worship, and choked mothers and babies in a cold-blooded manner, while also destroying economic centres. What you don’t know is that it is the food/meals and medicine of the military personnel that protected the Tamil people from the clutches of the LTTE. It is a blatant lie that Tamil people were massacred (‘killing fields’). If that happened, how would I get 50% more votes than those given to the Tamil National Alliance from the Tamil people of the North and the East at the Presidential Election held before even one year had elapsed since the end of the war? That itself proves that the Tamil people don’t believe that the military caused them to have grievances. ”
He concluded with a request to Bachelet: “Do justice to us; otherwise, you will be a disgrace to the decorum of your office (the UN OHCHR).”
Idealism sans pragmatism is merely wishful thinking at best and a recipe for disaster at worst.
The chauvinistic delusion that the current GoSL labours under, which is that certain military personnel did not engage in the kind of conduct that even Fonseka as the then Commander of the Army acknowledges, would have occurred, or simply put, having a blanket “no human rights violations were ever perpetrated by the governmental security forces” policy, is a form of willful blindness of the “lies agreed upon” kind, which has had the effect of pushing ourselves, as a nation, into a corner, and worse, has led Sri Lanka down the perilously slippery slope of isolation in the league of nations; whence, more similar privations await, if no attitudinal course correction of policy on the part of the Government is made or the latter is not disabused of the said fallacious and problematic notion. In fact, one could argue that not meting out justice to those with grievances such as journalist Prageeth Eknaligoda and his wife Sandhya, despite, as noted by Fonseka, there being ample evidence concerning the identities of the offenders behind his abduction, enforced disappearance, and/or killing, lends credence, credibility, and weight to the allegations of the same.
It is both factual and realistic, therefore, to acknowledge the sins of the past, deal with such in a just fashion, and in this regard, Fonseka himself will become part of any such investigation into human rights violations and will have to testify in his capacity as the Army Commander under whose watch some of these violations are alleged to have occurred and perhaps be held liable under the doctrine of command responsibility.
On the other side, Bachelet would do well to be mindful of the fact that LTTE’s mostly ideological sympathisers in the diasporas that make up the international community, who are major and powerful influencers in the UNHRC’s processes as far as Sri Lanka’s case is concerned, too are playing a political game that has little or no concern for the Tamil citizens of Sri Lanka, in which the latter are merely a disillusioned pawn or disaffected prop, or both. The military’s humanitarian role during the war too need not be subsumed by its bad apples and the horrors of the conflict, and this context too is a reality that Bachelet and her activist ilk should not be quick to dismiss. Kapruka
Discover Kapruka, the leading online shopping platform in Sri Lanka, where you can conveniently send Gifts and Flowers to your loved ones for any event. Explore a wide range of popular Shopping Categories on Kapruka, including Toys, Groceries, Electronics, Birthday Cakes, Fruits, Chocolates, Automobile, Mother and Baby Products, Clothing, and Fashion. Additionally, Kapruka offers unique online services like Money Remittance, Astrology, Medicine Delivery, and access to over 700 Top Brands. Also If you’re interested in selling with Kapruka, Partner Central by Kapruka is the best solution to start with. Moreover, through Kapruka Global Shop, you can also enjoy the convenience of purchasing products from renowned platforms like Amazon and eBay and have them delivered to Sri Lanka.Send love straight to their heart this Valentine's with our thoughtful gifts!
Discover Kapruka, the leading online shopping platform in Sri Lanka, where you can conveniently send Gifts and Flowers to your loved ones for any event. Explore a wide range of popular Shopping Categories on Kapruka, including Toys, Groceries, Electronics, Birthday Cakes, Fruits, Chocolates, Automobile, Mother and Baby Products, Clothing, and Fashion. Additionally, Kapruka offers unique online services like Money Remittance, Astrology, Medicine Delivery, and access to over 700 Top Brands. Also If you’re interested in selling with Kapruka, Partner Central by Kapruka is the best solution to start with. Moreover, through Kapruka Global Shop, you can also enjoy the convenience of purchasing products from renowned platforms like Amazon and eBay and have them delivered to Sri Lanka.Send love straight to their heart this Valentine's with our thoughtful gifts!