Action Alert Archive

Take Action Now!

Political assassinations, ‘disappearances’ continue as human rights team resigns in protest

March 13, 2008

I urgently call to your attention the latest human rights abuses in Sri Lanka, which include a political assassination and widespread disappearances.

On March 7, Member of Parliament Kiddinan Sivanesan was assassinated by a claymore attack on his vehicle. He was a member of the Tamil National Alliance, a political party vocally- supportive of the LTTE, and vocally-critical of the Sri Lankan government’s human rights violations. Honorable Sivanesan is the third of 22 Tamil MPs to have been killed since the conflict resumed in 2005.

Human Rights Watch released an in-depth report on March 6, entitled Recurring Nightmare: State Responsibility for ‘Disappearances’ and Abductions in Sri Lanka. The report held government forces responsible for the abductions and involuntary disappearances of Tamil community leaders, clergy, educators, journalists, and humanitarian aid workers.

HRW Deputy Asia Director Elaine Pearson condemned the Sri Lankan president for having “led his government to become one of the world’s worst perpetrators of enforced disappearances.”

The same day of the HRW report’s release, an international human rights body appointed to oversee investigations of human rights violations resigned. After operating for just one year, the International Independent Group of Eminent Persons cited several failures within Sri Lanka’s government which prohibited it from substantively working towards the protection of human rights in Sri Lanka.

It decried the “lack of political and institutional will to investigate and inquire into the cases” of human rights violations. The IIGEP reported that most of their suggestions were ignored or rejected, and condemned the “refusal of the State authorities at the highest level to fully cooperate with the investigations and inquiries.”

I urge you to condemn the Sri Lankan government for the pervading climate of impunity, which permits political assassinations and involuntary disappearances. Advise Sri Lanka to invite an international human rights monitoring team there to stem rampant human rights violations.