The Australian Tamil Congress welcomes the UN’s call for a fully independent and impartial inquiry into allegations of Human Rights abuses in
Sri Lanka.
"The Sri Lankan Government must be held to account by the international community for the atrocities that have taken place"
Dr Sam Pari – Spokesperson for the Australian Tamil Congress (ATC)
Impartial and independent experts commissioned by UN envoy Philip Alston, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, have confirmed that video footage from 2009 showing Sri Lankan troops executing Tamils is authentic.
The Sri Lankan Government had previously rejected the veracity of the footage saying it was a fraudulent attempt aimed at discrediting the
security forces.
“There have been countless allegations of atrocities committed by the SriLankan Government, and this incident further demonstrates the Government’s lack of resolve to establish an independent and impartial inquiry to investigate human rights abuses and breaches of international humanitarian law” Dr Pari said.
“The ATC hopes issues surrounding human rights abuses in Sri Lanka and the process for reconstruction of Sri Lanka after almost thirty years of civil war, will be discussed by Australia’s Foreign Minister, The Hon Stephen Smith MP when he meets with the US Secretary of State, Senator Hilary Clinton later this month. The international community must keep holding the Government of Sri Lanka to account”, Dr Pari said.
Independent’ information detailing the appalling record of human rights abuses in Sri Lanka follows:
· In 2008, Sri Lanka was voted off the UN Human Rights Council and South African Archbishop Emeritus and Nobel Peace laureate Desmond Tutu said: “the systematic abuses by Sri Lankan government forces are among the most serious imaginable”.
· Figures cited in the UN Working Group on Disappearances 2008 annual report indicate that Sri Lanka has the second highest disappearances next to Iraq. A disproportionate number of Tamils have been recorded to be among the disappeared.
· Since the election of President Rajapakse in November 2005, 34 journalists and media workers have been killed. Twenty nine were Tamil.
· In the year 2009 alone, more than 25 Sri Lankan journalists fled the country and in the Press Freedom Index 2009, out of 176 countries, Sri
Lanka was ranked 165 and placed lower than Fiji (152) or Zimbabwe (136). In fact out of all the commonwealth countries listed by Reporters without Borders, Sri Lanka is ranked the lowest.
Sam Pari, MD is available for interview on this topic Ph: 0433 428 967
