Lanka mends fences with Palestine as UN envoy lashes out at Israel

By Thalif Deen at the united nations

NEW YORK - After its political faux pas last month in temporarily abandoning its seat in the General Assembly during a crucial vote on Palestine, Sri Lanka is now bending over backwards to show its support and solidarity to a cause that successive governments in Colombo have advocated from time immemorial.

Spanish musician Cristina del Valle conducts an orchestra in front of the controversial separation barrier being built by Israel and said to be illegal by the International Court of Justice on the outskirts of the holy West Bank town of Bethlehem which is being surrounded by this structure 22 December 2006. Del Valle is heading a delegation of artists, journalists and politicians to the Palestinian territories for Christmas. The International Court of Justice issued in 2004 a non-binding ruling that parts of the 650-kilometre (410-mile) barrier which criss-crosses the West Bank are illegal and should be torn down. Israel has vowed to complete the project.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa, a one-time head of the Sri Lanka-Palestine Solidarity Movement, was apparently furious when he heard that Sri Lanka ducked a vote on Palestine by deliberately keeping its seat vacant during roll call time.

The instructions to abscond came from the Foreign Ministry which was trying to cave into American pressure by presumably playing ball with the US on a UN resolution that deplored the Israeli killings of Palestinian civilians.

The voting was overwhelming in favour of the resolution, with 156 (out of 192 member states voting for it), with only seven against and six abstentions (Canada, Cote d'Ivoire, Papua New Guinea, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuautu).

The US was supported only by Australia and Israel -- and by what is known here as the "usual suspects" -- namely Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru and Palau.

The President apparently called both the Sri Lanka Ambassador to the US, Bernard Goonetilleke, and Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative to the UN, Prasad Kariyawasam, for an explanation. The no-voting fiasco was out of Goonetilleke's political ballpark.

So, it was left to Kariyawasam to explain the circumstances under which Sri Lanka had to run away from its seat -- and keep unholy company with the likes of Burundi, Equatorial Guinea, Rwanda, Dominican Republic, Turkmenistan, Liberia and Samoa.

The President's call triggered a statement from Kariyawasam who said that "Sri Lanka continues to strongly support the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people and their right to an independent sovereign state. We are acutely concerned about human rights violations taking place in the (Israeli) occupied territories."

The statement was a reiteration of Sri Lanka's longstanding policy on Palestine -- going back to the days of Ambassadors Shirley Amerasinghe, B.J. Fernando, Ben Fonseka, Nissanka Wijaywaradane, Daya Perera, Dr Stanley Kalpage, H.L. de Silva, John de Saram, Bernard Goonetilleke and Chittambaranathan Mahendran.

All of them chaired the "UN Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices" (read: Malpractices) involving the violation of human rights of Palestinians in occupied territories. Sri Lanka is the only non-Islamic country in the three-member Committee, the others being Malaysia and Senegal.

President Rajapaksa's intervention was also prompted by a meeting with the Palestinian envoy and some of the Arab ambassadors based in Colombo who expressed their concerns over the Sri Lankan no-show during the General Assembly vote.

But the President, also mindful of the fact that Sri Lanka's expatriate remittances from the Arab world continue to soar over one billion dollars annually, had to re-assure the Middle Eastern ambassadors that there was no change in Sri Lanka's policy towards the Palestinians.

Meanwhile, Kariyawasam continued to lash out at the repressive Israeli policies in the West Bank and Gaza. As chair of the Special Committee, he said: "Palestine was under harsh military occupation, the longest recorded in recent times, with violations of international humanitarian law."

The suspension of aid to the Palestinian Authority, combined with Israel's halting of customs and tax revenues, had triggered a humanitarian crisis, he told the General Assembly last month.

Moreover, violence and human rights violations were at unprecedented levels, and Israel had taken the lives of innocent civilians, including women and children, besides demolishing homes and infrastructure.

The destruction of Gaza's only power station, he pointed out, had cut electricity and led to water restrictions, which, when combined with the alarmingly expanded poverty rate and health problems, pointed to a humanitarian crisis.

Kariyawasam said the growth of Jewish settlements in confiscated lands made it difficult for Palestinians to reach schools, workplaces as well as health and social services facilities. The humanitarian situation in the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights was just as bad.

He said the Special Committee's recent trip to the Middle East also provided ample opportunity to see those problems for itself and record its experiences.

Stressing that impunity on the part of Israel must now be brought to an end by all available legal means, he said Palestinians must be empowered to request compensation for the deaths of their loved ones, and for damage to property and infrastructure.
And for its part, the Palestinian Authority must ensure the restoration of the rule of law in territories under its jurisdiction.

During the Special Committee's field visit, there were expressions of anger against the "inaction of the international community, including the United Nations", as many Palestinians felt neglected, if not abandoned.

"New peace initiatives were needed to reverse the situation, and the Special Committee welcomed the ceasefire in Gaza. Hopefully, it would engender further action for peace," he added.