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The request came despite the standoff between Washington and Colombo over the United States moving a resolution last Thursday at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva over Sri Lanka’s alleged war crimes. US diplomats were at the External Affairs Ministry this week meeting officials. They were seeking Sri Lanka’s support for a proposed US resolution [...]
Economic growth destabilising long-run growth momentum
Last Sunday’s column pointed out that sustaining the growth momentum of around 7.5 per cent was difficult as the economic strategy was detrimental to longer-term economic growth. Much of the growth achieved since 2009 was due to post-war resuscitation of the economy, reconstruction and infrastructure development rather than based on increasing productivity. Therefore it does [...]
UNHRC, Sri Lanka and the importance of India
After the adoption of the US/UK-led resolution against Sri Lanka in a highly fraught session at the UN Human Rights Council on Thursday, it’s difficult to avoid the feeling that from now on everything has changed. Sri Lanka’s conversation with the world will have to factor-in the consequences of that resolution at every turn and [...]
The ides of March and a reality check for Sri Lanka
Surely the members of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) would not have thought, even in their most nightmarish dreams, that a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) sanctioning an international investigation into Sri Lanka’s human rights violations would be primarily based on their 2011 findings. A heady paradox Indeed, it [...]
What went wrong in Geneva, diplomatic blunders must be rectified
That the third United States resolution, this time calling for an international investigation into alleged war crimes, would sail through last Thursday’s sessions of the UN Human Rights Council was a foregone fact. However, there was a shocker. India called the resolution an “intrusive approach” undermining Sri Lanka’s “national sovereignty and institutions” and abstained from [...]
Raring to return from retirement
My Dear Satellite, I heard that you had been quite busy over the past few days, writing letters to Mahinda maama and then releasing those letters to the media so that we could read what it was all about. So, I thought I should indulge in some correspondence of my own with you. I heard [...]
India takes the wind out of US sails but leaves Lanka puffed
Though India took the wind out of puffed US sails set to charter a new turbulent course for Lanka by abstaining from voting in the US-sponsored resolution on Thursday, her non committal stance did nothing, however, to rock the smooth passage of the resolution which was comfortably passed with 23 nations voting for and 12 [...]