Last weekend, Tamils in Sri Lanka gathered to commemorate those who died or went missing in the country’s civil war, which lasted from 1983 to 2009. As they have for the last 16 years, they also called for justice. Despite overwhelming evidence gathered by the United Nations and human rights groups of war crimes and human rights abuses by state security forces, successive governments have failed to launch any credible accountability process. Meanwhile, Tamil activists and victim communities continue to face repression and other violations.
The war between the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan government was marked by widespread violations by both sides. As the Sri Lankan military closed in on the LTTE, eventually defeating them on May 18, 2009, soldiers committed summary executions, rape, and forcible disappearances of hundreds of surrendered combatants. The military indiscriminately shelled civilians who were trapped in the combat zone by the LTTE, which used them as human shields.
In last year’s elections, many Tamils voted for Anura Kumara Dissanayake for president, hoping he would break from previous administrations and address the legacy of repression and discrimination. They have been disappointed.
The Dissanayake government has backed failed initiatives of previous governments, including the Office on Missing Persons, the Office for Reparations, and the Office for National Unity and Reconciliation, which have made little if any progress. These institutions have been rejected by many victims’ families, who see them as part of a pattern of failed promises.
Meanwhile, the government has kept in place the abusive Prevention of Terrorism Act, long used to target Tamils. The government had pledged to repeal this draconian law, including to the European Union as a condition to keep tariff-free access to the EU market under the Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP+).
The UN Human Rights Council mandated that the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights report and monitor progress on accountability, and establish the Sri Lanka Accountability Project to gather evidence of international crimes for use in future prosecutions. Those mandates are due for renewal in September. Given the lack of progress in Sri Lanka, renewal is vital to hold perpetrators of international crimes accountable. The Dissanayake government has opposed the council’s intervention as “divisive and intrusive.”
Instead of pretending that discredited domestic initiatives are working, the government should demonstrate its commitment to accountability by backing the resolution to renew the Accountability Project, and work towards delivering justice at last.
