to support implementation of the recommendations of the Panel of
Experts on Accountability.”
The Report also stated that there was credible evidence that at least 70,000 civilians
had died during the last phase of the war. The Report made mention about Sri Lanka’s
own Commission to look into the war and reconciliation process which was called the
Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission.
“The LLRC was fundamentally
constrained by a mandate that did not focus on actual accountability and by
the lack of an enabling environment for judicial follow up.”
According to the Catholic Bishop of Mannar, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Rayappu Joseph in his
submission to the Lesson Learnt and Reconciliation Commission [LLRC] 146,679
people are yet unaccounted for after the final stage of the war. The British Foreign and
Commonwealth Office on Human Rights and Democracy said in a report in May 2012
that there are 90,000 Tamil war widows living in the North and East.
There is no belief at all that the current Sri Lankan government will ever take steps to
ensure accountability and justice for the events of 2008-09. Prof. Steven Ratner, a
member of the Panel of Experts appointed by the UN Secretary General observed in an
article he wrote for the ‘American Journal of International Law’ that:
“Nearly four years after the war, the Sri Lankan accountability process has finally
been set in motion, but in a sense it has barely begun. The majority within the
Human Rights Council that the United States cobbled together for the March 2012
resolution may dissipate over time. In the end, states may emphasize other
important aspects of national reconciliation within Sri Lanka and may no longer
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