Sri Lanka slams ‘external initiatives’ at HRC

Such moves will ‘polarise our society’

Sri Lanka on Tuesday said it rejects “any external initiatives” established by UN mechanisms, envisaged in the resolution adopted by the Human Rights Council in March, claiming that domestic processes are “vigorously addressing” questions of accountability and justice lingering from the civil war years.

The , adopted with 22 of the 47 member-states of Council backing it, underscored the “persistent lack of accountability of domestic mechanisms”, and decided to strengthen the capacity of the Office of the High Commissioner to “collect, consolidate, analyse, and preserve” information and evidence and to develop strategies for future accountability processes for gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in Sri Lanka.

Delivering a statement a day after the UN Human Rights Chief’s oral update on Sri Lanka, in which she sought “close attention” on, and “concrete actions” from Sri Lanka, Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris said external initiatives “will polarise our society”.