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UN questions Lankan govt on alleged war crimes
The United Nations has asked the Sri Lankan government to explain its position on the allegations leveled by the former army chief general Sarath Fonseka that three senior Tamil Tiger leaders were executed by soldiers as they came forward to surrender. Sutirtho Patranobis reports.
The United Nations has asked the Sri Lankan government to explain its position on the allegations leveled by the former army chief general Sarath Fonseka that three senior Tamil Tiger leaders were executed by soldiers as they came forward to surrender.
Fonseka, opposition candidate for the January 26 Presidential election, had made the allegations in an interview to Sunday Leader newspaper on December 13.
"When Nadeshan, Pulidevan and Ramesh walked towards the SLA positions carrying white cloths in the first hours of 18 May 2009, soldiers opened fire on them and killed them. An unspecified number of family members of the three men were killed as well," Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary execution wrote in a letter submitted to Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations office at Geneva. Alston was quoting from the Fonseka interview.
Alston added: “Theses allegations were made by the Commander of the Sri Lanka Army at the time of the events and subsequent Chief of Defence Staff (now retired) Genral Gardihewa Sarath Chandralal Fonseka, in an interview to the newspaper The Sunday Leader. The accounts of journalists embedded with the SLA 58th Brigade confirm some of the alleged circumstances of the death of Messers. Nadeshan, Pulidevan and Ramesh and their families.”
The letter, addressed to President Mahinda Rajapaksa, ended with questions for the Lankan government. ``Are the allegations summarised above accurate, If not so, please share the information and documents proving their inaccuracy,’’ and ``What information does your Excellency's Government have on the family members of Messrs. Nadeshan, Pulidevan and Ramesh allegedly killed on 18 May 2009?’’
Alston said the responses from the Lankan government would be part of the report he compiles and submits to the UN’s Human Rights Council.
A day after the interview was published, Fonseka qualified his statement saying that he as the army chief takes responsibility whatever soldiers did during the war.
The government was ``making a careful study of the UN Rapporteur’s letter regarding the circumstances of the death of three senior LTTE cadres and their families at the last stages of military operations’’ the Presidential Secretariat’s media unit said.
