War crimes in Sri Lanka
Encyclopedia
According to the UN Panel Report, there are credible allegations and credible evidence that war crimes and according to the British Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt
, there is a convincing evidence that violations of international humanitarian and human rights law, were committed by the Sri Lankan military
and the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(Tamil Tigers) during the Sri Lankan Civil War
, particularly during the final months of the conflict in 2009.
The alleged war crimes include attacks on civilians and civilian buildings by both sides; executions of combatants and prisoners by both sides; enforced disappearances by the Sri Lankan military and paramilitary groups backed by them; acute shortages of food, medicine, and clean water for civilians trapped in the war zone; and child recruitment by the Tamil Tigers. A United Nations
expert panel investigating violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the final stages of the civil war found "credible evidence" and "credible allegations" which, if proven, indicated that war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by the Sri Lankan military and the Tamil Tigers. The panel has called on the UN Secretary General to conduct an independent international inquiry into the alleged violations of international law.The United States welcomed the UN Panel of Experts’ report on Sri Lanka. In a statement by Ambassador Susan E. Rice, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, said, "We appreciate the detailed and extensive work of the panel and believe it makes a valuable contribution to next steps that should be taken in support of justice, accountability, human rights, and reconciliation in Sri Lanka." In an April 2009 report to U.S. Congress, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said "I think that the Sri Lankan Government knows that the entire world is very disappointed that in its efforts to end what it sees as 25 years of conflict, it is causing such untold suffering."
War crimes are prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, of which Sri Lanka is a signatory. In 2002 the International Criminal Court
(ICC) was created by the Rome Statute to prosecute individuals for serious crimes, such as war crimes. Sri Lanka is not a signatory of the Rome Statute. Therefore it is only possible for the ICC to investigate and prosecute war crimes in Sri Lanka if the UN Security Council was to refer Sri Lanka to the ICC, which is unlikely. However, individual countries may investigate and prosecute alleged culprits over whom they have jurisdiction, such as those with dual-nationality. In addition, a number of countries apply universal jurisdiction
in respect of certain crimes, such as war crimes, allowing them to prosecute individuals irrespective of where the crime was committed, the nationality of the culprits and the nationality of the victims.
state of Tamil Eelam
in the North
and East
of Sri Lanka since 1983. After the failure of the Norwegian
mediated peace process in 2006 the Sri Lankan military launched offensives aimed at recapturing territory controlled by the Tamil Tigers. By July 2007 the military had recaptured all of the east. The military offensive in the north escalated in October 2008 as the Sri Lankan military attacked the Vanni
heartland of the Tamil Tigers. After successive defeats the Tamil Tigers were forced to retreat to the north-east coast in Mullaitivu District
. The civilian population of the Vanni also fled. The Sri Lankan government has alleged that the civilians were forced to do so by the Tamil Tigers. By January 2009 the Tamil Tigers and the civilians were trapped in a small piece of land on the north-east coast.
As the Sri Lankan military advanced further into Tamil Tiger controlled areas, international concern grew for the fate of the 350,000 civilians trapped. On 21 January 2009 the Sri Lankan military declared a 32 square kilometres (12.4 sq mi) Safe Zone 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) north-west of Puthukkudiyiruppu
, between the A35 highway and Chalai Lagoon
. According to the Sri Lankan the purpose of the Safe Zone was to allow the trapped civilians to cross into territory controlled by the military. However, very few civilians actually crossed into the military territory. The Sri Lankan military, UN and human rights organisations accused the Tamil Tigers of preventing the civilians from leaving.
The fighting between the military and the Tamil Tigers continued, causing the civilians to flee from the Safe Zone to a narrow strip of land between Nanthi Kadal
lagoon and the Indian Ocean
. On 12 February 2009 the military declared a new 10 square kilometres (3.9 sq mi) Safe Zone in this area, north-west of Mullaitivu
town. Over the next three months a brutal siege of the Safe Zone occurred as the military allegedly blitzed by land and air the last remnants of Tamil Tigers trapped in the Safe Zone. Satellite images of the Safe Zone publishes by the UN, foreign governments and scientific organisations showed heavy damage that could have only been caused by bombardment. Inevitably many thousands of civilians were killed or injured. The UN, based on credible witness evidence from aid agencies as well civilians evacuated from the Safe Zone by sea, estimated that 6,500 civilians were killed and another 14,000 injured between mid-January, when the Safe Zone was first declared, and mid-April. There are no official casualty figures after this period but a report in The Times
claims that that civilian deaths increased to an average of 1,000 per day after mid-April 2009. The UN has refused to confirm the Times' allegations. Estimates of the death toll for the final four months of the civil war (mid-January to mid-May) range from 15,000 to 20,000. A US State Department report has suggested that the actual casualty figures were probably much higher than the UN's estimates and that significant numbers of casualties were not recorded. As the civil war edged towards a bitter end in late April/early May the number of civilians leaving the Safe Zone turned from a trickle to a torrent. On 19 May the Sri Lankan government declared victory.
After the end of the war a number of countries and human rights organisations called for an independent investigation into the final stages of the civil war.
and Kilinochchi
, the organisations said. And in the LTTE-controlled Vanni
area, the Tigers have hindered thousands of families from moving to safer places by imposing a strict pass system and, in some instances, forcing some family members to stay behind to ensure the return of the rest of the family. These measures seem designed in part to use civilians as a buffer against government forces - a serious violation of international humanitarian law. "Both sides to this long conflict have again shown that they will jeopardise the lives of thousands of ordinary people in the pursuit of military objectives," said Amnesty International spokesperson Yolanda Foster. "In the absence of independent international monitors, Sri Lankan civilians lack protection and remain at the mercy of two forces with long records of abuse."
The Sri Lankan government has furiously rejected all claims that its forces committed war crimes. In a June 2010 speech, President Rajapaksa insisted that his soldiers did not kill a single civilian. “Our troops carried a gun in one hand and a copy of the human rights charter in the other,” the president said. These statements are at odds with multiple independent sources; the United Nations itself has said that at least 7,000 ethnic Tamil civilians died in the first four months of last year, just before the government claimed final victory over the Tigers, and high-level United States officials have said, “The US has strong, credible allegations of evidence of atrocities during the prosecution of the war against the Tamil Tigers."
. The resolution admonished Sri Lanka being caught in a spiral of violence and its use of torture against the civilian population. Sri Lanka reacted with shock and anger to the conflict being brought to the agenda. The resolution, calling upon all parties and groups to renounce the use of force and acts of violence and to pursue a negotiated political solution, based on principles of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, received wide support from Latin American, African, Western European countries and India. The resolution needed a 12 vote majority to pass. Two detailed reports on Arrest, Detention and Torture in Sri Lanka, and the other on Extrajudicial and Arbitrary Killings were distributed among delegates. Norway, Canada, Belgium and Australia joined Argentina in moving to support the original resolution in private, while thirteen non-governmental organisations in their joint statement to the commission stated "The situation (in Sri Lanka) is so grave that it warrants exceptional and urgent consideration by this distinguished Commission. We appeal to the conscience of the distinguished delegates and the governments they represent to ensure that all essential steps are undertaken in terms of international human rights and humanitarian law". They deplored the use of foreign mercenaries by Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka sought Britain, France and the United State's support. These countries expressed concern at the Rapporteur and Working Group's reports. British mercenaries of the secret KMS unit working in support of the Sri Lankan Government had left the island that year because of atrocities committed against the Tamil population, walking out after complaining that the Sri Lankan Special Task Force "was running out of control and was indiscriminately killing and torturing Tamil civilians". Sri Lanka sought Pakistan's aid in submitting a counter resolution extolling the efforts of the Sri Lankan Government and condemning Tamil groups. This counter resolution was not considered by the commission.
Given Sri Lanka and Argentina's then membership in the Non-Aligned Movement
and gradual build up of support for the resolution, the Sri Lankan Government eventually agreed to negotiate a consensus resolution with the other commission members as a compromise, with mediation conducted by Senegal. The sessions proved incredibly heated in their exchanges, and at one stage co-sponsors Argentina, Canada and Norway threatened to abandon any negotiations and pass the original resolution. A Belgian delegate stated "We now know how Sri Lanka has been conducting negotiations with the Tamils on the ethnic problem". Eventually, the UNHRC passed Commission Resolution 1987/61 unanimously, a revised resolution of E/CN. 4/1987/L. 74/Rev. 1 on 12 March 1987 that called upon the government to intensify its cooperation with the ICRC in the field of dissemination and promotion of international humanitarian law but amended with criticism on torture and disappearances removed. Martin Ennals
of International Alert
stated in his intervening statement "....there can be no doubt that the security forces of the government of Sri Lanka have committed serious offences against civilians caught up in the internal conflict, that innocent civilians have been killed, not in the cross fire between factions but in the course of the day to day existence of family life..."
(UNHRC) to investigate war crimes in Sri Lanka. They put forward a resolution that deplored abuses by both the Sri Lankan government forces and the Tamil Tigers, urged the government to co-operate fully with humanitarian organisations and to provide protection to civilians and displaced persons, and made an appeal to the Sri Lankan government to respect media freedom and investigate attacks against journalists and human rights defenders. This was thwarted after the Sri Lankan government received support from China, Russia, India and developing countries.
The UNHRC instead passed resolution A/HRC/S-11/L.1/Rev.2 on 27 May 2009 which commended the Sri Lankan government's actions, condemned the Tamil Tigers and ignored allegations of violations of human rights and humanitarian law by government forces. This resolution was passed by 29 votes to 12 votes with 6 abstentions.
The UN expert panel report published in April 2011 has, based on its findings, recommended that the Human Rights Council reconsider resolution A/HRC/S-11/L.1/Rev.2.
called for an independent, international investigation of possible war crimes committed during the last few months of the war in Sri Lanka.
appointed a three-member panel of experts to advise him on whether war crimes were committed in the final stages of the civil war. The panel consisted of Marzuki Darusman (Indonesia - chair), Steven Ratner (USA) and Yasmin Sooka (South Africa). The panel looked into "accountability with regard to any alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law" and whether the commitment on "human rights accountability" given by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa
to Ban Ki-moon has been implemented. The panel examined "the modalities, applicable international standards and comparative experience with regard to accountability processes, taking into account the nature and scope of any alleged violations in Sri Lanka".
The Sri Lankan government reacted angrily to the panel's appointment, calling it "an unwarranted and unnecessary interference with a sovereign nation". It stated that the panel would not be allowed to enter Sri Lanka, a move criticised by Darusman. The panel's appointment was welcomed by the United States and EU but criticised by Russia and China. The panel met for the first time on 19 July 2010.
On 12 April 2011 the panel handed over its report, the Report of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability In Sri Lanka, to the Secretary-General who passed on a copy to the Sri Lankan government. The Sri Lankan government immediately rejected the report as "fundamentally flawed" and "patently biased". The report was not initially made public to allow the Sri Lankan government time to make a formal reply. On 16 April 2011 the report was published in The Island, an-independently owned nationalist Sri Lankan newspaper. It had been suggested that the Sri Lankan government leaked the report so that it can issue a full rebuttal before of the report is officially made public by the UN. The Sri Lankan government did not make a formal reply and on 25 April 2011 the UN published the full report.
The evidence obtained by the panel revealed a "a very different version of the final stages of the war than that maintained to this day by the Government of Sri Lanka". The panel found "credible allegations, which if proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law were committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity". The panel concluded that the "conduct of the war represented a grave assault on the entire regime of international law designed to protect individual dignity during both war and peace".
The panel found "credible allegations" that the Sri Lankan military/government killed civilians through widespread shelling; shelled hospitals and humanitarian objects; denied humanitarian assistance; violated the human rights of civilians and Tamil Tiger combatants; and it violated the human rights of those outside the conflict zone such as the media. The panel found "credible allegations" that the Tamil Tigers used civilians as a human buffer; killed civilians attempting to escape Tamil Tiger control; used military equipment in the proximity of civilians; forcibly recruited children; used forced labour; and killed civilians using suicide attacks.
Specific findings of the panel:
The report states that the "credible allegations" demand a serious investigation and the prosecution of those responsible. If the allegations are proved senior commanders, military and political, on both sides are liable for prosecution under international criminal law. The panel noted the Sri Lankan government's attempt at accountability consisted solely of investigating the actions of the previous government and the Tamil Tigers, and not of the present government's actions during the final stages of the war. The panel concluded this is not in accordance with international standards and fell "dramatically short of international expectations". The panel found the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission
(LLRC) established by the Sri Lankan government to be "deeply flawed" and not up to international standards of independence and impartiality due the "deep-seated conflicts of interests" of some of its members. The mandate of the LLRC, its work and methodology meant that it was incapable of investigating the serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law or of examining the causes of the civil war. The panel concluded that the LLRC could not satisfy the commitment on accountability given by President Rajapaksa and Bank Ki-moon.
The panel found that the Sri Lankan justice system was incapable of providing accountability. The independence of the Attorney General
had been eroded and the continuation of Emergency Regulations and the Prevention of Terrorism Act precluded the judiciary from holding the government accountable on human rights issues. Military courts and other domestic institutions were also incapable of providing accountability. The panel found that the government's triumphalism and the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora
's inability to acknowledge the Tamil Tigers' role in the humanitarian disaster also hindered accountability.
The panel criticised the UN for not protecting civilians. It's reluctance to release casualty figures undermined the call to protect civilians.
The panel a number of recommendations including that there be an independent international inquiry into the alleged violations of international law and that the Sri Lankan government carry out genuine investigations of the alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights law committed by both sides.
In the final report the panel also admitted that the UN system knowingly failed to release the casualty figures of the civilians, avoided serious allegations against the role the UN officials and others and said that The Secretary-General should conduct a comprehensive review of actions by the United Nations system during the war in Sri Lanka and the aftermath, regarding the implementation of its humanitarian and protection mandates.
on incidents that happened during the final months of the conflict in Sri Lanka. The report detailed allegations that the majority of shelling into the Safe Zone was from Sri Lankan government forces; the government forces carried out shelling during a 48-hour "ceasefire"; the government forces unlawfully killed captives and combatants seeking to surrender, including senior Tamil Tigers; the government forces and paramilitary groups abducted and then killed Tamil civilians, particularly children and young men; there was an acute shortage of food, medicine and clean water despite government assurances that it would supply sufficient amounts; the Tamil Tigers forcibly prevented the escape of IDPs and used them as human shields; and that the Tamil Tigers forcibly recruited children. The report surmised that the allegations in the report "may constitute violations of international humanitarian law and/or crimes against humanity, and...human rights abuses".
The Sri Lankan government rejected the report but Stephen Rapp
, the United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues
, subsequently called on Sri Lanka to investigate the allegations stating that sources used in the report "were credible and reliable and that allegations had been corroborated".
held a Tribunal on Sri Lanka in Dublin, Ireland
to investigate allegations that the Sri Lankan armed forces committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during its final phase of the war, and to examine violations of human rights in the aftermath of the war and the factors that led to the collapse of the 2002 ceasefire. The tribunal's 11-member panel of judges consisted of François Houtart
(chair), Daniel Feierstein, Denis Halliday
, Eren Keskin
, Mary Lawlor, Francesco Martone, Nawal El Saadawi
, Rajinder Sachar
, Sulak Sivaraksa
, Gianni Tognoni and Oystein Tveter. The tribunal received reports from NGOs and human rights groups, victims’ testimony, eye-witness accounts including from members of the Sri Lankan armed forces, expert testimony, journalistic reports, video footage and photographs. Parts of the tribunal were held in camera
to protect the identity of witnesses. The tribunal found the Sri Lankan government guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The tribunal found numerous instances of human rights violations committed by the Sri Lankan government. Violations between 2006 (end of the ceasefire) and 2009 (end of the war) included: bombing civilian objectives like hospitals, schools and other non-military targets; bombing government-proclaimed ‘safety zones’ or ‘no fire zones’; withholding of food, water, and health facilities in war zones; use of heavy weaponry, banned weapons and air-raids; using food and medicine as a weapon of war; mistreatment, torture and execution of captured or surrendered Tamil Tiger combatants, officials and supporters; torture; rape and sexual violence against women; deportations and forcible transfer of individuals and families; and desecration of the dead. Violations committed in the IDP camps
included: shooting of Tamil citizens and Tamil Tiger supporters; forced disappearances; rape; malnutrition; and lack of medical supplies. There was also evidence of forced “disappearances” of targeted individuals from the Tamil population during the ceasefire (2002–2006).
The tribunal concluded that the human rights violations during the war (2006–2009) "clearly constitute war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan Government, its security forces and aligned paramilitary forces, as defined under the Geneva Conventions and in the Rome Statute (Article 8)." Sri Lanka is a signatory of the Geneva Convention but not the Rome Statute. The tribunal found that war crimes were committed irrespective of whether the civil war was considered to be an international conflict or as an internal armed conflict. The tribunal also found that human rights violations committed in the in the IDP camps and the forced disappearances during the ceasefire (2002–2006) "clearly constitute crimes against humanity" as defined under Article 7 of the Rome Statute. The tribunal could not find enough evidence to justify the charge of genocide
but it requested that a thorough investigation be held as some of the evidence it had received indicated "possible acts of genocide". The tribunal could also not find enough evidence to justify the charge of crimes against the peace. The tribunal stated that the crimes committed by the Sri Lankan government against the Tamil Tigers could not be justified because "neither war crimes, nor crimes against humanity would be justified by any act committed by the victims". The tribunal found that the USA and UK undermined the ceasefire by pressurising the EU into designating the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist organisation. This allowed the Sri Lankan government to re-start the war and thus commit the human rights violations.
The tribunal made a number of recommendations to the Sri Lankan government, UN and international community, including that a UN special rapporteur be appointed to "investigate and identify responsibilities for human rights violations, violations of humanitarian law and war crimes committed by all parties in conflict". The tribunal's findings were completely rejected by the Sri Lankan government.
published a detailed report on war crimes during the final months of the civil war. The report collated vast amounts of evidence including numerous reliable eyewitness statements, hundreds of photographs, video, satellite images, electronic communications and documents from multiple credible sources. The report concluded that war crimes were committed by the Sri Lankan armed forces and the Tamil Tigers.
The report found credible evidence of intentional shelling of civilians by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shelling of hospitals by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shelling of humanitarian operations by the Sri Lankan armed forces; deliberate obstruction of food and medical treatment for the civilian population by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shooting of civilians by the Tamil Tigers; and intentional infliction of suffering on civilians by the Tamil Tigers. The report found evidence that suggested that during 2009 tens of thousands of Tamil civilians were killed, countless wounded and hundreds of thousands deprived of basic food and medical care which resulted in further, unnecessary deaths. The report suggested that the actions of some members of the international community produced conditions which allowed war crimes to be committed.
The report made a number of recommendations, particularly that there should be an international investigation into alleged war crimes. The report stated that it was impossible for any domestic (Sri Lankan) investigation into the government/security forces to be impartial "given the entrenched culture of impunity". The report noted that although Sri Lanka was not a member of the International Criminal Court
and the UN Security Council was unlikely to refer Sri Lanka to the ICC, individual countries may investigate and prosecute alleged culprits over whom they have jurisdiction, such as those with dual-nationality. Sri Lanka's Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
holds dual US-Sri Lankan citizenship and Sarath Fonseka
, commander of the Sri Lankan armed forces during the final months of the war, has a US Green Card .
during the final stages of the civil war, was appointed deputy ambassador to Germany, Switzerland and the Vatican.
In January 2011 the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights
, a German human rights group, sent a dossier detailing alleged war crimes committed by the 57 Division to the German Federal Foreign Office
The ECCHR followed the military offensives as described by the Sri Lankan military, examined reports produced by the Sri Lankan government and NGOs, and talked to eyewitnesses present in the conflict area. The dossier concluded that many violations of international law were committed by the Sri Lankan military and the Tigers, particularly war crimes. The dossier supports the view of the US embassy in Colombo that the senior military and civilian leaders were responsible for these crimes. The dossier urges the German government
to investigate Dias' individual criminal responsibility, withdraw his diplomatic visa and declare him persona non grata
.
In August 2011 the Society for Threatened Peoples
and TRIAL - Swiss Association against Impunity filed a criminal complaint with the Public Ministry of Switzerland against Dias for alleged war crimes. Dias dismissed the war crimes allegations as "baseless, unfounded and non-substantiated allegations. Fictions, not facts". The Swiss government subsequently confirmed it had distressed the alleged war crimes with Dias. On 14 September 2011 Dias was recalled to Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan government claimed that he was returning to Sri Lankan because his two-year term had come to an end but reports in the media suggested that he had been stripped of his diplomatic immunity and the recall was was to prevent war crimes charges being filed against him. The Swiss federal prosecutor has announced that a criminal investigation against Dias would commence if he ever returned to Switzerland.
A confidential UN report dated 26 April 2009 comparing UNOSAT
images of the Safe Zone taken between 5 February 2009 and 19 April 2009 was leaked the media. The images showed numerous craters caused by shelling. The main finding of the report was that "there are new indications of building destruction and damages resulting from shelling and possible air-strikes". The report found that 60 main buildings had been destroyed to date in the Safe Zone but this excluded temporary structures erected by the IDPs as it was not possible to identify damage to these using satellite images. Over 5,000 IDP shelters had also been relocated during April 2009 due the shelling and bombardment. There was evidence of hundreds of craters and heavy damage to buildings outside the Safe Zone. The report concluded that damage estimates were a minimum and that the "actual damages are likely to be greater". The accuracy of some of the damage suggested that it could only have been done by air-dropped bombs. Although the report not apportion blame, given that Tamil Tigers' air wing had been destroyed in early 2009, this damage could only have been caused by the Sri Lankan Air Force
. After being confronted with the UN satellite images during an interview with Al Jazeera
Sri Lankan Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona
admitted that the Sri Lankan armed forces had carried out shelling and air raids in the Safe Zone. This contradicted the statements by the Sri Lankan government and President Rajapaksa, and an earlier statement by Kohona himself, that there was no shelling by the Sri Lankan armed forces in the Safe Zone.
Following a request from Amnesty International
and Human Rights Watch
the American Association for the Advancement of Science
compared commercial high-resolution satellite images of the Safe Zone taken on 6 May 2009 and 10 May 2009 to evaluate the impact of heavy fighting on 9/10 May. They found evidence of significant removal of IDP shelters, artillery and mortar emplacements, destroyed permanent structures, bomb shell impact craters and 1,346 individual graves. By calculating the trajectory of the shells which caused the craters the AAAS was able to conclude that the shells came from Sri Lankan Army
territory.
US government satellites had been monitoring the war zone secretly. In April 2009 the US State Department released two satellite images of the Safe Zone showing 100,000 civilians trapped in 8 square miles (20.7 km²) area. The State Department report to Congress (above) included a number of images taken by US government satellites. The images showed that Puthukkudiyiruppu Hospital had been heavily damaged between 28 January 2009 and 16 March 2009.
On 25 August 2009 Britain's Channel 4 News
broadcast mobile phone video of gunmen alleged to be Sri Lankan soldiers apparently summarily executing eight bound and blindfolded Tamil men at point-blank range in January 2009. The video was alleged to have been taken by a Sri Lankan government soldier and to have been circulating amongst soldiers before Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, a group of exiled Sri Lankan journalists, obtained it.
The Sri Lankan government rejected the video footage, calling it a fabrication. It established a four-member panel of Sri Lankan experts (Siri Hewawitharana, Chatura Ranjan de Silva, Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe and Major P. A. Bandara) to investigate the authenticity of the video. This panel produced a technical analysis of the video in early September which concluded that the video was fake. The independence of the Sri Lankan panel was questioned as two of the panel worked for the Sri Lankan military.
An investigation by a UN commissioned panel of independent experts (Peter Diaczuk, Daniel Spitz and Jeff Spivack) found that the video was authentic. In a point-by-point repudiation of the Sri Lankan government's assessment, the experts concluded that the reaction and movement of the victims' bodies and blood evidence were consistent with being shot; the movement of the weapon and the shooter and the gases expelled from the muzzle were consistent with live ammunition firing, not blank cartridges; there was no evidence of breaks in continuity in the video, no additional video layers; and no evidence of image manipulation; and that video had been filmed on a mobile phone, not a camcorder, as the Sri Lankan government's analysis had maintained. The experts were unable to explain 17 frames at the end of the video but this did not invalidate its authenticity.
The independent experts' findings led Philip Alston
, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, to call for "an independent inquiry to carry out an impartial investigation into war crimes and other grave violations of international humanitarian and human rights law allegedly committed in Sri Lanka."
as a 50-minute special titled Sri Lanka's Killing Fields
on Channel 4
on 14 June 2011. The special features films shot during the last stages of the war that appear to show the shelling of areas in the no-fire zone and the aftermath, executions of captured LTTE combatants and dead female Tamil fighters being loaded on to a truck. Videos used in the first half were shot by individuals in the no-fire zone while the latter half seemingly shows mobile phone footage shot by the Sri Lankan soldiers. The same program was broadcast in Australia on ABC TV 4 Corners program on 4 July 2011 presenting allegations that up to 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed by shelling or executions after surrender in many cases after being sexually abused.
The Sri Lankan government has responded in multiple ways including questioning Channel 4's "standards and fairness". The video was to be shown to British MPs and parliamentary officials at a special showing in the House of Commons. Following the documentary on the Sri Lankan civil war, the UK called for the Sri Lankan government to launch an investigation following allegations of war crimes, as many times earlier as well.
Criticism has been levelled at the program from many parties. According to the SL Government website, AA Gill of UK Sunday Times wrote "Not a second of this has been shot by Channel 4; none of the eyewitness accounts comes from journalists" and said "Jon Snow's commentary was intemperate and partisan, and it was all held together by assumptions". It went on to state what its general claimed were inconsistencies in the report . Ofcom
investigated Channel 4's documentary after more than 100 complaints were received saying that it was misleading and misrepresentative. However, Ofcom found the documentary to be 'not in breach' of any regulations.
In July 2011, Channel 4 exclusively revealed two individuals who witnessed the final violent stage on May 2009 who claimed a military commander and Sri Lanka's defence secretary ordered war crimes. One stated "They shot people at random. Stabbed people. Raped them. Cut out their tongues, cut women's breasts off. I saw people soaked in blood."
(GTF), an umbrella group for Tamil diaspora groups, published photographs that appeared to show the massacre of civilians and execution of Tamil Tigers. The photos showed blood stained bodies of young men and women with blindfolds and hands tied behind their backs. The GTF could not verify the authenticity of the photographs. It had obtained them from a Tamil Tiger intelligence official who said they had obtained the photos from someone in the Sri Lankan Army. The Sri Lankan government rejected the photos as an attempt to tarnish Sri Lanka's image.
On 10 November 2010 Al Jazeera
broadcast photographs that appeared to show the aftermath of Sri Lankan Army soldiers massacring civilians and executing Tamil Tigers in the final stages of the civil war. The graphic images showed dead bodies piled on top of each other, often naked. One of the photos showed what is believed to be the dead body of Prabhakaran's son. Some of the photos showed naked bodies with blindfolds and hands tied behind their backs. They appear to have been executed. Al Jazeera could not verify the authenticity of the photographs. It had obtained them from Tamils who said they had obtained the photos from someone in the Sri Lankan military. The Sri Lankan government reacted by calling the photos lies and fabrications. It claimed that some of the photos were the same as those broadcast by Channel 4 News in May 2010. Amnesty International reacted by stating that the photos were evidence that there needs to be an independent international investigation into what happened in the final stages of the civil.
On 18 May 2010 Channel 4 News
broadcast interviews with two people who claimed they were Sri Lankan soldiers and who made the allegation that they had been given orders from "the top" to summarily execute all ethnic Tamils, civilians as well as fighters. A senior commander claimed "the order would have been to kill everybody and finish them off..It is clear that such orders were...from the top". Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
, President Rajapaksa
's brother, was said to have given direct orders to army commanders at the battle front. It was also claimed in the story that Velupillai Prabhakaran
's 13-year old son Balachandran was interrogated by the Sri Lankan military before being shot. A front line soldier said "our commander ordered us to kill everyone. We killed everyone". The soldier claimed that the Tamils were tortured before being executed. Numerous photos taken by Sri Lankan soldiers showing dead bodies and Tamil prisoners were also shown in the broadcast. No audio of the actual commander or the front line soldier making the claims were aired to protect their identity, a standard practice.
newspaper published an interview with General Sarath Fonseka
, commander of the Sri Lankan armed forces during the final months of the war, in which he claimed that Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
had ordered an army commander at the battlefront to shoot dead all Tamil Tiger leaders who tried to surrender. Fonseka claimed that during the final days of the civil war senior Tamil Tiger leaders were trying to arrange their surrender by communicating with Basil Rajapaksa, senior adviser to President Rajapaksa, via Norway and other foreign governments. Basil Rajapaksa then informed his brother Gotabhaya Rajapaksa about the attempts surrender. Fonseka claimed that Gotabhaya Rajapaksa ordered Brigadier Shavendra Silva, commander of the Sri Lankan Army’s 58 Division
, not to allow the Tamil Tiger leaders to surrender and directed that “they must all be killed". Two Tamil Tiger leaders, Balasingham Nadesan
and Seevaratnam Pulidevan, contacted Norwegian minister Erik Solheim
and stated that they wanted to surrender. Solheim informed the Red Cross in Colombo who in turn informed the Sri Lankan government. Fonseka claimed that the Rajapaksa brothers, via foreign governments, told the Tamil Tigers leaders to “Get a piece of white cloth, put up your hands and walk towards the other side in a non-threatening manner”. Fonseka claimed that on the night of 17/18 May 2009 Nadesan, Pulidevan, Ramesh and their families were all shot dead by the Sri Lankan Army as they tried to surrender.
There was uproar in Sri Lanka when the "Sunday Leader" article was published. The government's Human Rights Minister, Mahinda Samarasinghe
, said General Fonseka's statements were lies that had damaged the image of the country, and characterised them as the biggest betrayal of its kind in Sri Lanka's history. As an apparent consequence of the "Sunday Leader" article, and just twelve days after his evident defeat in the Sri Lankan presidential election, General Fonseka was arrested by military forces on February 8, 2010. The military based the arrest, it said, on allegations of "committing military offences", but it offered no details. The director general of the government's Media Centre for National Security told state TV that Fonseka will be tried by a military tribunal. His ongoing detention was subsequently attributed to civil and criminal charges including inciting the public against the government. During the previous month's run-up to the presidential election, Fonseka and his aides had moved into a luxurious Colombo hotel on January, 26, 2010, election day. According to Time
magazine, "The hotel was soon surrounded by military. Fonseka complained that there was a threat to his life and that the government was limiting his movements. Authorities claimed that security had been increased around the hotel as a precaution, although several former military officers working on the Fonseka campaign were arrested as they left the hotel."
On May 12, 2010, after three months in military custody, the general said, according to the BBC, that the "Sunday Leader" newspaper had misquoted him, that he was innocent of any attempt to incite the public, and that the case was part of an attempt to silence him. Then, while still in military custody, Fonseka seemed to downplay his earlier claim that Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa had ordered the killing of Tamil Tiger rebels as they were trying to surrender in May, 2009. The BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo noted, however, that Fonseka did not make a blanket denial that no war crimes had been committed, but rather stipulated that no war crimes took place to his knowledge. Next, in a June 7, 2010 interview with the BBC's Hard Talk programme Defence Secretary Rajapaksa threatened to execute Fonseka if he testified at an independent war crimes investigation, stating "He can't do that..That is a treason. We will hang him if he do that." The next day, June 8, 2010, General Fonseka denied having told lies or having committing treason when speaking of the possibility of war crimes being committed during fighting against Tamil Tiger rebels.
After his arrest Fonseka was charged with a number of civilian and military offences. On 13 August 2010 Fonseka was found guilty of engaging in politics while on active service by a court martial. He was stripped of his rank and medals. On 17 September 2010 Fonseka was found guilty of breaching arms procurement guidelines (corruption) by a court martial. He was sentenced to 30 months rigorous imprisonment and stripped of his parliamentary seat. Fonseka is currently being tried in a civilian court on accusations of spreading public disaffection in respect of the "white flag" case.
During a counter-insurgency
seminar conducted by Sri Lanka Army in June 2011, Lawrence Smith - an attaché of the American embassy in Sri Lanka from 2008 revealed "...from what I was privileged to hear and to see, the offers to surrender that I am aware of seemed to come from the mouthpieces of the LTTE -- Nadesan
, KP -- people who weren't and never had really demonstrated any control over the leadership or the combat power of the LTTE. So their offers were a bit suspect anyway, and they tended to vary in content hour by hour, day by day. I think we need to examine the credibility of those offers before we leap to conclusions that such offers were in fact real..." However the US State Department
characterized the statement as "personal opinion".
made a plea for international attention to what she called a possible government-sponsored genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka. She cited reports of camps into which Tamils were being herded as part of what she described as "a brazen, openly racist war". She also mentioned that the "Government of Sri Lanka is on the verge of committing what could end up being genocide
" and described the Sri Lankan IDP camps
where Tamil civilians are being held as concentration camps. A Sri Lankan writer called Roy's remarks "ill-informed and hypocritical" and criticized her for "whitewashing the atrocities of the LTTE". Roy has said of such accusations: "I cannot admire those whose vision can only accommodate justice for their own and not for everybody. However I do believe that the LTTE and its fetish for violence was cultured in the crucible of monstrous, racist, injustice that the Sri Lankan government and to a great extent Sinhala society visited on the Tamil people for decades."
, Mexico's Ambassador to the United Nations and president of the United Nations Security Council
said, 'We demand that the LTTE immediately lay down arms, renounce terrorism, allow a UN-assisted evacuation of the remaining civilians in the conflict area, and join the political process.' He added that they 'strongly condemned the LTTE, a terrorist organisation, for the use of civilians as human shields and for not allowing them to leave the area'. He also urged the Sri Lankan government to "abide by international humanitarian law" with regards to access to refugees. The meeting was not a formal session of the Security Council and the president's statements were non-binding.
made the comment, ".....After all, both General Fonseka and Mr. Rajapaksa executed the 30-year conflict to its bloody conclusion at the expense of huge numbers of Tamil civilian casualties.
By early May, when the war was ending, the United Nations estimated that some 7,000 civilians had died and more than 10,000 had been wounded in 2009 as the army’s noose was being drawn tight around the remaining rebels and hundreds of thousands of noncombatants, who could not escape government shelling. The final two weeks likely saw thousands more civilians killed, at the hands of both the army and the rebels.
and Bernard Kouchner
made the comment,
In April 2009, we travelled together as foreign ministers to Sri Lanka, as 25 years of fighting between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers neared its end.
The remaining fighters were trapped in the northern most part of the country — along with large numbers of civilians. U.N. estimates put the numbers of civilians there in the last few months of the war at over 300,000.
We visited refugee camps that had been created to house Tamil refugees from Jaffna. Their stories were brutal and shocking. Random shelling in areas of fighting — including after the government had announced an end to fighting. Men and boys taken away from refugee camps — and now out of contact. Tamil life treated as fourth or fifth class. If foreign policy is about anything, it should be about stopping this kind of inhumanity.............Restrictions on journalism meant that there was a war without witness in Sri Lanka.............It seems to us essential that this process is taken forward. As the report says, accountability is a duty under domestic and international law, and those responsible, including Sri Lanka Army commanders and senior government officials, would bear criminal liability for international crimes.............Kofi Annan has said that the international community cannot be selective in its approach to upholding the rule of law. We therefore call on our governments to set a deadline, soon, for satisfactory response from the Sri Lankan government, and if it is not forthcoming to initiate the international arrangements recommended by the report.............Reports like the one compiled for the secretary general must not stand on the shelf. They must be the basis of action. Or the law becomes an ass."
has used networking sites such as Twitter and MySpace to discuss and highlight the human rights abuses Sri Lanka is accused of perpetrating against Tamils. M.I.A. has joined other activists in condemning the actions of the Sri Lankan government against the Tamils during the civil war
as "systematic genocide". Sri Lanka's Foreign Secretary denied that his country perpetrated genocide, responding that he felt M.I.A. was "misinformed" and that she should "stay with what she's good at, which is music, not politics." Consequently, she has been accused of being a "terrorist sympathiser" and "LTTE supporter" by the Sri Lankan government, whose agents have threatened listeners with prosecution if they post her music videos on the internet. M.I.A. endorsed candidate Jan Jananayagam
at the 2009 European Parliament election
, a last minute candidate and long standing critic of multiple international policy failures towards the Tamil national self determination question, who stood on a platform of anti-genocide, civil liberties, financial transparency, the environment and women's rights and became the most successful independent election candidates ever in UK electoral history. Death threats directed at M.I.A. and her son have followed her activism, which she also cited as an influence on the songs on her album Maya. In 2010, she condemned China's role in supporting and supplying arms to the Sri Lankan government during the conflict in an interview with music magazine Mondomix, stating that China's influence within the UN was preventing prosecutions of war crimes committed during the conflict. Her 2010 music video "Born Free
" refilmed the trophy videos of war crimes that were broadcast by Channel 4
, with the Tamils substituted for red headed
people.
, South Africa's ruling party released a statement in January 2009 calling from an end to the violence and an immediate ceasefire and access to humanitarian aid, expressing increasing alarm that the "continued conflict in Sri Lanka has been cited on the human rights watch international monitoring mechanisms as a conflict now reaching genocidal proportions."
party J. Jayalalitha issued a statement on 27 April 2011 welcoming the report, stating that it confirmed the "human rights violations and brutal repression that was earlier in the realm of speculation or dismissed as biased or partisan reportage". The statement urged the Indian government to take steps to "bring Mahinda Rajapakshe to stand trial for war crimes and genocide along with his generals, senior ministers and all others who were party to the brutal excesses". Jayalalitha was sworn in as the Chief Minister of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu
on 16 May 2011.
The Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly passed unanimously a resolution on 8 June 2011 which, based on the report, accused Sri Lanka of: failure in constitutionally resolving the righteous demands of Tamils since independence; working for complete extermination of Tamils in the island; mass killings of innocent Tamils, other atrocities and failure in humanitarian action during the war; continued human rights abuses after the war; and human rights abuses on media persons and others outside of the war zone. The resolution urged the Indian central government
to impose economic sanctions against Sri Lanka until Tamils are given equal rights and to press the UN to declare as “war criminals” those who committed alleged war crimes during the conflict in Sri Lanka.
In an official state visit to Chennai, Hillary Clinton discussed the Tamil situation at length with J. Jayalalitha, contrary to claims beforehand from India's Central Government that the matter would not be broached. Clinton stated that the United States was looking at "creative and innovative ways" to break the impasse over Sri Lanka.
doctrine established by the UN in 2005, Noam Chomsky
said:
Chomsky was responding to a question that referred to Jan Egeland
, former head of the UN's Humanitarian Affairs' earlier statement that R2P was a failure in Sri Lanka.
raised the observation:
"The targeting of civilians is a war crime. If proved, these charges go right up the chain of command of Sri Lanka's military and government. If Iran stands condemned for killing hundreds in the wake of the June 2009 election, if Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic now face justice in The Hague, if Bashar al-Assad faces UN sanctions for an assault that has killed 1,300 Syrians, how it is that President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother, the defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, escape all censure, after over 40,000 civilians were killed?
That the LTTE assassinated presidents and invented the suicide belt, that the Tigers used civilians as human shields, is no defence from the charge that Sri Lankan soldiers summarily executed prisoners in their custody. Sri Lanka is trying to pretend these events are history, as the economy and tourism pick up. They are not. This evidence has to be faced."
raised the observation, ".........Ban Ki-Moon insists that an international investigation can only be launched with the consent of the Sri Lankan Government, but an investigation would also be inconvenient for the UN as when it pulled out of the country in 2008 Sri Lankan cried out for help and asked the organisation to stay as they already knew how the situation would end."
and The Sunday Times
in late May 2009 related investigations the papers had conducted that revealed more than 20,000 Tamil civilians were killed in the final throes of the Sri Lankan civil war, most as a result of government shelling. In a commentary that admonished the murder of journalists with impunity, The Times raised the observation that Sri Lanka’s sacrifice of life may sow seeds of a "new conflict".
accused the United Nations (UN) of deliberately hiding facts about civilian deaths during the last months of the war in order to protect possible complicity in crimes committed in the Vanni.
raised the observation:
"President Rajapaksa would be well advised to distance himself swiftly from his brother's stream-of-consciousness on sensitive issues that are not his business. This includes an outrageous comment that because a Tamil woman, an “LTTE cadre” who was a British national, interviewed in the Channel 4 documentary was “so attractive” but had been neither raped nor killed by Sri Lankan soldiers, the allegation of sexual assault by soldiers could not be true. For this statement alone, Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa must be taken to task."
Alistair Burt
Alistair James Hendrie Burt is a British Conservative Party politician. He is the Member of Parliament for North East Bedfordshire...
, there is a convincing evidence that violations of international humanitarian and human rights law, were committed by the Sri Lankan military
Sri Lanka Armed Forces
The Sri Lanka Armed Forces is the overall unified military of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka encompassing the Sri Lanka Army, the Sri Lanka Navy, the Sri Lanka Air Force which comes under preview of the Ministry of Defence...
and the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam was a separatist militant organization formerly based in northern Sri Lanka. Founded in May 1976 by Vellupillai Prabhakaran, it waged a violent secessionist and nationalist campaign to create an independent state in the north and east of Sri Lanka for Tamil...
(Tamil Tigers) during the Sri Lankan Civil War
Sri Lankan civil war
The Sri Lankan Civil War was a conflict fought on the island of Sri Lanka. Beginning on July 23, 1983, there was an on-and-off insurgency against the government by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam , a separatist militant organization which fought to create an independent Tamil state named Tamil...
, particularly during the final months of the conflict in 2009.
The alleged war crimes include attacks on civilians and civilian buildings by both sides; executions of combatants and prisoners by both sides; enforced disappearances by the Sri Lankan military and paramilitary groups backed by them; acute shortages of food, medicine, and clean water for civilians trapped in the war zone; and child recruitment by the Tamil Tigers. A United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
expert panel investigating violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the final stages of the civil war found "credible evidence" and "credible allegations" which, if proven, indicated that war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by the Sri Lankan military and the Tamil Tigers. The panel has called on the UN Secretary General to conduct an independent international inquiry into the alleged violations of international law.The United States welcomed the UN Panel of Experts’ report on Sri Lanka. In a statement by Ambassador Susan E. Rice, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, said, "We appreciate the detailed and extensive work of the panel and believe it makes a valuable contribution to next steps that should be taken in support of justice, accountability, human rights, and reconciliation in Sri Lanka." In an April 2009 report to U.S. Congress, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said "I think that the Sri Lankan Government knows that the entire world is very disappointed that in its efforts to end what it sees as 25 years of conflict, it is causing such untold suffering."
War crimes are prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, of which Sri Lanka is a signatory. In 2002 the International Criminal Court
International Criminal Court
The International Criminal Court is a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression .It came into being on 1 July 2002—the date its founding treaty, the Rome Statute of the...
(ICC) was created by the Rome Statute to prosecute individuals for serious crimes, such as war crimes. Sri Lanka is not a signatory of the Rome Statute. Therefore it is only possible for the ICC to investigate and prosecute war crimes in Sri Lanka if the UN Security Council was to refer Sri Lanka to the ICC, which is unlikely. However, individual countries may investigate and prosecute alleged culprits over whom they have jurisdiction, such as those with dual-nationality. In addition, a number of countries apply universal jurisdiction
Universal jurisdiction
Universal jurisdiction or universality principle is a principle in public international law whereby states claim criminal jurisdiction over persons whose alleged crimes were committed outside the boundaries of the prosecuting state, regardless of nationality, country of residence, or any other...
in respect of certain crimes, such as war crimes, allowing them to prosecute individuals irrespective of where the crime was committed, the nationality of the culprits and the nationality of the victims.
Background
The Tamil Tigers had been waging a full scale war for an independentIndependence
Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state in which its residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory....
state of Tamil Eelam
Tamil Eelam
Tamil Eelam , is the name given by certain Tamils in Sri Lanka and the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora to the independent state which they aspire to create in the north and east of Sri Lanka. Tamil Eelam has no official status or recognition by any other state or authority...
in the North
Northern Province, Sri Lanka
The Northern Province is one of the 9 provinces of Sri Lanka. The provinces have existed since the 19th century but did not have any legal status until 1987 when the 13th Amendment to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka established provincial councils. Between 1988 and 2006 the province was...
and East
Eastern Province, Sri Lanka
The Eastern Province is one of the 9 provinces of Sri Lanka. The provinces have existed since the 19th century but they didn't have any legal status until 1987 when the 13th Amendment to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka established provincial councils. Between 1988 and 2006 the province was...
of Sri Lanka since 1983. After the failure of the Norwegian
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
mediated peace process in 2006 the Sri Lankan military launched offensives aimed at recapturing territory controlled by the Tamil Tigers. By July 2007 the military had recaptured all of the east. The military offensive in the north escalated in October 2008 as the Sri Lankan military attacked the Vanni
Vanni (Sri Lanka)
The Vanni is the name given to the mainland area of the Northern Province, Sri Lanka. It covers the entirety of Mannar, Mullaitivu and Vavuniya Districts, and most of Kilinochchi District. It has an area of approximately 7,650 km2...
heartland of the Tamil Tigers. After successive defeats the Tamil Tigers were forced to retreat to the north-east coast in Mullaitivu District
Mullaitivu District
Mullaitivu district is one of the 25 administrative districts of Sri Lanka. The district is administered by a District Secretariat headed by a District Secretary appointed by the central government of Sri Lanka. The headquarters is located in Mullaitivu town...
. The civilian population of the Vanni also fled. The Sri Lankan government has alleged that the civilians were forced to do so by the Tamil Tigers. By January 2009 the Tamil Tigers and the civilians were trapped in a small piece of land on the north-east coast.
As the Sri Lankan military advanced further into Tamil Tiger controlled areas, international concern grew for the fate of the 350,000 civilians trapped. On 21 January 2009 the Sri Lankan military declared a 32 square kilometres (12.4 sq mi) Safe Zone 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) north-west of Puthukkudiyiruppu
Puthukkudiyiruppu (Mullaitivu)
Puthukkudiyiruppu is a small town in the Mullaitivu District of Sri Lanka.There are four main roads which lead to Mullaithivu in the east, Paranthan towards west, Iranaipalai towards north and Oddusuddan towards south...
, between the A35 highway and Chalai Lagoon
Chalai Lagoon
Chalai Lagoon is a lagoon in Mullaitivu District, north-east Sri Lanka. The town of Chalai is located on a sand bar between the lagoon and the Indian Ocean....
. According to the Sri Lankan the purpose of the Safe Zone was to allow the trapped civilians to cross into territory controlled by the military. However, very few civilians actually crossed into the military territory. The Sri Lankan military, UN and human rights organisations accused the Tamil Tigers of preventing the civilians from leaving.
The fighting between the military and the Tamil Tigers continued, causing the civilians to flee from the Safe Zone to a narrow strip of land between Nanthi Kadal
Nanthi Kadal
Nanthi Kadal is a lagoon in Mullaitivu District, north-east Sri Lanka. The English translation of Nanthi Kadal is "the sea of conches".The lagoon is fed by a number of small rivers, including Per Aru....
lagoon and the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean
The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering approximately 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by the Indian Subcontinent and Arabian Peninsula ; on the west by eastern Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and...
. On 12 February 2009 the military declared a new 10 square kilometres (3.9 sq mi) Safe Zone in this area, north-west of Mullaitivu
Mullaitivu
Mullaitivu is a small town on the north-eastern coast of Sri Lanka. It is the capital of Mullaitivu District in the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. A largely fishing settlement, the town in the early 20th century grew as an anchoring harbour of the small sailing vessels transporting goods between...
town. Over the next three months a brutal siege of the Safe Zone occurred as the military allegedly blitzed by land and air the last remnants of Tamil Tigers trapped in the Safe Zone. Satellite images of the Safe Zone publishes by the UN, foreign governments and scientific organisations showed heavy damage that could have only been caused by bombardment. Inevitably many thousands of civilians were killed or injured. The UN, based on credible witness evidence from aid agencies as well civilians evacuated from the Safe Zone by sea, estimated that 6,500 civilians were killed and another 14,000 injured between mid-January, when the Safe Zone was first declared, and mid-April. There are no official casualty figures after this period but a report in The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
claims that that civilian deaths increased to an average of 1,000 per day after mid-April 2009. The UN has refused to confirm the Times' allegations. Estimates of the death toll for the final four months of the civil war (mid-January to mid-May) range from 15,000 to 20,000. A US State Department report has suggested that the actual casualty figures were probably much higher than the UN's estimates and that significant numbers of casualties were not recorded. As the civil war edged towards a bitter end in late April/early May the number of civilians leaving the Safe Zone turned from a trickle to a torrent. On 19 May the Sri Lankan government declared victory.
After the end of the war a number of countries and human rights organisations called for an independent investigation into the final stages of the civil war.
Accusations
International organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have accused both sides in Sri Lanka's long-running conflict of deliberately putting civilians at risk to pursue military objectives. Nearly 70,000 people were displaced due to aerial bombardment and artillery attacks by government forces in MullaitivuMullaitivu
Mullaitivu is a small town on the north-eastern coast of Sri Lanka. It is the capital of Mullaitivu District in the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. A largely fishing settlement, the town in the early 20th century grew as an anchoring harbour of the small sailing vessels transporting goods between...
and Kilinochchi
Kilinochchi
Kilinochchi is a city in the Kilinochchi District, part of the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. Kilinochchi is situated at the A9 road some south-east of Jaffna...
, the organisations said. And in the LTTE-controlled Vanni
Vanni
Vanni may refer to:* Vanni , an area of northern Sri Lanka* Vanni Electoral District, an electoral district of Sri Lanka* Vanni Wang, international fashion designer China, USA...
area, the Tigers have hindered thousands of families from moving to safer places by imposing a strict pass system and, in some instances, forcing some family members to stay behind to ensure the return of the rest of the family. These measures seem designed in part to use civilians as a buffer against government forces - a serious violation of international humanitarian law. "Both sides to this long conflict have again shown that they will jeopardise the lives of thousands of ordinary people in the pursuit of military objectives," said Amnesty International spokesperson Yolanda Foster. "In the absence of independent international monitors, Sri Lankan civilians lack protection and remain at the mercy of two forces with long records of abuse."
The Sri Lankan government has furiously rejected all claims that its forces committed war crimes. In a June 2010 speech, President Rajapaksa insisted that his soldiers did not kill a single civilian. “Our troops carried a gun in one hand and a copy of the human rights charter in the other,” the president said. These statements are at odds with multiple independent sources; the United Nations itself has said that at least 7,000 ethnic Tamil civilians died in the first four months of last year, just before the government claimed final victory over the Tigers, and high-level United States officials have said, “The US has strong, credible allegations of evidence of atrocities during the prosecution of the war against the Tamil Tigers."
UN Commission of Human Rights 43rd session
In March 1987, a draft resolution expressing concern at reports submitted by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, the Report of the Special Rapporteur on Summary Executions and the Report of the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances in Sri Lanka was submitted by Argentina to the now defunct United Nations Commission on Human RightsUnited Nations Commission on Human Rights
The United Nations Commission on Human Rights was a functional commission within the overall framework of the United Nations from 1946 until it was replaced by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2006...
. The resolution admonished Sri Lanka being caught in a spiral of violence and its use of torture against the civilian population. Sri Lanka reacted with shock and anger to the conflict being brought to the agenda. The resolution, calling upon all parties and groups to renounce the use of force and acts of violence and to pursue a negotiated political solution, based on principles of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, received wide support from Latin American, African, Western European countries and India. The resolution needed a 12 vote majority to pass. Two detailed reports on Arrest, Detention and Torture in Sri Lanka, and the other on Extrajudicial and Arbitrary Killings were distributed among delegates. Norway, Canada, Belgium and Australia joined Argentina in moving to support the original resolution in private, while thirteen non-governmental organisations in their joint statement to the commission stated "The situation (in Sri Lanka) is so grave that it warrants exceptional and urgent consideration by this distinguished Commission. We appeal to the conscience of the distinguished delegates and the governments they represent to ensure that all essential steps are undertaken in terms of international human rights and humanitarian law". They deplored the use of foreign mercenaries by Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka sought Britain, France and the United State's support. These countries expressed concern at the Rapporteur and Working Group's reports. British mercenaries of the secret KMS unit working in support of the Sri Lankan Government had left the island that year because of atrocities committed against the Tamil population, walking out after complaining that the Sri Lankan Special Task Force "was running out of control and was indiscriminately killing and torturing Tamil civilians". Sri Lanka sought Pakistan's aid in submitting a counter resolution extolling the efforts of the Sri Lankan Government and condemning Tamil groups. This counter resolution was not considered by the commission.
Given Sri Lanka and Argentina's then membership in the Non-Aligned Movement
Non-Aligned Movement
The Non-Aligned Movement is a group of states considering themselves not aligned formally with or against any major power bloc. As of 2011, the movement had 120 members and 17 observer countries...
and gradual build up of support for the resolution, the Sri Lankan Government eventually agreed to negotiate a consensus resolution with the other commission members as a compromise, with mediation conducted by Senegal. The sessions proved incredibly heated in their exchanges, and at one stage co-sponsors Argentina, Canada and Norway threatened to abandon any negotiations and pass the original resolution. A Belgian delegate stated "We now know how Sri Lanka has been conducting negotiations with the Tamils on the ethnic problem". Eventually, the UNHRC passed Commission Resolution 1987/61 unanimously, a revised resolution of E/CN. 4/1987/L. 74/Rev. 1 on 12 March 1987 that called upon the government to intensify its cooperation with the ICRC in the field of dissemination and promotion of international humanitarian law but amended with criticism on torture and disappearances removed. Martin Ennals
Martin Ennals
Martin Ennals was a British human rights activist.Ennals served as the Secretary-General of Amnesty International, between 1968 and 1980....
of International Alert
International Alert
International Alert is a London-based charity and international non-governmental organisation working to prevent and end violent conflict across the globe that marked its 20th anniversary in 2006...
stated in his intervening statement "....there can be no doubt that the security forces of the government of Sri Lanka have committed serious offences against civilians caught up in the internal conflict, that innocent civilians have been killed, not in the cross fire between factions but in the course of the day to day existence of family life..."
UN Human Rights Council 11th session
In May 2009 17 countries (Argentina, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Canada, Chile, France, Germany, Italy, Mauritius, Mexico, Netherlands, Slovenia, Slovakia, South Korea, Switzerland, Ukraine, Uruguay, and the United Kingdom) attempted to get the 11th session of the United Nations Human Rights CouncilUnited Nations Human Rights Council
The United Nations Human Rights Council is an inter-governmental body within the United Nations System. The UNHRC is the successor to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights , and is a subsidiary body of the United Nations General Assembly...
(UNHRC) to investigate war crimes in Sri Lanka. They put forward a resolution that deplored abuses by both the Sri Lankan government forces and the Tamil Tigers, urged the government to co-operate fully with humanitarian organisations and to provide protection to civilians and displaced persons, and made an appeal to the Sri Lankan government to respect media freedom and investigate attacks against journalists and human rights defenders. This was thwarted after the Sri Lankan government received support from China, Russia, India and developing countries.
The UNHRC instead passed resolution A/HRC/S-11/L.1/Rev.2 on 27 May 2009 which commended the Sri Lankan government's actions, condemned the Tamil Tigers and ignored allegations of violations of human rights and humanitarian law by government forces. This resolution was passed by 29 votes to 12 votes with 6 abstentions.
The UN expert panel report published in April 2011 has, based on its findings, recommended that the Human Rights Council reconsider resolution A/HRC/S-11/L.1/Rev.2.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
On 25 October 2009 the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human RightsOffice of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is a United Nations agency that works to promote and protect the human rights that are guaranteed under international law and stipulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948...
called for an independent, international investigation of possible war crimes committed during the last few months of the war in Sri Lanka.
UN Secretary - General's advisory panel
In June 2010 UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moonBan Ki-moon
Ban Ki-moon is the eighth and current Secretary-General of the United Nations, after succeeding Kofi Annan in 2007. Before going on to be Secretary-General, Ban was a career diplomat in South Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in the United Nations. He entered diplomatic service the year he...
appointed a three-member panel of experts to advise him on whether war crimes were committed in the final stages of the civil war. The panel consisted of Marzuki Darusman (Indonesia - chair), Steven Ratner (USA) and Yasmin Sooka (South Africa). The panel looked into "accountability with regard to any alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law" and whether the commitment on "human rights accountability" given by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa
Mahinda Rajapaksa
Percy Mahendra "Mahinda" Rajapaksa ; ; born November 18, 1945) is the 6th and current President of Sri Lanka and Commander in Chief of the Sri Lankan Armed Forces. A lawyer by profession, Rajapaksa was first elected to the Parliament of Sri Lanka in 1970, and served as prime minister from April 6,...
to Ban Ki-moon has been implemented. The panel examined "the modalities, applicable international standards and comparative experience with regard to accountability processes, taking into account the nature and scope of any alleged violations in Sri Lanka".
The Sri Lankan government reacted angrily to the panel's appointment, calling it "an unwarranted and unnecessary interference with a sovereign nation". It stated that the panel would not be allowed to enter Sri Lanka, a move criticised by Darusman. The panel's appointment was welcomed by the United States and EU but criticised by Russia and China. The panel met for the first time on 19 July 2010.
On 12 April 2011 the panel handed over its report, the Report of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability In Sri Lanka, to the Secretary-General who passed on a copy to the Sri Lankan government. The Sri Lankan government immediately rejected the report as "fundamentally flawed" and "patently biased". The report was not initially made public to allow the Sri Lankan government time to make a formal reply. On 16 April 2011 the report was published in The Island, an-independently owned nationalist Sri Lankan newspaper. It had been suggested that the Sri Lankan government leaked the report so that it can issue a full rebuttal before of the report is officially made public by the UN. The Sri Lankan government did not make a formal reply and on 25 April 2011 the UN published the full report.
The evidence obtained by the panel revealed a "a very different version of the final stages of the war than that maintained to this day by the Government of Sri Lanka". The panel found "credible allegations, which if proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law were committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity". The panel concluded that the "conduct of the war represented a grave assault on the entire regime of international law designed to protect individual dignity during both war and peace".
The panel found "credible allegations" that the Sri Lankan military/government killed civilians through widespread shelling; shelled hospitals and humanitarian objects; denied humanitarian assistance; violated the human rights of civilians and Tamil Tiger combatants; and it violated the human rights of those outside the conflict zone such as the media. The panel found "credible allegations" that the Tamil Tigers used civilians as a human buffer; killed civilians attempting to escape Tamil Tiger control; used military equipment in the proximity of civilians; forcibly recruited children; used forced labour; and killed civilians using suicide attacks.
Specific findings of the panel:
- The Sri Lankan military used large-scale and widespread shelling causing large numbers of civilian deaths. This constituted persecution of the population of the Vanni.
- The Tamil Tigers kept hostage 330,000 civilians who were fleeing the shelling and trapped in an ever decreasing area.
- The Sri Lankan government tried to intimidate and silence the media and other critics of the war using a variety of threats and actions, including the use of white vans to abduct and to make people disappear.
- The Sri Lankan military shelled on large scale the three Safe Zones where it had encouraged the civilian population to concentrate. It did this even after saying it would cease using heavy weapons.
- The Sri Lankan military shelled the UN hub, food distribution lines and Red Cross ships coming to rescue the wounded and their relatives. It did this despite having intelligence as well as notifications by the UN, Red Cross and others.
- Most of the civilian casualties were caused by Sri Lankan military shelling.
- The Sri Lankan military systematically shelled hospitals on the frontlines. All hospitals in the Vanni were hit by mortars and artillery, sometimes repeatedly, despite the Sri Lankan military knowing their locations.
- The Sri Lankan government systematically deprived civilians in the conflict zone of humanitarian aid, in the form of food and medical supplies, adding to their suffering. The government deliberately underestimated the number of civilians in order to deprive them of humanitarian aid.
- Tens of thousands of civilians were killed between January and May 2009. Many died anonymously in the final days.
- The Sri Lankan government subjected the civilians who managed to escape the conflict zone to further deprivation and suffering.
- Screening for Tamil Tigers took place without any transparency or external scrutiny. Some of those separated by the screening were summarily executed whilst women were raped. Others simply disappeared.
- All IDPs were detained in closed overcrowded campsSri Lankan IDP campsThe final stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War created 300,000 internally displaced persons who were transferred to camps in Vavuniya District and detained there against their will. This process, together with the conditions inside the camps and the slow progress of resettlement in 2009 had...
where they were deprived of their basic rights. The conditions in the camps resulted in many unnecessary deaths. - There were interrogations and torture in the camps. Suspected Tamil Tigers were taken to other facilities where they faced further abuse.
- The Tamil Tigers refused to allow civilians to leave the conflict zone and kept them as hostages. The civilians were sometimes used as human shields.
- The Tamil Tigers forcibly recruited members during whole civil war but this intensified during the final stages of the war. Some of the recruits were young as 14.
- The Tamil Tigers forced civilians to dig trenches, risking making them look like combatants.
- The Tamil Tigers kept on fighting even when it became clear they had lost in order to save the lives of its leaders. This futile prolonging of the conflict resulted many civilians dying unnecessarily.
- The Tamil Tigers shot at point blank any civilian trying to leave the conflict zone.
- The Tamil Tigers fired artillery from near civilians. They also stored military equipment near civilians and civilian structures such as hospitals.
- The Tamil Tigers carried out suicide attacks against civilians outside the conflict zone even during the final stages of the civil war.
The report states that the "credible allegations" demand a serious investigation and the prosecution of those responsible. If the allegations are proved senior commanders, military and political, on both sides are liable for prosecution under international criminal law. The panel noted the Sri Lankan government's attempt at accountability consisted solely of investigating the actions of the previous government and the Tamil Tigers, and not of the present government's actions during the final stages of the war. The panel concluded this is not in accordance with international standards and fell "dramatically short of international expectations". The panel found the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission
Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission
Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission is a commission of inquiry appointed by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa in May 2010 to look into events of the Sri Lankan Civil War between February 2002 and May 2009.-Background:...
(LLRC) established by the Sri Lankan government to be "deeply flawed" and not up to international standards of independence and impartiality due the "deep-seated conflicts of interests" of some of its members. The mandate of the LLRC, its work and methodology meant that it was incapable of investigating the serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law or of examining the causes of the civil war. The panel concluded that the LLRC could not satisfy the commitment on accountability given by President Rajapaksa and Bank Ki-moon.
The panel found that the Sri Lankan justice system was incapable of providing accountability. The independence of the Attorney General
Attorney General of Sri Lanka
The Attorney General of Sri Lanka is the Sri Lankan government's chief legal advisor, and its primary lawyer in the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. The Attorney General is usually a highly-respected Senior Advocate, and is appointed by the ruling government. The current Attorney General is Mohan...
had been eroded and the continuation of Emergency Regulations and the Prevention of Terrorism Act precluded the judiciary from holding the government accountable on human rights issues. Military courts and other domestic institutions were also incapable of providing accountability. The panel found that the government's triumphalism and the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora
Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora
The Sri Lankan Tamil Diaspora refers to the global diaspora of the people of Sri Lankan Tamil origin. It can be said to be a subset of the larger Sri Lankan as well as Tamil diaspora....
's inability to acknowledge the Tamil Tigers' role in the humanitarian disaster also hindered accountability.
The panel criticised the UN for not protecting civilians. It's reluctance to release casualty figures undermined the call to protect civilians.
The panel a number of recommendations including that there be an independent international inquiry into the alleged violations of international law and that the Sri Lankan government carry out genuine investigations of the alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights law committed by both sides.
In the final report the panel also admitted that the UN system knowingly failed to release the casualty figures of the civilians, avoided serious allegations against the role the UN officials and others and said that The Secretary-General should conduct a comprehensive review of actions by the United Nations system during the war in Sri Lanka and the aftermath, regarding the implementation of its humanitarian and protection mandates.
US Congress report
In October 2009 the US State Department submitted a detailed report to Congress' Committees on AppropriationsUnited States House Committee on Appropriations
The Committee on Appropriations is a committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is in charge of setting the specific expenditures of money by the government of the United States...
on incidents that happened during the final months of the conflict in Sri Lanka. The report detailed allegations that the majority of shelling into the Safe Zone was from Sri Lankan government forces; the government forces carried out shelling during a 48-hour "ceasefire"; the government forces unlawfully killed captives and combatants seeking to surrender, including senior Tamil Tigers; the government forces and paramilitary groups abducted and then killed Tamil civilians, particularly children and young men; there was an acute shortage of food, medicine and clean water despite government assurances that it would supply sufficient amounts; the Tamil Tigers forcibly prevented the escape of IDPs and used them as human shields; and that the Tamil Tigers forcibly recruited children. The report surmised that the allegations in the report "may constitute violations of international humanitarian law and/or crimes against humanity, and...human rights abuses".
The Sri Lankan government rejected the report but Stephen Rapp
Stephen Rapp
Stephen J. Rapp is an American lawyer and is currently United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues.-Career:...
, the United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues
United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues
The United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues is the head of the Office of War Crimes Issues in the United States Department of State. The ambassador-at-large advises the United States Secretary of State directly and formulates U.S. policy responses to atrocities committed in areas...
, subsequently called on Sri Lanka to investigate the allegations stating that sources used in the report "were credible and reliable and that allegations had been corroborated".
Permanent Peoples' Tribunal
Between 14 and 16 January 2010 the Permanent Peoples' TribunalPermanent Peoples' Tribunal
The Permanent Peoples' Tribunal is international opinion tribunal that was founded in Bologna June 24, 1979 at the initiative of Senator Lelio Basso. - International opinion tribunal :...
held a Tribunal on Sri Lanka in Dublin, Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
to investigate allegations that the Sri Lankan armed forces committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during its final phase of the war, and to examine violations of human rights in the aftermath of the war and the factors that led to the collapse of the 2002 ceasefire. The tribunal's 11-member panel of judges consisted of François Houtart
François Houtart
François Houtart is a Belgian marxist sociologist and Catholic priest.He studied philosophy and theology at the seminary of Mechelen and became a priest in 1949. He earned a masters degree in political and social sciences at the Catholic University of Leuven . He earned a degree at the...
(chair), Daniel Feierstein, Denis Halliday
Denis Halliday
Denis J. Halliday was the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq from September 1, 1997, until 1998. He is Irish and holds an M.A. in Economics, Geography and Public Administration from Trinity College, Dublin....
, Eren Keskin
Eren Keskin
Eren Keskin is a lawyer and human rights activist in Turkey.She is vice-president of the Turkish Human Rights Association and a former president of its Istanbul branch....
, Mary Lawlor, Francesco Martone, Nawal El Saadawi
Nawal El Saadawi
Nawal El Saadawi , born October 27, 1931, is an Egyptian feminist writer, activist, physician and psychiatrist. She has written many books on the subject of women in Islam, paying particular attention to the practice of female genital mutilation in her society....
, Rajinder Sachar
Rajinder Sachar
Rajindar Sachar is an Indian lawyer and a former Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court. He was also a member of United Nations Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities. He has also served as a counsel for the People's Union for Civil Liberties...
, Sulak Sivaraksa
Sulak Sivaraksa
Sulak Sivaraksa [] is founder and director of the Thai NGO “Sathirakoses-Nagapradeepa Foundation”, named after two authorities on Thai culture, Sathirakoses and Nagapradeepa...
, Gianni Tognoni and Oystein Tveter. The tribunal received reports from NGOs and human rights groups, victims’ testimony, eye-witness accounts including from members of the Sri Lankan armed forces, expert testimony, journalistic reports, video footage and photographs. Parts of the tribunal were held in camera
In camera
In camera is a legal term meaning "in private". It is also sometimes termed in chambers or in curia.In camera describes court cases that the public and press are not admitted to...
to protect the identity of witnesses. The tribunal found the Sri Lankan government guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The tribunal found numerous instances of human rights violations committed by the Sri Lankan government. Violations between 2006 (end of the ceasefire) and 2009 (end of the war) included: bombing civilian objectives like hospitals, schools and other non-military targets; bombing government-proclaimed ‘safety zones’ or ‘no fire zones’; withholding of food, water, and health facilities in war zones; use of heavy weaponry, banned weapons and air-raids; using food and medicine as a weapon of war; mistreatment, torture and execution of captured or surrendered Tamil Tiger combatants, officials and supporters; torture; rape and sexual violence against women; deportations and forcible transfer of individuals and families; and desecration of the dead. Violations committed in the IDP camps
Sri Lankan IDP camps
The final stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War created 300,000 internally displaced persons who were transferred to camps in Vavuniya District and detained there against their will. This process, together with the conditions inside the camps and the slow progress of resettlement in 2009 had...
included: shooting of Tamil citizens and Tamil Tiger supporters; forced disappearances; rape; malnutrition; and lack of medical supplies. There was also evidence of forced “disappearances” of targeted individuals from the Tamil population during the ceasefire (2002–2006).
The tribunal concluded that the human rights violations during the war (2006–2009) "clearly constitute war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan Government, its security forces and aligned paramilitary forces, as defined under the Geneva Conventions and in the Rome Statute (Article 8)." Sri Lanka is a signatory of the Geneva Convention but not the Rome Statute. The tribunal found that war crimes were committed irrespective of whether the civil war was considered to be an international conflict or as an internal armed conflict. The tribunal also found that human rights violations committed in the in the IDP camps and the forced disappearances during the ceasefire (2002–2006) "clearly constitute crimes against humanity" as defined under Article 7 of the Rome Statute. The tribunal could not find enough evidence to justify the charge of genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
but it requested that a thorough investigation be held as some of the evidence it had received indicated "possible acts of genocide". The tribunal could also not find enough evidence to justify the charge of crimes against the peace. The tribunal stated that the crimes committed by the Sri Lankan government against the Tamil Tigers could not be justified because "neither war crimes, nor crimes against humanity would be justified by any act committed by the victims". The tribunal found that the USA and UK undermined the ceasefire by pressurising the EU into designating the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist organisation. This allowed the Sri Lankan government to re-start the war and thus commit the human rights violations.
The tribunal made a number of recommendations to the Sri Lankan government, UN and international community, including that a UN special rapporteur be appointed to "investigate and identify responsibilities for human rights violations, violations of humanitarian law and war crimes committed by all parties in conflict". The tribunal's findings were completely rejected by the Sri Lankan government.
International Crisis Group report
In May 2010 the International Crisis GroupInternational Crisis Group
The International Crisis Group is an international, non-profit, non-governmental organization whose mission is to prevent and resolve deadly conflicts around the world through field-based analyses and high-level advocacy.-History:...
published a detailed report on war crimes during the final months of the civil war. The report collated vast amounts of evidence including numerous reliable eyewitness statements, hundreds of photographs, video, satellite images, electronic communications and documents from multiple credible sources. The report concluded that war crimes were committed by the Sri Lankan armed forces and the Tamil Tigers.
The report found credible evidence of intentional shelling of civilians by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shelling of hospitals by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shelling of humanitarian operations by the Sri Lankan armed forces; deliberate obstruction of food and medical treatment for the civilian population by the Sri Lankan armed forces; intentional shooting of civilians by the Tamil Tigers; and intentional infliction of suffering on civilians by the Tamil Tigers. The report found evidence that suggested that during 2009 tens of thousands of Tamil civilians were killed, countless wounded and hundreds of thousands deprived of basic food and medical care which resulted in further, unnecessary deaths. The report suggested that the actions of some members of the international community produced conditions which allowed war crimes to be committed.
The report made a number of recommendations, particularly that there should be an international investigation into alleged war crimes. The report stated that it was impossible for any domestic (Sri Lankan) investigation into the government/security forces to be impartial "given the entrenched culture of impunity". The report noted that although Sri Lanka was not a member of the International Criminal Court
International Criminal Court
The International Criminal Court is a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression .It came into being on 1 July 2002—the date its founding treaty, the Rome Statute of the...
and the UN Security Council was unlikely to refer Sri Lanka to the ICC, individual countries may investigate and prosecute alleged culprits over whom they have jurisdiction, such as those with dual-nationality. Sri Lanka's Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Lieutenant Colonel Nandasena Gotabaya Rajapaksa, RWP, RSP, psc, GR is a retired officer of the Sri Lanka Army and the current Defence Secretary of Sri Lanka. After serving through the early parts of the country's civil war with Tamil Tiger rebels, he retired from the Army in 1992...
holds dual US-Sri Lankan citizenship and Sarath Fonseka
Sarath Fonseka
Gardihewa Sarath Chandralal Fonseka, known as Sarath Fonseka is a former commander and General of the Sri Lanka Army and a former candidate for President of Sri Lanka. As Commander of the Army, he played an instrumental role in ending the 26 year Sri Lankan Civil War in 2009, defeating the...
, commander of the Sri Lankan armed forces during the final months of the war, has a US Green Card .
European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights and Jagath Dias
Following the end of the civil war many senior Sri Lankan military officers were appointed to diplomatic positions abroad. Major General Jagath Dias, who had been commander of 57 Division57 Division (Sri Lanka)
The 57 Division is a newly formed infantry division of the Sri Lanka Army. A principal offensive division it is currently deployed for combat operations in the Wanni region.-Formation:...
during the final stages of the civil war, was appointed deputy ambassador to Germany, Switzerland and the Vatican.
In January 2011 the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights
European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights
The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights is a human rights organisation founded in Berlin in 2007 by a group of lawyers. The current president is Michael Ratner....
, a German human rights group, sent a dossier detailing alleged war crimes committed by the 57 Division to the German Federal Foreign Office
Foreign Office (Germany)
The Foreign Office is the foreign ministry of Germany, a federal agency responsible for both the country's foreign politics and its relationship with the European Union. From 1871 to 1919, it was led by a Foreign Secretary, and since 1919, it has been led by the Foreign Minister of Germany...
The ECCHR followed the military offensives as described by the Sri Lankan military, examined reports produced by the Sri Lankan government and NGOs, and talked to eyewitnesses present in the conflict area. The dossier concluded that many violations of international law were committed by the Sri Lankan military and the Tigers, particularly war crimes. The dossier supports the view of the US embassy in Colombo that the senior military and civilian leaders were responsible for these crimes. The dossier urges the German government
Cabinet of Germany
The Cabinet of Germany is the chief executive body of the Federal Republic of Germany. It consists of the Chancellor and the cabinet ministers. The fundamentals of the cabinet's organization are set down in articles 62 to 69 of the Basic Law.-Nomination:...
to investigate Dias' individual criminal responsibility, withdraw his diplomatic visa and declare him persona non grata
Persona non grata
Persona non grata , literally meaning "an unwelcome person", is a legal term used in diplomacy that indicates a proscription against a person entering the country...
.
In August 2011 the Society for Threatened Peoples
Society for Threatened Peoples
Society for Threatened Peoples is an international NGO and human rights organization based in Göttingen, Germany. It seeks to create awareness of and protect minority peoples around the world who are threatened by oppressive governments. The group states on its website that it "campaigns against...
and TRIAL - Swiss Association against Impunity filed a criminal complaint with the Public Ministry of Switzerland against Dias for alleged war crimes. Dias dismissed the war crimes allegations as "baseless, unfounded and non-substantiated allegations. Fictions, not facts". The Swiss government subsequently confirmed it had distressed the alleged war crimes with Dias. On 14 September 2011 Dias was recalled to Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan government claimed that he was returning to Sri Lankan because his two-year term had come to an end but reports in the media suggested that he had been stripped of his diplomatic immunity and the recall was was to prevent war crimes charges being filed against him. The Swiss federal prosecutor has announced that a criminal investigation against Dias would commence if he ever returned to Switzerland.
Evidence
In addition to the evidence of alleged war crimes produced by the organisations detailed above, the following evidence have been published/broadcast independently.Satellite images
A number of independent organisations have published analysis of satellite images of the Safe Zone showing heavy damage that could only have been caused by shelling and aerial bombardment. These contradicted Sri Lankan government claims that its forces had not used aerial bombardment or heavy weaponry.A confidential UN report dated 26 April 2009 comparing UNOSAT
UNOSAT
UNOSAT is the United Nations Institute for Training and Research Operational Satellite Applications Programme, implemented in co-operation with the European Organization for Nuclear Research...
images of the Safe Zone taken between 5 February 2009 and 19 April 2009 was leaked the media. The images showed numerous craters caused by shelling. The main finding of the report was that "there are new indications of building destruction and damages resulting from shelling and possible air-strikes". The report found that 60 main buildings had been destroyed to date in the Safe Zone but this excluded temporary structures erected by the IDPs as it was not possible to identify damage to these using satellite images. Over 5,000 IDP shelters had also been relocated during April 2009 due the shelling and bombardment. There was evidence of hundreds of craters and heavy damage to buildings outside the Safe Zone. The report concluded that damage estimates were a minimum and that the "actual damages are likely to be greater". The accuracy of some of the damage suggested that it could only have been done by air-dropped bombs. Although the report not apportion blame, given that Tamil Tigers' air wing had been destroyed in early 2009, this damage could only have been caused by the Sri Lankan Air Force
Sri Lankan Air Force
The Sri Lanka Air Force is the air arm and the youngest of the Sri Lanka Armed Forces. It was founded in 1951 as the Royal Ceylon Air Force with the assistance of the Royal Air Force . The SLAF played a major role throughout the Sri Lankan Civil War...
. After being confronted with the UN satellite images during an interview with Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera is an independent broadcaster owned by the state of Qatar through the Qatar Media Corporation and headquartered in Doha, Qatar...
Sri Lankan Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona
Palitha Kohona
Palitha T. B. Kohona is a Sri Lankan born diplomat. He is the current the Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the UN. Until August 2009 he was the Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Government of Sri Lanka and was the former Secretary-General of the Secretariat for...
admitted that the Sri Lankan armed forces had carried out shelling and air raids in the Safe Zone. This contradicted the statements by the Sri Lankan government and President Rajapaksa, and an earlier statement by Kohona himself, that there was no shelling by the Sri Lankan armed forces in the Safe Zone.
Following a request from Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
and Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
the American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science is an international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsibility, and supporting scientific education and science outreach for the...
compared commercial high-resolution satellite images of the Safe Zone taken on 6 May 2009 and 10 May 2009 to evaluate the impact of heavy fighting on 9/10 May. They found evidence of significant removal of IDP shelters, artillery and mortar emplacements, destroyed permanent structures, bomb shell impact craters and 1,346 individual graves. By calculating the trajectory of the shells which caused the craters the AAAS was able to conclude that the shells came from Sri Lankan Army
Sri Lankan Army
The Sri Lanka Army is the oldest and largest of the Sri Lanka Armed Forces and is responsible for land-based military and humanitarian operations. Established as the Ceylon Army in 1949, it was renamed when Sri Lanka became a republic in 1972...
territory.
US government satellites had been monitoring the war zone secretly. In April 2009 the US State Department released two satellite images of the Safe Zone showing 100,000 civilians trapped in 8 square miles (20.7 km²) area. The State Department report to Congress (above) included a number of images taken by US government satellites. The images showed that Puthukkudiyiruppu Hospital had been heavily damaged between 28 January 2009 and 16 March 2009.
Video
In May 2009 New Delhi TV reported that it had received a video of what is alleged to be Tamil Tigers forcing civilians to work as labourers to aid their defence effort. The video is alleged to have been found on a dead Tamil Tiger. The video is said to show Tamil Tigers in civilian clothing firing at fleeing civilians as well as the Sri Lankan military.On 25 August 2009 Britain's Channel 4 News
Channel 4 News
Channel 4 News is the news division of British television broadcaster Channel 4. It is produced by ITN, and has been in operation since the broadcaster's launch in 1982.-Channel 4 News:...
broadcast mobile phone video of gunmen alleged to be Sri Lankan soldiers apparently summarily executing eight bound and blindfolded Tamil men at point-blank range in January 2009. The video was alleged to have been taken by a Sri Lankan government soldier and to have been circulating amongst soldiers before Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, a group of exiled Sri Lankan journalists, obtained it.
The Sri Lankan government rejected the video footage, calling it a fabrication. It established a four-member panel of Sri Lankan experts (Siri Hewawitharana, Chatura Ranjan de Silva, Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe and Major P. A. Bandara) to investigate the authenticity of the video. This panel produced a technical analysis of the video in early September which concluded that the video was fake. The independence of the Sri Lankan panel was questioned as two of the panel worked for the Sri Lankan military.
An investigation by a UN commissioned panel of independent experts (Peter Diaczuk, Daniel Spitz and Jeff Spivack) found that the video was authentic. In a point-by-point repudiation of the Sri Lankan government's assessment, the experts concluded that the reaction and movement of the victims' bodies and blood evidence were consistent with being shot; the movement of the weapon and the shooter and the gases expelled from the muzzle were consistent with live ammunition firing, not blank cartridges; there was no evidence of breaks in continuity in the video, no additional video layers; and no evidence of image manipulation; and that video had been filmed on a mobile phone, not a camcorder, as the Sri Lankan government's analysis had maintained. The experts were unable to explain 17 frames at the end of the video but this did not invalidate its authenticity.
The independent experts' findings led Philip Alston
Philip Alston
Philip G. Alston is an international law scholar and human rights practitioner. He is John Norton Pomeroy Professor of Law at New York University School of Law, and co-Chair of the law school's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice...
, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, to call for "an independent inquiry to carry out an impartial investigation into war crimes and other grave violations of international humanitarian and human rights law allegedly committed in Sri Lanka."
Sri Lanka's Killing Fields
A compilation of amateur videos from the civil war was presented by Jon SnowJon Snow
Jon Snow is an English journalist and presenter, currently employed by ITN. He is best known for presenting Channel 4 News.He was Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University from 2001 to 2008.-Early life:...
as a 50-minute special titled Sri Lanka's Killing Fields
Sri Lanka's Killing Fields
Sri Lanka's Killing Fields was an investigatory documentary about the final weeks of the Sri Lankan Civil War broadcast by the British TV station Channel 4 on 14 June 2011...
on Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
on 14 June 2011. The special features films shot during the last stages of the war that appear to show the shelling of areas in the no-fire zone and the aftermath, executions of captured LTTE combatants and dead female Tamil fighters being loaded on to a truck. Videos used in the first half were shot by individuals in the no-fire zone while the latter half seemingly shows mobile phone footage shot by the Sri Lankan soldiers. The same program was broadcast in Australia on ABC TV 4 Corners program on 4 July 2011 presenting allegations that up to 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed by shelling or executions after surrender in many cases after being sexually abused.
The Sri Lankan government has responded in multiple ways including questioning Channel 4's "standards and fairness". The video was to be shown to British MPs and parliamentary officials at a special showing in the House of Commons. Following the documentary on the Sri Lankan civil war, the UK called for the Sri Lankan government to launch an investigation following allegations of war crimes, as many times earlier as well.
Criticism has been levelled at the program from many parties. According to the SL Government website, AA Gill of UK Sunday Times wrote "Not a second of this has been shot by Channel 4; none of the eyewitness accounts comes from journalists" and said "Jon Snow's commentary was intemperate and partisan, and it was all held together by assumptions". It went on to state what its general claimed were inconsistencies in the report . Ofcom
Ofcom
Ofcom is the government-approved regulatory authority for the broadcasting and telecommunications industries in the United Kingdom. Ofcom was initially established by the Office of Communications Act 2002. It received its full authority from the Communications Act 2003...
investigated Channel 4's documentary after more than 100 complaints were received saying that it was misleading and misrepresentative. However, Ofcom found the documentary to be 'not in breach' of any regulations.
In July 2011, Channel 4 exclusively revealed two individuals who witnessed the final violent stage on May 2009 who claimed a military commander and Sri Lanka's defence secretary ordered war crimes. One stated "They shot people at random. Stabbed people. Raped them. Cut out their tongues, cut women's breasts off. I saw people soaked in blood."
Photographs
In October 2010 the Global Tamil ForumGlobal Tamil Forum
Global Tamil Forum is an International Tamil organization meant to further Tamil causes in Tamil areas of Sri Lanka GTF supports self-determination for Tamils and wants Justice for War crimes against Tamils. It is headed by S. J. Emmanuel. In UK it works with both Labour and Conservative Parties...
(GTF), an umbrella group for Tamil diaspora groups, published photographs that appeared to show the massacre of civilians and execution of Tamil Tigers. The photos showed blood stained bodies of young men and women with blindfolds and hands tied behind their backs. The GTF could not verify the authenticity of the photographs. It had obtained them from a Tamil Tiger intelligence official who said they had obtained the photos from someone in the Sri Lankan Army. The Sri Lankan government rejected the photos as an attempt to tarnish Sri Lanka's image.
On 10 November 2010 Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera is an independent broadcaster owned by the state of Qatar through the Qatar Media Corporation and headquartered in Doha, Qatar...
broadcast photographs that appeared to show the aftermath of Sri Lankan Army soldiers massacring civilians and executing Tamil Tigers in the final stages of the civil war. The graphic images showed dead bodies piled on top of each other, often naked. One of the photos showed what is believed to be the dead body of Prabhakaran's son. Some of the photos showed naked bodies with blindfolds and hands tied behind their backs. They appear to have been executed. Al Jazeera could not verify the authenticity of the photographs. It had obtained them from Tamils who said they had obtained the photos from someone in the Sri Lankan military. The Sri Lankan government reacted by calling the photos lies and fabrications. It claimed that some of the photos were the same as those broadcast by Channel 4 News in May 2010. Amnesty International reacted by stating that the photos were evidence that there needs to be an independent international investigation into what happened in the final stages of the civil.
Eyewitness accounts and statements by opposing leaders
Civilians who managed to escape the war zone claimed that the Tamil Tigers had shot at injured civilians fleeing the fighting. It was claimed that the Tigers were keeping them human shields as well using them as fighters, a charge denied by the Tigers. The civilians' claims were corroborated by Tamil Tiger officials who surrendered to the Sri Lankan Army.On 18 May 2010 Channel 4 News
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
broadcast interviews with two people who claimed they were Sri Lankan soldiers and who made the allegation that they had been given orders from "the top" to summarily execute all ethnic Tamils, civilians as well as fighters. A senior commander claimed "the order would have been to kill everybody and finish them off..It is clear that such orders were...from the top". Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Lieutenant Colonel Nandasena Gotabaya Rajapaksa, RWP, RSP, psc, GR is a retired officer of the Sri Lanka Army and the current Defence Secretary of Sri Lanka. After serving through the early parts of the country's civil war with Tamil Tiger rebels, he retired from the Army in 1992...
, President Rajapaksa
Mahinda Rajapaksa
Percy Mahendra "Mahinda" Rajapaksa ; ; born November 18, 1945) is the 6th and current President of Sri Lanka and Commander in Chief of the Sri Lankan Armed Forces. A lawyer by profession, Rajapaksa was first elected to the Parliament of Sri Lanka in 1970, and served as prime minister from April 6,...
's brother, was said to have given direct orders to army commanders at the battle front. It was also claimed in the story that Velupillai Prabhakaran
Velupillai Prabhakaran
Thiruvenkadam Velupillai Prabhakaran was the founder and leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam , a militant organization that sought to create an independent Tamil state in the north and east of Sri Lanka...
's 13-year old son Balachandran was interrogated by the Sri Lankan military before being shot. A front line soldier said "our commander ordered us to kill everyone. We killed everyone". The soldier claimed that the Tamils were tortured before being executed. Numerous photos taken by Sri Lankan soldiers showing dead bodies and Tamil prisoners were also shown in the broadcast. No audio of the actual commander or the front line soldier making the claims were aired to protect their identity, a standard practice.
"White flag" case
On 13 December 2009 The Sunday LeaderThe Sunday Leader
The Sunday Leader is an English-language Sri Lankan Sunday newspaper privately owned and published by Leader Publications, which is known for its outspoken news coverage.-Controversy and retaliation:...
newspaper published an interview with General Sarath Fonseka
Sarath Fonseka
Gardihewa Sarath Chandralal Fonseka, known as Sarath Fonseka is a former commander and General of the Sri Lanka Army and a former candidate for President of Sri Lanka. As Commander of the Army, he played an instrumental role in ending the 26 year Sri Lankan Civil War in 2009, defeating the...
, commander of the Sri Lankan armed forces during the final months of the war, in which he claimed that Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Gotabhaya Rajapaksa
Lieutenant Colonel Nandasena Gotabaya Rajapaksa, RWP, RSP, psc, GR is a retired officer of the Sri Lanka Army and the current Defence Secretary of Sri Lanka. After serving through the early parts of the country's civil war with Tamil Tiger rebels, he retired from the Army in 1992...
had ordered an army commander at the battlefront to shoot dead all Tamil Tiger leaders who tried to surrender. Fonseka claimed that during the final days of the civil war senior Tamil Tiger leaders were trying to arrange their surrender by communicating with Basil Rajapaksa, senior adviser to President Rajapaksa, via Norway and other foreign governments. Basil Rajapaksa then informed his brother Gotabhaya Rajapaksa about the attempts surrender. Fonseka claimed that Gotabhaya Rajapaksa ordered Brigadier Shavendra Silva, commander of the Sri Lankan Army’s 58 Division
58 Division (Sri Lanka)
The 58 Division is an infantry division of the Sri Lanka Army formed in 2008, prior to which it was known as Task Force 1 from 2007 to 2009. A principal offensive division, it is currently deployed for combat operations in the Wanni region...
, not to allow the Tamil Tiger leaders to surrender and directed that “they must all be killed". Two Tamil Tiger leaders, Balasingham Nadesan
Balasingham Nadesan
Balasingham Nadesan was the LTTEs Political Chief from late 2007 until his death in 2009. He used to be the head of Police of the LTTE and was formerly based in Tamil Nadu.-Personal life:...
and Seevaratnam Pulidevan, contacted Norwegian minister Erik Solheim
Erik Solheim
Erik Solheim is a Norwegian politician for the Socialist Left Party . He holds two posts in the current Norwegian cabinet, and carries the title Minister of the Environment and Minister of Development Cooperation...
and stated that they wanted to surrender. Solheim informed the Red Cross in Colombo who in turn informed the Sri Lankan government. Fonseka claimed that the Rajapaksa brothers, via foreign governments, told the Tamil Tigers leaders to “Get a piece of white cloth, put up your hands and walk towards the other side in a non-threatening manner”. Fonseka claimed that on the night of 17/18 May 2009 Nadesan, Pulidevan, Ramesh and their families were all shot dead by the Sri Lankan Army as they tried to surrender.
There was uproar in Sri Lanka when the "Sunday Leader" article was published. The government's Human Rights Minister, Mahinda Samarasinghe
Mahinda Samarasinghe
Mahinda Buddhadasa Samarasinghe, MP is a Sri Lankan politician and former diplomat. He is the current Cabinet Minister of Plantation in President Mahinda Rajapakse's Government, and Sri Lanka Freedom Party chief organiser for the Agalawatte Electorate in Kalutara District...
, said General Fonseka's statements were lies that had damaged the image of the country, and characterised them as the biggest betrayal of its kind in Sri Lanka's history. As an apparent consequence of the "Sunday Leader" article, and just twelve days after his evident defeat in the Sri Lankan presidential election, General Fonseka was arrested by military forces on February 8, 2010. The military based the arrest, it said, on allegations of "committing military offences", but it offered no details. The director general of the government's Media Centre for National Security told state TV that Fonseka will be tried by a military tribunal. His ongoing detention was subsequently attributed to civil and criminal charges including inciting the public against the government. During the previous month's run-up to the presidential election, Fonseka and his aides had moved into a luxurious Colombo hotel on January, 26, 2010, election day. According to Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine, "The hotel was soon surrounded by military. Fonseka complained that there was a threat to his life and that the government was limiting his movements. Authorities claimed that security had been increased around the hotel as a precaution, although several former military officers working on the Fonseka campaign were arrested as they left the hotel."
On May 12, 2010, after three months in military custody, the general said, according to the BBC, that the "Sunday Leader" newspaper had misquoted him, that he was innocent of any attempt to incite the public, and that the case was part of an attempt to silence him. Then, while still in military custody, Fonseka seemed to downplay his earlier claim that Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa had ordered the killing of Tamil Tiger rebels as they were trying to surrender in May, 2009. The BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo noted, however, that Fonseka did not make a blanket denial that no war crimes had been committed, but rather stipulated that no war crimes took place to his knowledge. Next, in a June 7, 2010 interview with the BBC's Hard Talk programme Defence Secretary Rajapaksa threatened to execute Fonseka if he testified at an independent war crimes investigation, stating "He can't do that..That is a treason. We will hang him if he do that." The next day, June 8, 2010, General Fonseka denied having told lies or having committing treason when speaking of the possibility of war crimes being committed during fighting against Tamil Tiger rebels.
After his arrest Fonseka was charged with a number of civilian and military offences. On 13 August 2010 Fonseka was found guilty of engaging in politics while on active service by a court martial. He was stripped of his rank and medals. On 17 September 2010 Fonseka was found guilty of breaching arms procurement guidelines (corruption) by a court martial. He was sentenced to 30 months rigorous imprisonment and stripped of his parliamentary seat. Fonseka is currently being tried in a civilian court on accusations of spreading public disaffection in respect of the "white flag" case.
During a counter-insurgency
Counter-insurgency
A counter-insurgency or counterinsurgency involves actions taken by the recognized government of a nation to contain or quell an insurgency taken up against it...
seminar conducted by Sri Lanka Army in June 2011, Lawrence Smith - an attaché of the American embassy in Sri Lanka from 2008 revealed "...from what I was privileged to hear and to see, the offers to surrender that I am aware of seemed to come from the mouthpieces of the LTTE -- Nadesan
Balasingham Nadesan
Balasingham Nadesan was the LTTEs Political Chief from late 2007 until his death in 2009. He used to be the head of Police of the LTTE and was formerly based in Tamil Nadu.-Personal life:...
, KP -- people who weren't and never had really demonstrated any control over the leadership or the combat power of the LTTE. So their offers were a bit suspect anyway, and they tended to vary in content hour by hour, day by day. I think we need to examine the credibility of those offers before we leap to conclusions that such offers were in fact real..." However the US State Department
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...
characterized the statement as "personal opinion".
Arundhati Roy
In an opinion piece, once again in The Guardian (April 1, 2009), Arundhati RoyArundhati Roy
Arundhati Roy is an Indian novelist. She won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her novel, The God of Small Things, and has also written two screenplays and several collections of essays...
made a plea for international attention to what she called a possible government-sponsored genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka. She cited reports of camps into which Tamils were being herded as part of what she described as "a brazen, openly racist war". She also mentioned that the "Government of Sri Lanka is on the verge of committing what could end up being genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
" and described the Sri Lankan IDP camps
Sri Lankan IDP camps
The final stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War created 300,000 internally displaced persons who were transferred to camps in Vavuniya District and detained there against their will. This process, together with the conditions inside the camps and the slow progress of resettlement in 2009 had...
where Tamil civilians are being held as concentration camps. A Sri Lankan writer called Roy's remarks "ill-informed and hypocritical" and criticized her for "whitewashing the atrocities of the LTTE". Roy has said of such accusations: "I cannot admire those whose vision can only accommodate justice for their own and not for everybody. However I do believe that the LTTE and its fetish for violence was cultured in the crucible of monstrous, racist, injustice that the Sri Lankan government and to a great extent Sinhala society visited on the Tamil people for decades."
Claude Heller
Claude HellerClaude Heller
Claude Heller Rouassant is the current Ambassador for Mexico to the United Nations and the Security Council. He has been Mexico's Ambassador to France, Cuba, Austria and Switzerland...
, Mexico's Ambassador to the United Nations and president of the United Nations Security Council
United Nations Security Council
The United Nations Security Council is one of the principal organs of the United Nations and is charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the United Nations Charter, include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of...
said, 'We demand that the LTTE immediately lay down arms, renounce terrorism, allow a UN-assisted evacuation of the remaining civilians in the conflict area, and join the political process.' He added that they 'strongly condemned the LTTE, a terrorist organisation, for the use of civilians as human shields and for not allowing them to leave the area'. He also urged the Sri Lankan government to "abide by international humanitarian law" with regards to access to refugees. The meeting was not a formal session of the Security Council and the president's statements were non-binding.
Chris Patten
In an Op-Ed contribution in The New York Times (January 12, 2010), Chris PattenChris Patten
Christopher Francis Patten, Baron Patten of Barnes, CH, PC , is the last Governor of British Hong Kong, a former British Conservative politician, and the current chairman of the BBC Trust....
made the comment, ".....After all, both General Fonseka and Mr. Rajapaksa executed the 30-year conflict to its bloody conclusion at the expense of huge numbers of Tamil civilian casualties.
By early May, when the war was ending, the United Nations estimated that some 7,000 civilians had died and more than 10,000 had been wounded in 2009 as the army’s noose was being drawn tight around the remaining rebels and hundreds of thousands of noncombatants, who could not escape government shelling. The final two weeks likely saw thousands more civilians killed, at the hands of both the army and the rebels.
David Miliband and Bernard Kouchner
In "The Opinion Pages" contribution in The New York Times (June 20, 2011), David MilibandDavid Miliband
David Wright Miliband is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament for South Shields since 2001, and was the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs from 2007 to 2010. He is the elder son of the late Marxist theorist Ralph Miliband...
and Bernard Kouchner
Bernard Kouchner
Bernard Kouchner is a French politician, diplomat, and doctor. He is co-founder of Médecins Sans Frontières and Médecins du Monde...
made the comment,
In April 2009, we travelled together as foreign ministers to Sri Lanka, as 25 years of fighting between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers neared its end.
The remaining fighters were trapped in the northern most part of the country — along with large numbers of civilians. U.N. estimates put the numbers of civilians there in the last few months of the war at over 300,000.
We visited refugee camps that had been created to house Tamil refugees from Jaffna. Their stories were brutal and shocking. Random shelling in areas of fighting — including after the government had announced an end to fighting. Men and boys taken away from refugee camps — and now out of contact. Tamil life treated as fourth or fifth class. If foreign policy is about anything, it should be about stopping this kind of inhumanity.............Restrictions on journalism meant that there was a war without witness in Sri Lanka.............It seems to us essential that this process is taken forward. As the report says, accountability is a duty under domestic and international law, and those responsible, including Sri Lanka Army commanders and senior government officials, would bear criminal liability for international crimes.............Kofi Annan has said that the international community cannot be selective in its approach to upholding the rule of law. We therefore call on our governments to set a deadline, soon, for satisfactory response from the Sri Lankan government, and if it is not forthcoming to initiate the international arrangements recommended by the report.............Reports like the one compiled for the secretary general must not stand on the shelf. They must be the basis of action. Or the law becomes an ass."
M.I.A. and Jan Jananayagam
Throughout her career, M.I.AM.I.A. (artist)
Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam , better known by her stage name M.I.A. , is an English singer-songwriter, rapper, record producer, painter and director of Sri Lankan Tamil descent. Her compositions combine elements of hip hop, electronica, dance, alternative and world music. M.I.A...
has used networking sites such as Twitter and MySpace to discuss and highlight the human rights abuses Sri Lanka is accused of perpetrating against Tamils. M.I.A. has joined other activists in condemning the actions of the Sri Lankan government against the Tamils during the civil war
Sri Lankan civil war
The Sri Lankan Civil War was a conflict fought on the island of Sri Lanka. Beginning on July 23, 1983, there was an on-and-off insurgency against the government by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam , a separatist militant organization which fought to create an independent Tamil state named Tamil...
as "systematic genocide". Sri Lanka's Foreign Secretary denied that his country perpetrated genocide, responding that he felt M.I.A. was "misinformed" and that she should "stay with what she's good at, which is music, not politics." Consequently, she has been accused of being a "terrorist sympathiser" and "LTTE supporter" by the Sri Lankan government, whose agents have threatened listeners with prosecution if they post her music videos on the internet. M.I.A. endorsed candidate Jan Jananayagam
Jan Jananayagam
Janani Jananayagam is a British Tamil banking professional, activist and politician. She was an independent candidate for the London region in the 2009 European Parliamentary elections.-Early life:...
at the 2009 European Parliament election
European Parliament election, 2009 (United Kingdom)
The European Parliament election was the United Kingdom's component of the 2009 European Parliament election, the voting for which was held on Thursday 4 June 2009, coinciding with the 2009 local elections in England. Most of the results of the election were announced on Sunday 7 June, after...
, a last minute candidate and long standing critic of multiple international policy failures towards the Tamil national self determination question, who stood on a platform of anti-genocide, civil liberties, financial transparency, the environment and women's rights and became the most successful independent election candidates ever in UK electoral history. Death threats directed at M.I.A. and her son have followed her activism, which she also cited as an influence on the songs on her album Maya. In 2010, she condemned China's role in supporting and supplying arms to the Sri Lankan government during the conflict in an interview with music magazine Mondomix, stating that China's influence within the UN was preventing prosecutions of war crimes committed during the conflict. Her 2010 music video "Born Free
Born Free (M.I.A. song)
"Born Free" is a song by recording artist M.I.A., released alongside an accompanying short film/music video of the same name from her third album, /\/\/\Y/\. "Born Free" was released as the unofficial first single from the album and premiered on internet music stores on April 23, 2010, with the...
" refilmed the trophy videos of war crimes that were broadcast by Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, with the Tamils substituted for red headed
Red hair
Red hair occurs on approximately 1–2% of the human population. It occurs more frequently in people of northern or western European ancestry, and less frequently in other populations...
people.
Government of South Africa
The African National CongressAfrican National Congress
The African National Congress is South Africa's governing Africanist political party, supported by its tripartite alliance with the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party , since the establishment of non-racial democracy in April 1994. It defines itself as a...
, South Africa's ruling party released a statement in January 2009 calling from an end to the violence and an immediate ceasefire and access to humanitarian aid, expressing increasing alarm that the "continued conflict in Sri Lanka has been cited on the human rights watch international monitoring mechanisms as a conflict now reaching genocidal proportions."
Government of Tamil Nadu
The leader of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra KazhagamAll India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam is a state political party in the states of Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, India. The party was founded by M. G. Ramachandran and is now headed by J. Jayalalithaa. The party headquarters is in Royapettah, Chennai, and was gifted to the party in 1986 by its...
party J. Jayalalitha issued a statement on 27 April 2011 welcoming the report, stating that it confirmed the "human rights violations and brutal repression that was earlier in the realm of speculation or dismissed as biased or partisan reportage". The statement urged the Indian government to take steps to "bring Mahinda Rajapakshe to stand trial for war crimes and genocide along with his generals, senior ministers and all others who were party to the brutal excesses". Jayalalitha was sworn in as the Chief Minister of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu is one of the 28 states of India. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu lies in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula and is bordered by the union territory of Pondicherry, and the states of Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh...
on 16 May 2011.
The Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly passed unanimously a resolution on 8 June 2011 which, based on the report, accused Sri Lanka of: failure in constitutionally resolving the righteous demands of Tamils since independence; working for complete extermination of Tamils in the island; mass killings of innocent Tamils, other atrocities and failure in humanitarian action during the war; continued human rights abuses after the war; and human rights abuses on media persons and others outside of the war zone. The resolution urged the Indian central government
Government of India
The Government of India, officially known as the Union Government, and also known as the Central Government, was established by the Constitution of India, and is the governing authority of the union of 28 states and seven union territories, collectively called the Republic of India...
to impose economic sanctions against Sri Lanka until Tamils are given equal rights and to press the UN to declare as “war criminals” those who committed alleged war crimes during the conflict in Sri Lanka.
In an official state visit to Chennai, Hillary Clinton discussed the Tamil situation at length with J. Jayalalitha, contrary to claims beforehand from India's Central Government that the matter would not be broached. Clinton stated that the United States was looking at "creative and innovative ways" to break the impasse over Sri Lanka.
Noam Chomsky and Jan Egeland
At a 2009 United Nations forum on R2P, the Responsibility to ProtectResponsibility to protect
The responsibility to protect is a norm or set of principles based on the idea that sovereignty is not a privilege, but a responsibility. RtoP focuses on preventing and halting four crimes: genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing, which it places under the generic...
doctrine established by the UN in 2005, Noam Chomsky
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...
said:
..."What happened in Sri Lanka was a major Rwanda-like atrocity, in a different scale, where the West didn't care. There was plenty of early warning. This [conflict] has been going on for years and decades. Plenty of things could have been done [to prevent it]. But there was not enough interest."
Chomsky was responding to a question that referred to Jan Egeland
Jan Egeland
Jan Egeland was the United Nations Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator from June 2003 to December 2006. Egeland was appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan and succeeded Kenzo Oshima...
, former head of the UN's Humanitarian Affairs' earlier statement that R2P was a failure in Sri Lanka.
The Guardian
In the editorial titled Sri Lanka: Evidence that won't be buried (June 15, 2011), The GuardianThe Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
raised the observation:
"The targeting of civilians is a war crime. If proved, these charges go right up the chain of command of Sri Lanka's military and government. If Iran stands condemned for killing hundreds in the wake of the June 2009 election, if Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic now face justice in The Hague, if Bashar al-Assad faces UN sanctions for an assault that has killed 1,300 Syrians, how it is that President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother, the defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, escape all censure, after over 40,000 civilians were killed?
That the LTTE assassinated presidents and invented the suicide belt, that the Tigers used civilians as human shields, is no defence from the charge that Sri Lankan soldiers summarily executed prisoners in their custody. Sri Lanka is trying to pretend these events are history, as the economy and tourism pick up. They are not. This evidence has to be faced."
International Business Times
In an article titled Channel 4 "Sri Lanka Killing Fields": is a trial at The Hague the answer? (June 15, 2011), International Business TimesInternational Business Times
The International Business Times is an online global business newspaper, published in 17 editions in 10 languages across 13 countries. The publication, sometimes called IBTimes, offers news, analysis and editorial commentary on business and business related stories...
raised the observation, ".........Ban Ki-Moon insists that an international investigation can only be launched with the consent of the Sri Lankan Government, but an investigation would also be inconvenient for the UN as when it pulled out of the country in 2008 Sri Lankan cried out for help and asked the organisation to stay as they already knew how the situation would end."
The Times
Editorials by The TimesThe Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
and The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
in late May 2009 related investigations the papers had conducted that revealed more than 20,000 Tamil civilians were killed in the final throes of the Sri Lankan civil war, most as a result of government shelling. In a commentary that admonished the murder of journalists with impunity, The Times raised the observation that Sri Lanka’s sacrifice of life may sow seeds of a "new conflict".
Le Monde
In late May 2009, French newspaper Le MondeLe Monde
Le Monde is a French daily evening newspaper owned by La Vie-Le Monde Group and edited in Paris. It is one of two French newspapers of record, and has generally been well respected since its first edition under founder Hubert Beuve-Méry on 19 December 1944...
accused the United Nations (UN) of deliberately hiding facts about civilian deaths during the last months of the war in order to protect possible complicity in crimes committed in the Vanni.
The Hindu
In the editorial titled A brother out of control (August 16, 2011), The HinduThe Hindu
The Hindu is an Indian English-language daily newspaper founded and continuously published in Chennai since 1878. According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, it has a circulation of 1.46 million copies as of December 2009. The enterprise employed over 1,600 workers and gross income reached $40...
raised the observation:
"President Rajapaksa would be well advised to distance himself swiftly from his brother's stream-of-consciousness on sensitive issues that are not his business. This includes an outrageous comment that because a Tamil woman, an “LTTE cadre” who was a British national, interviewed in the Channel 4 documentary was “so attractive” but had been neither raped nor killed by Sri Lankan soldiers, the allegation of sexual assault by soldiers could not be true. For this statement alone, Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa must be taken to task."
See also
- Allegations of State terrorism by Sri Lanka
- Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation CommissionLessons Learnt and Reconciliation CommissionLessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission is a commission of inquiry appointed by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa in May 2010 to look into events of the Sri Lankan Civil War between February 2002 and May 2009.-Background:...
- List of attacks attributed to the LTTE
- List of attacks attributed to the Sri Lankan military
- 2009 Tamil diaspora protests2009 Tamil diaspora protestsThe 2009 Tamil diaspora protests refers to a series of protests and demonstrations which took place in several countries across the world, urging national and world leaders and organizations to take action on bringing a unanimous cease fire to the Sri Lankan Civil War, which had taken place for...
External links
- People's Tribunal on Sri Lanka
- Times photographs expose Sri Lanka’s lie on civilian deaths at beach The Sunday TimesThe Sunday TimesThe Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
- The hidden massacre: Sri Lanka’s final offensive against Tamil Tigers The Sunday TimesThe Sunday TimesThe Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
- Sri Lanka on brink of catastrophe as UN aid blocked The Sunday TimesThe Sunday TimesThe Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
- Sri Lanka: Military Conference to Whitewash War Crimes
- Sri Lanka: Confronting the killing fields
- INVESTIGATIONS INTO A VIDEO FOOTAGE WHICH ALLEGEDLY DOCUMENTS MEMBERS OF THE SRI LANKAN ARMY COMMITTING EXTRA-JUDICIAL EXECUTIONS(From Page 423) Report of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial summary or arbitrary executions, Christof Heyn at Human Rights Council
- What happened to Bosnian women is happening to Sri Lankan Tamil women
- Ban Ki Moon’s double standard in dealing with Sri Lanka on war crimes
- Lifting the lid on Sri Lanka's war crimes
- War crimes: The world has seen the evidence. Now we must act
- C4 tests boundaries of broadcasting with Sri Lanka exposé
- Time to change tactics
- Britain renews call for Sri Lanka war crimes inquiry
- Evidence of war crimes in Sri Lanka, leaked UN report claims
- War crimes and denial
- Lanka's war of blame
- Alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka under the microscope
- Sri Lanka's civil war atrocities shown in British documentary
- Channel 4 rejects Sri Lanka 'war crimes' film criticism
- Sri Lanka 'war crimes': Main allegations
- Varavara for probe into war crimes in Lanka
- ‘Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields'
- Sri Lanka's Killing Fields @ Four Corners of ABC(Australia)
- Four Corners Open Letters
- Footage sparks calls for Sri Lanka war crimes probe
- Whose language is it anyway?
- Provides execution video to Channel 4
- Sri Lanka: Diplomatic Offensive Won’t Make Killing Fields Disappear
- Beyond the horror, seeking voiceless victims of Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields
- HR Council needs to revisit war crimes issue: Kevin
- Will New Evidence of War Crimes Tip the Scales Against the Sri Lankan Government
- How India kept pressure off Sri Lanka
- India and Sri Lanka after the LTTE
- Spread the word about 'Sri Lanka's Killing Fields'
- Spotlighting Lankan Tamils
- Why should we care about the suffering of Tamils?
- Lanka war crimes: Govt can't sit on the fence, says Jaswant Singh
- Photo Evidence : http://www.photos.warwithoutwitness.com
- Video Evidence : http://www.videos.warwithoutwitness.com