Did Feltman make it ‘felt’?
Posted on July 22nd, 2017
By Sulochana Ramiah Mohan Courtesy Ceylon Today
A sudden announcement by the government that it has gazzetted the long awaited Office of the Missing Persons (OMP) came in without much ado and at a time when the UN under Secretary General for Political Affairs Jeffery Feltman was in town.
It’s obvious the high-powered official seemed to have held his ‘last round’ of serious talks to remind the government of its failure and lethargic attitude towards paying attention to the thousands of grieving parties who lost their loved ones on the battle field and beyond.
Hearing the OMP being established, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres also congratulated the Sri Lankan Government for setting it up. It’s an important step for all Sri Lankans who are still looking for the truth about their loved ones.”
He also said that the UN stands ready to support this process and he looks forward to the OMP becoming operational as soon as possible, starting with the appointment of independent commissioners.”
In the last two weeks, Sri Lanka saw several top visitors arriving in the country to check out what’s going on here as time is ticking for Sri Lanka – a co sponsor of the UN Resolution but stagnated due to political bureaucracy.
MP Namal Rajapaksa also tweeted about his wonderment at the OMP. He tweeted yesterday, “Will the Office on Missing Persons also investigate the many Tamil child soldiers the LTTE terrorists forcefully recruited (now missing)?”
Before Feltman came, an independent human rights expert from the UK Ben Emmerson was here and came out with outright criticisms noting that Sri Lanka has made ‘routine and endemic’ use of torture against people detained on national security grounds. He quoted some of the prisoners’ living conditions in the camp. “Based on my experience in the last six years in human rights monitoring in countries where counter terrorism is a problem, nowhere has such treatment been so endemic and systematically built into the entire criminal justice system as it has been in the PTA in this country.”
He also said the international community was running out of patience.
His revelations agitated the Justice Minister and the President. Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe said Rapporteur Emmerson and many others who have visited Sri Lanka lacked calibre and diplomacy and that he would inform the President and the Premier about them.
The OMP and its contents thereof were interpreted in many ways even saying that the incumbent government was playing to the whims and fancies of the international community and all attempts were basically to ‘please’ the minority communities, especially the Tamils, by means of ‘penalizing’ the security forces for their alleged war crimes.
However, the government over and over again explained it was not a process to try the security forces and the OMP will also heal many of the saddened families who lost their loved ones during the JVP insurgency and beyond that.
At Thursdays’ press conference, Foreign Minister Ravi Karunanayake promptly added that the OMP is an independent commission open to all.
There was some amendment to the OMP Bill that was concluded three weeks ago over which the President placed his signature to pass the Act.
The Foreign Minister stated that with the OMP every single armed forces person who has done no wrong will be protected. But certain persons who have put on their hat themselves and who misused their powers, are the ones who feel vulnerable in this process, he pointed out. “All those in the armed forces that have done their job properly have nothing to worry. That is the reason the PM stopped short of signing the ‘Rome Convention.’
Also at the end of last week, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) made public its annual Human Rights Report for 2016, placing Sri Lanka as one of 30 ‘Human Rights Priority Countries’ (HRPCs).
The report also welcomed the improvements in the human rights situation in Sri Lanka, while also emphasizing the need for further progress.
The report just before the OMP was gazzetted called on the OMP to be operationalized. The report also calls on the government to repeal the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) and draft new counter-terrorism legislation in line with international human rights standards.
It recognizes the need for further development of the Police force, in order to reduce the risk of human rights violations, including torture, and improving public confidence in the rule of law.
The international community has taken the lead in support of human rights and reconciliation in Sri Lanka. Many of the diplomats stationed in Sri Lanka took to tweets to congratulate the government for fixing the OMP to address the people’s grievances.
The UK Government has pledged £6.6m in the period 2016 – 2019 to continue support for reconciliation and human rights. Work with the Government of Sri Lanka will be to continue to strengthen democracy and the rule of law, and to share UK experience and expertise.
British High Commissioner to Sri Lanka James Dauris, said:
“The purpose of our Annual Report is to draw attention to human rights issues of concern in countries around the world, to encourage progress and recognize achievements made. In the past year we have engaged closely with the Sri Lankan Government and many others to support delivery on human rights commitments.”
The OMP should have clear cut policies in running the Office including paying attention on criminalizing disappearances that could lead to minimizing the number of missing persons in future accounts.
July 23rd, 2017 at 9:51 am
All Sri Lankans lived in harmony until the interference by foreign entities and and few local people with political ambitions.
The Sri Lankan government army had to fight the worst terrorist organization in the world and as some with vested interests attempt show was not a war against the Tamil people. How is it that all the Tamils who can afford live in Colombo as well as other parts of the country without any problem.
July 23rd, 2017 at 10:01 am
After creating problems now UK wants to spend millions of pounds for so called reconciliation. It is like the cosmetic companies aggressively advertising makeup products which is followed by another advertisement for an expensive makeup remover.
July 23rd, 2017 at 11:23 am
Office of Missing Persons (OMP) in Sri Lanka :
Thousands of Southern people who lost their family members during the 1980s especially (JVP protests over 13-A) can now present their cases to OMP ?
This can include the Batalanda disappearances too ?
July 23rd, 2017 at 6:33 pm
Pres MR has stated that the OMP is illegal per the Sri Lanka Constitution.
July 23rd, 2017 at 6:35 pm
It was the Tamil ordinary people who lost the most due to the LTTE. Their children were forcibly recruited to the LTTE, the food supplies were diverted to the LTTE fighters most of whom came from South India, most of the infrastructure in the North and East were destroyed by the LTTE and also by the fighting between LTTE and the army. The LTTE was essentially a group of thugs and terrorists who just wanted a kingdom for themselves. They cloaked their greed in Tamil Nationalism to obtain support from South Indian Tamils and also from the Tamil diaspora abroad. They called themselves freedom fighters to cover their actions and the brutality towards the Sinhala people who had given them so much when they came as illegal immigrants from Tamil Nadu.
This small group of terrorists could have been put down very easily as they did the uprising by the Sinhala youth in the South in 1970’s and again in 1989-90’s period by both Mrs. Bandaranaiyake and Ranil Wickremasinghe. According to the Batalanda report, Ranil is supposed to have directed the torture and killed over 15,000 Sinhala youth most of whom were innocents. A total of 60-90,000 is supposed to have died. No inquiries were held for crimes committed by the police and the armed services. Why was there no outcry by the International agencies, Amnesty International, UNHRC etc?
The LTTE was not put down in the same manner since it became internationalized due to the interference by many Western powers, and India. Some of the puppets of the International powers such as CBK and Ranil prevented the removal of Prabhakaran many times. Even that final stages of the war David Milliband from U.K. and Boucher from France came over to exert pressure on President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Luckily for the country on May 19, 2009, he withstood all international pressure and let the armed forces do their job.
If there were missing people how do we set about finding what happened to them?
1. Several people died in the Tsunami of 2004.
2. Several people fled abroad to India and the West and assumed different identities. Recently a whole family which is supposed to have disappeared resurfaced in India and were arrested by India police.
3. Many people died in the war.
4. Many civilians were killed by the LTTE themselves. When the LTTE took 300,000 civilians as hostages they shot anyone who tried to escape. It was the Sri Lanka Army at great sacrifice to themselves who saved these civilians and also rehabilitated the 12,000 hardcore LTTE who were then released into society. Any effort to look for the truth must look at both sides of the issues and look at the good done by the Sri Lanka Army and also the massacres of innocent Sinhala villages done by the LTTE. Sri Lanka must be the only country in the world which fed their enemies while fighting a terrorist uprising.
The office of the Missing Persons set up by the current Yahapalanaya is another Trojan horse which has been brought into harm our Honorable soldiers. According to the rules which go against all natural law, anyone abroad can bring charges against anyone in Sri Lanka and then those countries are bound to bring them to justice in those countries. In addition, the witnesses who bring such charges cannot be cross-examined as in a normal court of law since their identities are kept hidden. It is an insane act that has been established to lower the morale of the Sri Lanka forces and to destroy the country so that the powers be can then take over the areas of Strategic interests such as the Trincomalee harbor, and divide up the country to help their allies such as the Tamils who can then import the hordes of poor Dalit Tamils in South India into Sri Lanka to Tamilize the country permanently.