[Amnesty International USA]

We are pleased to hear that the United States has decided to press for action at the March session of the Human Rights Council on accountability for wartime abuses in Sri Lanka.  This issue has long been a high priority for us due to the massive scale of abuses committed in the final months of the war and the Sri Lankan government’s resistance to any serious domestic inquiry.

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[UN News Centre]

[AFP]

Sri Lanka on Wednesday used draconian anti-terror laws to detain thousands of Tamil rebel suspects who would have had to be freed when a state of emergency ended after 28 years, an official said.

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[Channel 4 News]

Footage broadcast by Channel 4 News showing the alleged massacre of Tamil prisoners is evidence of “serious international crimes”, the UN says, as pressure mounts for an international investigation. A UN envoy has urged the international community and Sri Lanka to further investigate footage obtained by Channel 4 News purporting to show the summary executions of naked and bound men and women during the country’s civil war.

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[AP]

An international panel of experts invited by Sri Lanka to monitor a government commission investigating human rights abuses announced Thursday it was resigning in frustration over the government’s lack of support. “There has been and continues to be a lack of political and institutional will to investigate and inquire into the cases before the (government) commission,” the panel, known as the International Independent Group of Eminent Persons, said in a statement.

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