UN Internal Review Reinforces
the Need for an International Commission of Investigation on Sri Lanka. Ban Ki Moon Urged to
Act Under Article 99 of the UN Charter: TGTE
· UN’s Adama Dieng urged to Make Public his Report on Tamil Genocide.
· Urged to include Genocide in the investigation.
· No equivalence between the Sinhala Buddhist aggression
and the victimization of the Tamils.
· Appalled to see the Sri Lankan Government’s obstructions
and manipulations of the UN Personnel.
( November 22, 2012, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) In the aftermath of the release
of the Report of the UN Secretary-General’s Internal Review Panel
on United Nations Action In Sri Lanka on November 14, 2012,
Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE), has reiterated its call
for the creation of an International Commission of investigation on
Sri Lanka by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, under Article 99
of the UN Charter, as recommended by his own legal team.
TGTE called on the Special
Adviser to the UN Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide, Mr. Adama Dieng, to make public his report on Tamil Genocide.
TGTE also called for prosecutions
should not be limited to War Crimes and Crimes against
Humanity but should also include Genocide.
Given the constraint mandate
of the LLRC coupled with the “lack of an enabling environment for
a judicial follow up” as stated in the UN Internal Review Report, the Secretary-General need not wait till the exhaustion of the domestic
remedies. Justice delayed is justice denied.
According to this Internal
Review Report, Ban Ki Moon’s own legal advisors recommended that he
has the authority under UN’s Article 99 to appoint an International Commission of Inquiry
on Sri Lanka to investigate the killing of over 100,000 Tamil civilians
in the final five months of the war that ended in May 2009.
“We are urging the UN Secretary
General to implement his own legal advisors’ recommendation on the creation of an International
Commission of Inquiry under Article 99 of the UN Charter and we
are also urging Mr. Dieng to make public his report on Tamil Genocide” said Mr. Deluxon Morris, TGTE's Minister for investigation
of Genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
“We hope that the Review
Panel Report will put an end to the blaming the victims syndrome that
we have seen for so long. We have been repeatedly saying that there
is no moral equivalence between the aggressor and the aggressed, between the persecutor and persecuted.”
The Review Panel Report clearly demonstrates with facts that there was
no equivalence between the Sinhala Buddhist aggression and the victimization
of the Tamils. He continued, “We are appalled to see the Sri Lankan
Government’s obstructions and manipulations of the UN Personnel”
The Internal Review Panel
in its report stated that “according to the UN data most casualties
are caused by government fire.” It went on to state “Some
UN staff in Colombo expressed to the UN Country Team leadership
that they are dismayed that the UN was placing primary emphasis on LTTE
responsibility when the fact suggested otherwise”.
TGTE wrote a letter to the
UN Secretary General as far back as April 29, 2011 following the report of the Panel of Experts, stating
that the acts mentioned in the Panel of Experts report clearly constituted
an act of Genocide.
It is stated in the Review
Panel Report that:
“The Special Adviser on the Prevention of
Genocide, who also has an international Human Rights and humanitarian
law mandate, raised concern with the Government and the Secretary-General
over the situation but favored quiet diplomacy and told the Government
he would “not speak out.” When his office later tried to issue a
public statement this was not supported by UNHQ”
We question if the conduct
of Ambassador Francis Deng was an act of “quiet diplomacy” or an
act of appeasement. If the quiet diplomacy did not save the lives of
tens of thousands of Tamils at the last phase of the war in Sri Lanka, then it clearly is
time for a public and robust diplomacy.
We demand that Ambassador Adama Dieng who replaced
Ambassador Deng to make the report on Tamil Genocide in the island
of Sri Lanka.
We also repeat our demand for an independent international
investigation on Sri Lanka under Article 99; and we call for prosecutions
which should not be limited to War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity
but should also include Genocide.
