Open Letter from SCOPP Secretary
General Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha to the
University Teachers for Human Rights Jaffna
Secretary General of Secretariat
for Coordinating the Peace Process (SCOPP)
05 December 2007
Prof Rajan Hoole
University Teachers for Human Rights Jaffna
Dear Sir,
I read with interest the account, in today's Morning Leader, of your
most recent report. Though I may disagree with some of the points you
make, let me take this opportunity to reiterate my admiration for your
work in general, and your principled stand in the past despite threats
to lives and livelihood by the LTTE.
There is one factual inaccuracy in the report which I should try to
correct, since it concerns someone else. The report suggests that you
were misled in reading reports of the Press Conference held by the Minister
of Disaster Management and Human Rights after he had led a delegation
to Geneva in connection with allegations of Human Rights violations
by the Sri Lankan government.
Entertainingly, and clearly only inadvertently, you seem to have assumed
- since both he and I participated in the Conference - that his title
is what you describe as the Orwellian one of Minister for Human Rights
and Head of the Peace Secretariat. In fact there are two people involved,
the Minister and myself, as Secretary General of the Peace Secretariat.
The two institutions are not symbiotically linked, though we work together
quite regularly, given that Human Rights should be an integral part
of any peace process.
The suggestion that there was a network of NGO companies was made
by me, not Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe. I should note that the position
of the Peace Secretariat has always been that allegations about violations
of human rights should be investigated, but it is difficult to do this
when they are presented in the form of generalizations, and in accordance
with what seems a political agenda. When I talked about companies, I
was referring in particular to some NGOs that had been arguing for UN
intervention, sometimes to the extent of invoking the Responsibility
to Protect, sometimes on the basis of wild allegations and unverified
statistics.
Your report suggests that the Free Media Movement was one of those
I highlighted. This was not intended, for I was referring more specifically
to those organizations which, while avoiding debate and discussion with
government officials in Geneva, arranged meetings together with representatives
of LTTE front organizations to attack the government.
However, since FMM was part of the conglomerate that produced a list
of nearly 1000 dead and disappeared, which it put forward as cases requiring
the intervention of HR authorities, they could well fit within the framework
in which I was specifically concerned about the Law and Society Trust,
which seems to have taken the lead in that exercise.
In this context I should perhaps share with you the relevant portions
of a letter I sent recently to the Chairman of the Trust which laid
out my worries - 'My initial concern about what seemed anxiety to present
inflated figures occurred when I noticed a Philippine national cited
amongst the disappeared. This was in fact an aid worker who had been
repatriated for medical treatment to Singapore.
I was familiar with the case because this office monitors any news report
that might suggest human rights problems. In that case it turned out
that a tendentious news report indicating the Sri Lankan forces were
at fault was quite misleading, and the individual in question had been
injured after entering a high security zone despite repeated warnings
to stop. The agency in question had subsequently acknowledged that he
was at fault and taken him away.
Despite this, with some confusion of dates, he appeared in the LST
list of the disappeared. Though his name has subsequently been withdrawn,
there has been no intimation to the international media, which continues
to highlight your findings, that such an egregious error had been committed.
Then it was brought to my attention that some of those described as
killed in a manner that you believe warrants the attention of the Sri
Lankan Human Rights Commission were soldiers who had fallen victim to
the LTTE. Their names had been altered so that for instance Lt. Col,
Jayantha Suraweera appeared as Liptinana Kernal Jeyanthasurvira. I am
sure LST did not intend this, but I cannot think of a greater insult
to a serviceman slaughtered in the course of duty than to suggest that
he was a victim of human rights violations on the part of the government.
When this was brought to the attention of your staff, they sent me
a letter claiming that 'We include names in our document on the basis
of information given to us by a few trusted sources - their methodology
includes noting direct reports of families and witnesses as well as
monitoring media reports. In replying, and mentioning the six wrongly
identified individuals, I asked if I could 'know which of your few trusted
sources gave you these names, and whether they told you that the methodology
employed was direct reporting of families and witnesses or else monitoring
media reports (and if so which reports) or something else.'
Your researcher said that she could not answer my first question,
which I had anticipated, given that obviously you would want to preserve
the confidentiality of such sources. However, my second question was
intended to suggest that, precisely because you lay such weight upon
such sources, you need to ensure their reliability. My question in this
regard remained unanswered.
This in itself was not surprising, given that it would have been very
odd for the death of the Lieutenant Colonel and those who died with
him to have been brought to the attention of your few trusted sources
in this strange fashion by a family member or an eyewitness. There remain
according to your researcher media reports. The idea that grave allegations,
used internationally to decry this country, should be based on media
reports that are notoriously unreliable is astonishing. I believe someone
of your stature should ensure that for the future any allegations based
on media reports are carefully checked, before reports that so extravagantly
magnify numbers are circulated internationally in the name of your organization
Further evidence of the irresponsible nature of the research dignified
by the name of your organization arose when I was told that four of
those who died in this attack will be restored to the list because they
'were in fact wildlife guards and therefore presumably civilians'. My
understanding of the purpose of this list however is that it serves
to draw attention to cases that are, obviously or possibly, violations
of human rights. Four government officials killed along with members
of the armed forces in the course of performing security duties cannot
by any stretch of the imagination be described as cases requiring the
attention of the Human Rights Commission, unless of course the Law and
Society Trust believes that all violent deaths or crimes imply a violation
of Human Rights. Similarly, the inclusion of the names of those killed
due to an explosion in a bus (or by bus exploding as your document had
it) seems inappropriate given the general thrust of the document and
the use you know will be made of it thereafter.
I cannot believe that an organization of which you are the Chairman,
and which has had so distinguished a history, is quite so naive. The
conclusion one is drawn to then is that LST too, or rather its junior
staff, has got into the game of number crunching and name calling and
finger pointing that so many so called human rights activists have recently
engaged in, some perhaps through misplaced idealism, others through
a political agenda that seeks to promote regime change on the lines
of what happened in 2001.'
I have had no reply to this letter. I have not had a response to the
second question raised above, nor to my subsequent letter to the researcher
responsible. The failure of this organization to engage may simply be
due to carelessness, but it is typical of a dispensation that cannot
deal in hard evidence and logical argument.
This does not mean that there are no cases that should be investigated.
But such carelessness and such a preposterous concept of what needs
investigation is at best irresponsible in organizations that engage
in critiques of the government of their county. Such an approach may
however be understandable, given that at least one of the organizations
involved is overtly political in its approach, being in effect run by
a leading member of the opposition; but it is a pity that such approaches
are always thought to be objective by the world at large.
This underlies another reason for my critique, namely the blatantly
oppositional character of some of these organizations. Recently I had
occasion to draw attention to the role of the Secretary to the Prime
Minister of the 2002/2003 government, who has held responsible positions
in several Non-Governmental Organizations which have received massive
funding in connection with the Peace Process. It would be surprising
if any donor seriously thought his approach would be apolitical, but
the organizations he is connected with continue to attract substantial
funding.
What is surprising meanwhile is that funding for very practical approaches
to solving our problems is difficult to obtain. I think you would agree
that ensuring adequate knowledge of Tamil on the part of security personnel
would help considerably in reducing tensions, but progress on this is
very slow. Training to develop human rights awareness in security personnel
through simulations and role plays, that would increase awareness of
the sensitivities of those with whom they interact, has been suggested
but there is no take up. Finding funding for rehabilitation for former
combatants - and in particular programmes that will promote pluralism
and practical skills - is also difficult. But, at the behest of the
shareholders of the companies I worry about, funds flood in for surveys,
seminars, awareness programmes and so on.
I have written at some length because, on the basis of our Press Conference,
you seem to think that the Minister, or I, or both, blanketly criticize
advocacy groups. I do not, nor does he, as must be apparent from his
putting members of these on an advisory committee in his Ministry, though
as it happened they attended very rarely before resigning dramatically.
For my part, as I took over this office, I invited members of Civil
Society to meetings on Confidence Building Measures and, though many
attended from less prominent groups, hardly any came from those I would
consider companies. I continue to have the highest regard for those
representatives of the National Peace Council, the Consortium of Humanitarian
Agencies and so on who have come to meetings and raised salient issues.
The others may well believe that talking to us is useless, since our
ideas are far apart. But, in a context in which we, and the Sri Lankan
government, continue to request the LTTE to return to negotiations,
on the basis that, however dissimilar views may be, it is necessary
to discuss things openly - in a context in which the world at large
also urges negotiations - I am sorry that you privileged organizations
will not talk, but expect the world to believe pronouncements that are
at best misleading. Sadly, it is to such that the world succumbs, not
to those who are always prepared to talk, but will not compromise on
principles or give in to terrorism, or prevarication, for the sake of
peace.
Prof Rajiva Wijesinha
Secretary General
Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process
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