Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Colombo (Agenzia Fides) – Sri Lankan society is expressing its disappointment and protesting the attitude of the international community towards the country: the United Nations and the European Union are particularly indignant at the nation. Since yesterday, hundreds of people, led by some members of the government, demonstrated outside the UN office in the capital, Colombo, to protest against the decision of the Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon. The Secretary has established a panel of three experts to shed light on the violence and abuses of human rights committed by the regular army against more than 7,000 Tamil civilians in the last phase of the civil war.
Moreover, the European Union, considering the inadequate government standard on human rights, has announced that beginning this August 15, there will be a withdrawal of preferential agreements on trade (known as GSP +), which will cost Colombo nearly 150 million dollars a year.
"We are very disappointed," Fides was told by Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo and President of the Episcopal Conference. The Archbishop, together with a delegation of religious leaders, went to Brussels a few months ago to plead the cause of a renewal of the agreements. "This decision will impact workers and the poorest people and certainly will not help the post-war reconstruction process. Nor will it encourage dialogue and reconciliation between the two groups of Sinhalese and Tamils in the country." "The demand for respect of human rights standards is certainly right - the Archbishop remarked - but the EU has submitted to the Colombo government a document with 15 stringent requirements that seemed too severe to the President. There was not sufficient flexibility and the government refused to comply."
A Sri Lankan priest told Fides: "The army has committed human rights violations, but so have the Tamil Tigers. And sometimes, the Tamil media exaggerates in their assessments.” Moreover, the priest adds, "in the final phase of the civil war some Sinhalese and Tamil journalists who criticized the government were killed, and since September of 2008 journalists, NGOs, and UN volunteers were removed from the northeastern part of the country: these events do not contributed to transparency and to establishment of the truth."
According to some NGOs, the government army has used banned weapons such as "cluster bombs" to fight against the Tamil Tigers, hitting camps and civilian infrastructure such as schools and hospitals. The conflict which lasted 27 years, has left a total of 65,000 dead and 1.5 million refugees. (PA) (Agenzia Fides 07/07/2010)
