by Shamindra Ferdinando
Successive governments facilitated a high profile treacherous Geneva process by conveniently or incompetently refraining from exploiting former RAF pilot Michael Wolfgang Laurence Morris or Lord Naseby’s shocking disclosure in the House of Lords on Oct 12, 2017 to set the record straight as regards unsubstantiated war crimes.
The real issue is not defeat suffered by Sri Lanka at the UNHRC yesterday (23) but the failure on the part of successive governments to properly defend the armed forces.
Sri Lanka defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which was widely considered to be invincible and the most ruthless terrorist organisation in the world, following a nearly three-year long combined security forces campaign. The war was brought to a successful conclusion on the banks of the Nanthikadal lagoon on May 19, 2009.
Sri Lanka’s collective failure to take advantage of Lord Naseby’s revelation as well as other related credible information in the public domain is nothing but betrayal of the war-winning armed forces. Lord Naseby provided the much needed ammunition to expose the Geneva lie two years after the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government betrayed the armed forces at the UNHRC in Oct 2015.
On behalf of Sri Lanka, the then Permanent Representative in Geneva Ambassador Ravinatha Aryasinghe accepted the ‘Accountability Resolution 30/1’ on a specific directive from Premier Wickremesinghe-FM Mangala Samaraweera. Aryasinghe, who had earlier strongly opposed the US-led resolution at the informal discussions with the Core Group of Sri Lanka, is our Ambassador in Washington now.
A controversial US statement
The first indication that unsubstantiated war crimes accusations can be successfully countered was received at the first ever Colombo Defence Seminar conducted in late May-June 2011 during Lt. Gen. Jagath Jayasuriya’s tenure as the Commander of the Army (July 2009-July 2013). Jayasuriya succeeded war-winning Army Commander Gen. Sarath Fonseka in the wake of an unprecedented dispute between the Rajapaksas and Fonseka. The Sinha Regiment veteran ended up as the common candidate at the 2010 presidential election challenging Mahinda Rajapaksa his Commander in Chief only a few months before.
Thanks to Wikileaks, the US role in making Fonseka the common candidate as well as ensuring the one-time LTTE proxy, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) extending support to him is in the public domain. The day the TNA declared its support to Fonseka, the unsubstantiated war crimes accusations should have been unceremoniously discarded. But, unfortunately, the war crimes accusations persisted even after the predominantly Tamil speaking northern and eastern electoral districts overwhelmingly voted for him.
At the first Defence Seminar, the then US Defence Advisor in Colombo Lt. Col. Lawrence questioned the very basis of allegations, including the execution of surrendered terrorists directed at the Army (58 Division/formerly Task Force I). The US official was responding to a query posed by retired Major General Ashok K. Mehta, formerly of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) deployed here, to Major General Shavendra Silva, the first General Officer Commanding (GoC) of the celebrated 58 Division. Silva, the incumbent Army Chief was there in his capacity as Sri Lanka’s then No 02 at the UN. Smith’s voluntary and spontaneous revelation, made weeks after the UNSG’s Panel of Experts (PoE) aka the Darusman report accused Sri Lanka of killing as many as 40,000 (paragraph 137) embarrassed the US (Sri Lanka Defence Symposium: Now, US suspects credibility of LTTE surrender offer with strap line…dismisses KP, Nadesan as ‘mouthpieces’ with no real authority – The Island, June 3, 2011)
The US State Department had no option but to claim Lt. Colonel Smith hadn’t represented the US at the seminar. The political leadership and Army Headquarters never exploited the US official’s statement. In fact, Smith’s statement made six years before Lord Naseby’s disclosure based on the then British Defence Advisor Lt. Col. Anthony Gash’s wartime dispatches, should have been the basis for Sri L:anka’s defence. It would be pertinent to examine why the first Rajapaksa administration never bothered to examine the US official’s statement. In fact, the Army never really pursued the matter during the tenure of Army Commanders – Daya Ratnayaka (Aug 2013-Feb 2015), Chrishantha de Silva (Feb-2015-June 2017) and Mahesh Senanayake (June 2017-August 2019) as Commander of the Army. Lord Naseby made his disclosure during Mahesh Senanayake’s tenure as the Commander. But, the Army never examined/exploited Lt. Col. Smith’s statement and that of Lord Naseby as part of Sri Lanka’s overall defence in Geneva.
The politically motivated US decision to slap a travel ban on incumbent Army Commander in Feb 2020 should be examined against the backdrop of the criminal negligence on Sri Lanka’s part to counter lies propagated in spite of having powerful ammunition. Actually a Special Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) is necessary to ascertain the shocking lapses on the part of political and military leaderships that led to ‘Accountability Resolution 30/1’ in 2015 and the expansion of relentless and continuing Western campaign.
Yahapalanaya rejects Naseby disclosure
Treacherous politicians, some sections of the media and diplomatic community and the civil the society worked overtime to suppress Lord Naseby’s disclosure that threatened to undermine the devious Geneva project. The Geneva operation was meant to introduce a new Constitution that did away with Sri Lanka’s unitary status in the guise of addressing accountability issues. The Sirisena-Wickremesinghe administration spearheaded the despicable project. The then Joint Opposition (now SLPP) co-operated in that endeavor by being part of a parliamentary process to draft a new Constitution, spearheaded by Premier Wickremesinghe. President Sirisena remained an onlooker whereas his parliamentary group participated in the process. Wimal Weerawansa’s National Freedom Front (NFF) subsequently quit the process though his efforts to convince the JO to do so failed.
Lord Naseby’s disclosure threatened to weaken the yahapalana project. The Foreign Ministry under Ravi Karunanayake (RK received the appointment in the wake of Samaraweera’s removal as FM in May 2017) ridiculed Lord Naseby’s statement.
Did the Sri Lanka High Commission in London bring Lord Naseby’s statement to the Foreign Ministry’s attention? For want of a Foreign Ministry response to Lord Naseby’s very important statement, even a week after it was made, the writer, on Oct 20, 2017, sought an explanation from the Foreign Ministry. The Foreign Ministry response really disappointed a vast majority of people, who expected the government to use the House of Lords disclosure to counter lies that had been propagated by various interested parties. Instead of taking advantage of Lord Naseby’s statement, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mahishini Colonne declared: “The Government of Sri Lanka remains committed to the national processes, aimed at realizing the vision of a reconciled, stable, peaceful and prosperous nation. Engaging in arguments and debates in the international domain over the number of civilians who may have died at a particular time in the country will not help resolve any issues, in a meaningful manner, locally, except a feel good factor for a few individuals who may think that they have won a debate or scored points over someone or the other.”
The writer also raised Lord Naseby’s disclosure with the four-party Tamil National Alliance (TNA), one-time mouthpiece of the LTTE and the main Opposition in Parliament. The TNA refrained from responding to The Island queries submitted to TNA leader R. Sampanthan. In spite of over a dozen calls/sms to Raghu Balachandran of Sampanthan’s Office, The Island never received the TNA’s response. You may want to know when the set of questions regarding TNA’s response to Lord Naseby’s disclosure was submitted to that party. The Island submitted the following questions to TNA and Opposition Leader R. Sampanthan on Nov. 27, 2017 and repeatedly reminded the Opposition Leader’s Office of the delay on its part to respond: Have you (TNA) studied Lord Naseby’s statement made in the House of Lords on Oct. 12, 2017? What is TNA’s position on Naseby’s claims? Did TNA leaders discuss Naseby’s claim among themselves? Did TNA respond to MP Dinesh Gunawardena’s statements in Parliament on Naseby’s disclosure? And did TNA take up this issue with the UK High Commissioner James Dauris?
The British HC too side-stepped the issue. When the writer raised the issue with Lord Naseby soon after his explosive Oct 12, 2017 disclosure, the Conservative Party member said that he received an assurance from the Minister of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Mark Field, that the issue at hand would be examined (FCO to study Naseby’s proposals – The Island, Oct 26, 2017). However, when the writer sought an explanation from the British HC in Colombo on the same matter, the mission dismissed Lord Naseby’s statement on the basis he was not speaking for the British government (Naseby’s call doesn’t reflect UK’s stand – HC, The Island Dec 6, 2017).
The UK never hesitated to praise Channel 4 News that propagated accusations that the Sri Lankan military massacred over 40,000 civilians. The then UK Prime Minister David Cameron went out of his way to praise the Channel 4 team accompanying him to Colombo for CHOGM 2013 when he addressed the media at the BMICH. Questions at this peculiar press conference were only fielded from a handpicked lot, especially from his retinue of embedded reporters from the UK brought with him. Is that another display of “British sense of justice and fair play”? But one plucky Lankan journalist Rajpal Abeynayake clearly shouted out “bloody hypocrites” as Cameron got up and left without taking any questions from independent journalists.
The UK should really examine its role here, how it had intentionally contributed to terrorism much to the disappointment of the majority of Sri Lankans. Let me remind you of a statement made by one-time UK High Commissioner in Colombo David Tattham in 1996 soon after the armed forces brought the Jaffna peninsula under the government control. Tattham, during a visit to Jaffna, urged the Diaspora not to fund the LTTE. But the UK didn’t take any notice of Tattham’s appeal. The LTTE was allowed to operate there with impunity.
Relevance of Offord’s speech
Despite being up to all types of villainy around the world (for example what did the ICC say recently about the behviour of her troops in Afghanistan and how London shamelessly passed hasty legislation to save their skins), the British are now championing human rights here in its new capacity as leader of the Sri Lanka Core Group without even examining the post-war situation. Perhaps a statement delivered by Matthew Offord, the current Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Sri Lanka (Lord Naseby is the Honorary President and Founder) on March 18, 2021 in the House of Commons debate on UK’s commitment to reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka underscored the need for a fresh examination of the war, post-war and related matters.
The following is the text of elected member Offord’s speech: “I start by highlighting my chairmanship of the all-party parliamentary group on Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka’s relationship with the rest of the world has been strongly shaped since the end of the conflict by allegations that the Army committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during the final phase of the civil war.
“A UN panel of experts reported in April 2011 that there were credible allegations of those crimes by both Government and Tamil Tiger forces. It remains my opinion that both sides were at fault. However, I regret the Government of Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw support for UNHRC resolution 30/1 and note that previous domestic initiatives have failed to deliver meaningful accountability. I therefore urge the Sri Lankan Government to engage in a process that has the confidence of all on the island.
“But it would be remiss to state that the current Sri Lankan Government has failed to act. The Office on Missing Persons and the Office for Reparations are to be retained and strengthened, so that communities may build trust. It will be good to see reform of the Prevention of Terrorism Act and progress on the release of political prisoners. We must act as a critical friend to the country. We need to help strengthen democratic institutions, and we must trust Sri Lanka to develop its own judicial and non-judicial mechanisms.
“Since the end of the conflict, reconciliation has occurred among Sinhala, Tamil and Muslim communities. People are able to live wherever they wish. They benefit from state resources, such as free education and health services. Private land that was occupied by the military has been returned, former conflict areas have been de-mined with assistance from the United Kingdom, and more than 12,000 ex-LTTE— Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam—cadres have been rehabilitated. There is greater connectivity throughout the island and globally, and all of this has transformed the business sector and the lives of everyone in the country.
“But we should remember that a fresh resolution and accountability are not a panacea for addressing underlying tensions. Questions about how to address the legacy of the Sri Lankan conflict must be answered: what kind of justice is attainable? How should the victims of violations be treated in the process? What might punishment look like, and how can justice play a constructive role in forging a lasting peace?
“Draft legislation for a truth and reconciliation commission had been prepared under the previous Sri Lankan Government, and that could be revisited. If it gains universal support in Sri Lanka, truth seeking among all stakeholders, including the diaspora in many of our communities and constituencies could make a lasting difference. When these issues have been resolved, a sustainable and acceptable peace will endure. Given the goodwill between our two countries, I ask the Minister: how can the UK help to facilitate a TRC mechanism that is unique to the needs of Sri Lanka?”
Offord took a sensible and impartial stand on the Sri Lanka issue at the poorly attended debate.
Unfortunately, Offord has either deliberately or inadvertently been silent on the need to examine Gash reports pertaining to the Vanni war. The elected House of Commons member owed the public an explanation. Why shouldn’t the Conservative party member ask his government to release the entire set of Gash reports to help ascertain the truth?
Recently, former Sri Lanka Chief Justice Sarath Nanda Silva told the writer that examination of wartime dispatches from Colombo-based defence advisors and defence attaches would help Geneva to establish the truth. Those who had been pushing Sri Lanka on the human rights front are silent on their own records and tend to depend on faceless accusers. The CJ, 41 was referring to PoE declaration that war crimes accuser wouldn’t be examined till 2031. If Offord is really keen on post-war Sri Lanka reconciliation he should push for a thorough inquiry. By depriving access to wartime British HC dispatches from Colombo, one cannot help with the reconciliation.
The writer is sure Offord understands the British lost credibility by offering sanctuary to LTTE activist Adele Balasingham, wife of Anton Balasingham, British citizen of Sri Lankan origin. Did the British ever inquire into the possibility of Adele’s direct involvement with women suicide cadres? The possibility of Adele knowing the woman suicide bomber who targeted former Indian PM and Congress I leader Rajiv Gandhi can never be ruled out. If New Delhi is really interested in finding the truth it should be the first party to pick up this line of thinking.
How Sri Lanka helped enemy strategy
Sri Lanka facilitated Western strategy against the country by allowing anti-Sri Lanka propagandists a free hand. One-time Deputy Minister and retired Rear Admiral Sarath Weerasekera addressing a media briefing organized by civil society organization ‘Eliya’ backing Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s candidature at the 2019 presidential poll said that Lord Naseby’s disclosure could be the basis for Sri Lanka’s defence at the Geneva body. The Navy veteran was flanked by the then The Island political columnist C.A. Chandraprema (our present Permanent Representative in Geneva) and Ven. Medagoda Abhayatissa. Weerasekera, now the Public Security Minister, faulted the yahapalana government for not exploiting Lord Naseby’s revelation to Sri Lanka’s advantage (Lord Naseby’s call to revise Vanni death toll: Parliament faulted for not taking up vital issue – The Island Nov 8, 2017).
The SLPP government certainly owed the public an explanation how it used/failed to use Lord Naseby’s disclosure along with other credible information such as Lt. Col. Smith’s stand at the 2011 Colombo Defence seminar, Wikileaks revelations and still confidential UN report that dealt with the Vanni conflict and placed the total number of dead at 7,721 to build up a strong case.
The writer during separate media briefings during the Yahapalana administration raised the accountability issue and was told by Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, Mahinda Samarasinghe and Dayasiri Jayasekera the cabinet had never discussed Sri Lanka’s response to alleged war crimes allegations. Fonseka’s colleagues in Nov 2017 (Dayasiri Jayasekera in his capacity as the Cabinet spokesperson) and Aug 2018 (Mahinda Samarasinghe in his capacity as the SLFP spokesperson) revealed a pathetic situation. They acknowledged that the Cabinet of ministers had not discussed Sri Lanka’s defence nor examined the Geneva Resolution. Jayasekera reacted angrily when the writer queried about the lapse on the part of the government. Jayasekera declared that a statement made by Lord Naseby in the House of Lords would be used by the government appropriately at the right time, though the Cabinet was yet to discuss it.
Jayasekera said that they wouldn’t take up issues pursued by The Island the way the newspaper wanted. It had not been taken up by the Cabinet on the basis it wasn’t considered a grave matter, the Minister said. The Minister initially asserted that Lord Naseby’s statement wasn’t directly relevant to the Geneva issue (Cabinet spokesman provoked by query on govt response to Naseby move – The Island Nov 16, 2017).
When the writer asked the then Deputy Minister of National Policies and Economic Affairs Dr. Harsha de Silva whether Lord Naseby’s disclosure could be used at the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the country’s human rights record at Geneva, the then UNPer said that the matter was not directly relevant to the UPR. He was responding to a query by The Island in his capacity as the leader of the country’s delegation to the UPR (The issue never discussed at cabinet: House of Lords statement not directly relevant to UPR-Dr. De Silva – The Island, Nov 14, 2017)
In spite of the change of government in Nov 2019, the country is yet to take tangible measures to expose the Geneva lie. The handling of the 46th Geneva session proved again Sri Lanka’s failure. Those responsible should keep in mind Geneva lie cannot be exposed by propaganda alone.
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