Human rights is top priority for next US Ambassador to Sri Lanka

Washington, DC: The nominee to be the next United States Ambassador to Sri Lanka and Maldives, Michele Jeanne Sison has vowed to make the human rights issue in Sri Lanka as the top priority during her tenure.

During her confirmation hearings on Wednesday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the thirty-year career diplomat assured that Sri Lanka’s human rights issues will be on top of her agenda.

“If confirmed I can [assure you] that human rights issues will be on the top of my agenda,” Sison told the members of the Committee.

She has noted that although the Sri Lankan government defeated the terrorist organisation Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), serious allegations of violations of human rights law and international humanitarian law committed by both sides at the end of the war remain to be investigated and have slowed reconciliation.

Senator Bob Casey (D-Pa.), the presiding member of the Committee has noted that Sri Lanka is yet to implement the recommendations made by the country’s own Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) and asked the President Obama’s nominee to keep the pressure on Sri Lankan government to investigate the human right violations and punish the violators on both sides of the war that ended three years ago.

He has urged an independent investigation into alleged war crimes, saying the issue would not go away “until the world sees results.”

“The United States should continue to work with the international community to push for greater accountability and protection for human rights in Sri Lanka,” Casey has said.

In her written testimony to the Committee, Sison has said the U.S. has broad interests in Sri Lanka as it is located along the busiest shipping lanes in the Indian Ocean, a region emerging as a “strategic arena” for U.S. interests.

“The United States recognises the importance of maintaining a broad range of partnerships with Sri Lanka as we encourage a lasting, democratic peace in the country after nearly three decades of devastating conflict,” Sison has said in her statement.

The Ambassador nominee has said that Sri Lanka needs to take credible steps to ensure equality and justice for all Sri Lankans, particularly for those living in former conflict areas, to achieve genuine reconciliation.

The measures she has stressed included demilitarisation of the former conflict zones, establishment of a mechanism to address cases of the missing and detained, and setting a date for provincial elections in the north and most importantly, formulating a solution to the devolution of power to the minority communities.