"SELF DETERMINATION IS KEY TO THE WORLD PEACE"
AP | Sep 12, 2011, 04.13PM IST
COLOMBO: A senior US official is visiting Sri Lanka to push for a credible report by the country’s civil war commission on alleged abuses during the two-decade-long conflict.
US assistant secretary of state Robert O Blake will meet with government officials, civic leaders, university students and politicians, embassy spokesman Christopher Elms said. He did not give further details.
Washington has pushed for a full investigation of alleged rights abuses on both sides during the civil war that ended in May 2009 with the defeat of separatist Tamil Tiger rebels.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said last week that one of the purposes of Blake’s visit is to discuss a report to be released in November by the government-appointed Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission.
"Our first goal is to ensure that it is a good, strong, credible report that can take Sri Lanka forward," she said.
Blake’s visit coincides with the start of a U.N. Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva where the issue is expected to be discussed. Sri Lanka has been trying to rally its traditional supporters, such as China, India and Cuba, to prevent any action against it at the U.N.
Sri Lanka appointed the commission last year under intense international pressure to probe possible war crimes in the final stages of the war.
But human rights groups say the commission does not meet international standards and some of its members have conflicts of interest.
The United Nations says at least 7,000 civilians were killed in the last five months of the war.
A report by a UN panel of experts accused both the government and rebels of potential war crimes and recommended an independent international inquiry. It said tens of thousands of civilians may have been killed in the last phase of the fighting.
The government has called the report biased and rejected an international probe, but acknowledged for the first time last month that civilian casualties occurred in the final phase of the conflict, calling the deaths unavoidable.
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GLOBAL PEACE SUPPORT GROUP - UK - TIRELESSLY WORK ON THE CONCEPT OF:
"SELF DETERMINATION IS KEY TO THE WORLD PEACE"
MOURNS ON THE CONTINUED TRAGEDY OF THE PEOPLE OF North & East of Tamil EELAM WITH THE HOPE OF ALL OF OUR ENDEAVOURS WOULD BRING AN END TO THOSE SUFFERING DURING THE YEAR AHEAD.
The International community has a duty towards the long suffering Sri Lankan Tamil population to restore their rights of SELF DETERMINATION.
Global Peace Support Group - believes that this is the ONLY way for a permanent PEACE in Sri Lanka.
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