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The Lankan Government stood in the dock this week in Geneva before the UN’s Human Rights Council accused by its Commissioner for failing to have a continuous accountability record toward ‘war crimes, corruption, human rights violations, and for abuse of power, which are vital to address if Lanka is to move forward.’ 

“More than a year ago mass protests demanded better governance and an inclusive vision for Sri Lanka—in short, a renewal of the social contract. But the potential for a historic transformation that would address long-standing challenges is far from being realised,” said UN High Human Rights Commissioner, Volker Türk, in his report.

Delivering Turk’s full report was the Deputy High Commissioner, Al-Nashif, who declared: ‘One year after the remarkable protest movement demanding deep political and democratic reforms, the transformation that was hoped for to address long-standing challenges has still not materialised’.

“Fourteen years since the war ended, tens of thousands of victims and their families continue to suffer in agony and grief as they wait for truth, justice, and remedy. Truth-seeking alone is not sufficient and must be accompanied by a clear commitment to accountability.”

Commissioner Turk also called for a probe into the Easter bomb attacks and noted that investigations should comply with international human rights standards.

“As the Government implements its economic recovery policies, it should be guided by its obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to protect the most vulnerable. The international community, including international financial institutions, should keep supporting Sri Lanka in its recovery, in line with obligations around international cooperation and assistance, by providing the fiscal space needed while pressing for genuine progress in governance, transparency and accountability.”

If High Commissioner Turk had expected Lanka to cringe and say ‘thank you’ for not exploiting her economic collapse and bankruptcy and calling on financial institutions in the West to grudge on granting aid until Lanka has fulfilled UNHRC demands at least to some extent, then he was in for a surprise.

Instead of some atoning penitent’s sign conveyed in diplomatic jargon that she’ll strive more to achieve her UN obligations in the coming year, the Sri Lankan envoy to the UNHRC delivered the Sri Lankan Government’s stinging rebuke, effectively reducing to pulp all the man hours and the millions of dollars spent by High Commissioner Turk’s office in compiling the full dossier—a dossier that would stand up to world scrutiny—on Sri Lanka’s violations on human rights last year.

DEFIANCE IN FACE OF ATTACK IS BEST FORM OF DEFENCE: Lanka’s Permanent Representative at the UN in Geneva, Himalee Arunatilaka rejects UN Human Rights High Commissioner’s report on Sri Lanka resolution in toto

But this time the mouse roared. This time there were no punches pulled, no shabby tactics to delay the day of judgement were employed but an unexpected slap in the Commissioner’s unguarded face to end the farce. Lanka took off her gloves, ready for battle to begin.

Like a down and almost out-for-the-count floored boxer, Lanka found Dutch courage from some mysterious external force to rise empowered to deliver her response: by flinging back the dossier and totally rejecting all ‘Conclusions and Recommendations including references to targeted sanctions pursuant to HRC Resolution 51/1’.

Then at that hour, the Lankan Government stood not in the Commission’s dock of shame but suddenly appeared to stand on lofty steeps of the high moral ground; when it assumed the tenuous position of a Government ‘more sinned against than sinning’ as King Lear had done in Shakespeare’s play.

The Lankan Government denounced all the accusations in High Commissioner Turk’s charge sheet as based on ‘incorrect, unsubstantiated sources contravening the principles of natural justice’ and thereby dismissed the report to the UN rubbish bin. Ironically this was the quintessence of Lanka’s reply whose own dictatorial leaders had denied natural justice to thousands of her citizens.

Sri Lanka told the UNHRC in Geneva on Monday, ‘These Resolutions are intrusive and polarising’.  She also made the wild allegation, ‘It’s upheld only by a handful of countries for reasons unrelated to human rights and based on their vote bank domestic politics.’

If Lanka’s human rights issue is a vote changer in the domestic politics of the core group of States that have sponsored this resolution against Lanka, it’s at least an acknowledgment that Governments of core group countries such as Britain, Canada, Germany, the United States and the others keenly listen to the people’s voice and act according to their people’s wish, unlike successive governments in Lanka which give scant regard to people’s wishes, flout all pre-election manifesto promises, and arbitrarily act contrarily to the manifested will of the Sri Lankan electorate.

Just barely up on her feet after her comatose state last year, the IMF-empowered Sri Lanka feigned ignorance of her own beggary, and, brazenly disputing High Commissioner Turk’s view of severe hard times faced by Lanka, had the audacity to camouflage her international default on debt as not an ‘isolated phenomenon affecting Sri Lanka alone’ but as one due to the normal ups and downs of international economies.

Sri Lanka went on the offensive by refuting observations made by Commissioner Turk that Lanka’s economic recovery is yet to materialise one year after the country’s anti-Government protests. Instead, she boasted that experts authorised by her—both domestically and internationally— ‘remain confident of Sri Lanka’s prospects.’

Perhaps, the Human Rights Commissioner had canvassed the views of experts in Lanka and abroad who haven’t been mandated by Sri Lanka to write reports expressing confidence and optimism as to the country’s future prospects in, perhaps, the miracle year 2048. Whatever mandated experts may write in their reports, the people are yet to feel the impact of a recovery that is beneficial to them. Except to note, amidst the insufferable rising cost of living, the resumption of political corruption in the Government.

She even had the temerity to bring the UN Secretary General into the frame that he had in solidarity with developing Member States in debt and financial distress arising from the current global context, was highlighting sympathetically the severe setbacks and challenges encountered by all developing countries in achieving the SDGs.’

But was the UN Secretary General in New York in the post-Covid years specifically referring to Lanka’s isolated case of defaulting on some 40 billion dollar debt to foreign states and sovereign bondholders or, in general to temporarily financially distressed nations who sought IMF assistance to help them weather the imminent storm, as Lanka had done 16 times before the final crash of 2023.

According to Fitch ratings only five nations out of the 193 States at the UN are presently in default since 2020, namely, Belarus, Lebanon, Ghana, Zambia and Sri Lanka. Can Sri Lanka crassly afford to say that this is the new norm at an international conference without inviting scorn?

As for expecting world sympathy for her plight what daydreams she must dream, especially since the world is aware that her economic collapse and default wasn’t merely due to world recession but due to corruption on a mega scale, abuses of state power by her leaders, selective enforcement of the rule of law, institutionalised nepotism, incompetent economic mismanagement, lack of a coherent well-articulated state policy in every facet of state activity, wastage and financial indiscipline on a rampant scale.

The world is only too aware that even in the midst of this economic disaster with only Lanka’s nostrils still above the water gasping for IMF’s loaned breath, the corruption still continues unabatedly within the ranks of Government. The world’s sympathy that reposes with the people of Lanka shouldn’t be held and misrepresented as one held toward their Government.

And finally, the Government accused the UNHRC of wasting the UN’s resources on a monitoring mechanism to compile a dossier on Sri Lanka. It said: ‘It is an unproductive and unhelpful drain on the resources of the Council and its Members.’ It stressed that
Sri Lanka will not cooperate with it.

Such creditable thriftiness towards the waste of UN money from a Government that spends extravagantly when at home.

The Lankan Government may be applauding its defiant stance in Geneva but it should not forget to hear the rumblings from its Godfather India who on Tuesday declared at the UN Commission, ‘We urge the Government of
Sri Lanka to work meaningfully towards early implementation of its commitments to ensure that the fundamental freedoms and human rights of all its citizens are fully protected.’

It’s fortunate that at this present session, the Commission will not vote on a resolution, but will only review Sri Lanka’s own commitments to human rights. Next year may witness the result.

So, will the bravura performance by a State as poor as a church mouse pay off or stiffen the resolve of the UNHRC and the Core group to continue the inquisition with keener interest?

No doubt the cardboard patriots with placards round their necks will come out in full force demanding ‘hands off Lanka’s sovereignty’ but let the rest remember that the Government is not in the dock for denying the rights of aliens but in the dock accused of violating human rights of its own citizens.

The Privy Council in England was the court of last resort before Ceylon went republic in 1972. Today the last resort for justice for all human rights denials by dictatorially bent Governments lies solely in this Geneva-based Human Rights tribunal of justice, where miscreant States are on trial, not its citizens. Unfortunately, though, if sanctions are imposed, the people may be called upon to suffer for the human rights sins of their Governments.

All the more reason why the people must exercise greater caution and care before they rush to jump on some dubious populist wave to elect regimes with a dictatorial bent.

If Lanka cannot live eternally on loans then neither can she live forever on a lie. Someday the truth will be out.

NASA joins space race to find alien gods Like the agnostics who deny the existence of God unless He physically manifests Himself before their eyes, so has NASA kept its belief in aliens on hold until one lands on its Florida doorstep. Now for some reason or another, there has suddenly been a conversion of its long-held faith. From disbelievers—not deniers as heathen infidels are—they have radically shifted their ground to become space explorers searching the heaven’s pantheon to finally discover and commune with their alien Gods in chariots of fire. THE HUNT IS ON: New NASA report leads to the launch of a space mission for aliens In a 333-page landmark report, published on Friday, which covered hundreds of cases of unidentified objects or phenomena in our skies, a 16-expert advisory panel stressed that there is ‘no reason to conclude’ that any of the sightings have been alien in origin — however, the panel did warn that mysterious flying objects were a ‘self-evident’ threat to American airspace. Lest they have to eat humble pie for scoffing at the devout and scorning their worship, NASA took great pains to hide its embracement at this shift of faith and hypocritically stressed that even though it has ruled out aliens, it ‘will continue to study the phenomena.’ What balderdash! If no alien exists, who’s behind the wheel? Or controls from afar mysterious spaceships? If it’s artificial intelligence, then AI must be the new millennium’s alien Gods.  Can the spacecraft itself not be a sentient being? The NASA advisory panel’s unprecedented new report, which comes as UFO fever has reached a tipping point in the US, analysed more than 800 cases across three decades. The panel noted that, to date, most UFO sightings are recorded with sensors and other equipment intended for nonscientific purposes, under accidental or ‘serendipitous’ circumstances that are far from ideal. NASA chief Bill Nelson announced that a new director for UFO research would help the space agency implement the panel’s recommendations though the name is still a top secret and remains hush hush. But thankfully NASA’s betrayal of its earlier agnostic faith didn’t have to wait till the ‘conversion of the Jews’. What might be a small step for ordinary men was nothing but a quantum leap for the space agency. If Mohammed went to the mountain since the mountain did not come to him, why not a USA space agency embark on an illuminating voyage of discovery to find the superior alien gods who, so far, have refused to come to their inferior feet?

NASA joins space race to find alien godsLike the agnostics who deny the existence of God unless He physically manifests Himself before their eyes, so has NASA kept its belief in aliens on hold until one lands on its Florida doorstep.Now for some reason or another, there has suddenly been a conversion of its long-held faith. From disbelievers—not deniers as heathen infidels are—they have radically shifted their ground to become space explorers searching the heaven’s pantheon to finally discover and commune with their alien Gods in chariots of fire. In a 333-page landmark report, published on Friday, which covered hundreds of cases of unidentified objects or phenomena in our skies, a 16-expert advisory panel stressed that there is ‘no reason to conclude’ that any of the sightings have been alien in origin — however, the panel did warn that mysterious flying objects were a ‘self-evident’ threat to American airspace.Lest they have to eat humble pie for scoffing at the devout and scorning their worship, NASA took great pains to hide its embracement at this shift of faith and hypocritically stressed that even though it has ruled out aliens, it ‘will continue to study the phenomena.’What balderdash! If no alien exists, who’s behind the wheel? Or controls from afar mysterious spaceships? If it’s artificial intelligence, then AI must be the new millennium’s alien Gods.  Can the spacecraft itself not be a sentient being?The NASA advisory panel’s unprecedented new report, which comes as UFO fever has reached a tipping point in the US, analysed more than 800 cases across three decades. The panel noted that, to date, most UFO sightings are recorded with sensors and other equipment intended for nonscientific purposes, under accidental or ‘serendipitous’ circumstances that are far from ideal.NASA chief Bill Nelson announced that a new director for UFO research would help the space agency implement the panel’s recommendations though the name is still a top secret and remains hush hush. But thankfully NASA’s betrayal of its earlier agnostic faith didn’t have to wait till the ‘conversion of the Jews’. What might be a small step for ordinary men was nothing but a quantum leap for the space agency. If Mohammed went to the mountain since the mountain did not come to him, why not a USA space agency embark on an illuminating voyage of discovery to find the superior alien gods who, so far, have refused to come to their inferior feet?