Sri Lanka: Tamils demand probe involve foreign judges

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ANKARA - Ethnic Tamils in Sri Lanka on Friday demanded foreign judges’ involvement in an investigation on war crimes that allegedly led to thousands of civilian deaths during a civil war spanning more than two decades.

The demand was raised in the Sinhalese parliament by Tamil National Alliance lawmaker Mathiaparanan Abraham Sumanthiran, who said foreign judges should be included in the investigations of war crimes and human rights violations in the country.

The demand was put forward a day after the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva granted Sri Lanka two additional years to set up a credible investigation in to the allegations.

The South Asian country has been accused of killing 40,000 Tamil civilians in the final months of the war, an allegation that the then-government strongly denies.

This is the third time that Colombo has been given such an extension by the rights body.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency over phone later in the day, Sumanthiran said that three resolutions co-sponsored by Sri Lanka in the UNHRC have clauses stipulating the inclusion of international authorities in the probe.

"After a report [by UNHRC] in September 2015, it was declared in October that year that hybrid courts will be established in the country which will have foreign judges," he explained.

Arguing that the government agreed to the hybrid courts only for "international consumption" only, he said if Colombo did not maintain its commitments Tamils would seek retribution from the International Criminal Court.

The Sri Lankan army and the Jaffna-based Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are accused of war crimes during the closing stages of the military conflict in 2009 when LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran was killed, ending years of secessionist insurgency in northern Sri Lanka where ethnic Tamils dominate.

One of the most significant opponents to such an investigation is the country's army chief Lieutenant General Mahesh Senanayake who said last Sunday that his army "was ready for any kind of investigation to defend its soldiers".

However, he refused to back an international investigation into the war crimes saying "our judiciary is capable of doing it".

The UNHRC has repeatedly sought accountability of Sri Lankan authorities since 2012 over mass allegations of rights violations.

In 2014, the UNHRC resolution demanded an international investigation into the alleged war crimes blamed on both sides.