UN Human Rights Chief welcomes Sri Lanka Consultation Task Force report on reconciliation mechanisms

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein has welcomed the report published by the Consultations Task Force (CTF) on Reconciliation Mechanisms earlier this week.

The UN High Commissioner welcomed the recommendations in the report especially the recommendation backing the implementation of a hybrid court with local and foreign judges to seek accountability for the war time abuses during the last phase of the country’s decades-long civil war.

In its final report released Tuesday, the Task Force has recommended including at least one international judge on every bench hearing alleged war crimes charges. Despite the recommendations by the government-appointed Task Force, the Sri Lankan government reiterated its policy stance that there will be no foreign judges in the judicial mechanism for transnational justice. Cabinet spokesman Minister Rajitha Senaratne, who stressed at the cabinet media briefing Wednesday that there will be no foreign judges in the domestic mechanism, said even the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights during his visit to Sri Lanka last year accepted the government’s stance of not including international judges. However, the Office of the High Commissioner said Zeid has always urged the creation of a hybrid court in Sri Lanka and his position remains unchanged.

In a report released in September 2015, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein highlighting the mistrust in domestic criminal justice system by the Sri Lankan citizenry said the establishment of a hybrid special court, integrating international judges, prosecutors, lawyers and investigators, is essential. “A purely domestic court procedure will have no chance of overcoming widespread and justifiable suspicions fueled by decades of violations, malpractice and broken promises,” he pointed out in his report urging the creation of a hybrid court.

He said the domestic process needs to be undertaken in parallel to the establishment of a special hybrid court, not in place of it.

The Secretary of the Consultation Task Force Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu said the victims have no trust that justice will be meted out by a domestic mechanism and therefore, it is the responsibility of the civil society to pressure the government to implement the recommendations made by the Consultation Task Force on including at least one foreign judge in the accountability mechanism.