Commonwealth Summit: Can it 'shine light' on abuses at end of Sri Lanka civil war?

Despite encouragement to boycott the summit, UK Prime Minister Cameron toured a former Tamil Tiger stronghold, trying to draw attention to 'chilling events' at the end of Sri Lanka's civil war.

|
Eranga Jayawardena/AP
British Prime Minister David Cameron talks to villagers of Internally displaced peoples camp at Chunnakam village, in Jaffna, northern Sri Lanka, Friday, Nov. 15, 2013. Cameron Friday traveled into northern areas in a detour designed to increase scrutiny of the Sri Lankan government's human rights record.

British Prime Minister David Cameron appeared to be making good on his promise to "shine a light" on the "chilling events" at the end of Sri Lanka's civil war, as he visited the country's Tamil north in a detour designed to increase scrutiny of the Sri Lankan government's human rights record.

Mr. Cameron is in Sri Lanka for the three-day, 53-nation Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Colombo. Ahead of his visit, he came under pressure to boycott the summit over accusations that the Sri Lankan government murdered and tortured minority Tamils after the end of the civil war, which is believed to have claimed a total of 100,000 lives.

But the prime minister argued that his attendance at the summit would do more than a boycott would, and looked to prove that with a visit to former Tamil territory that he said on Twitter would "shine a light on chilling events there first hand."

CNN reports that there was "full-scale chaos" in Jaffna, a city once controlled by the rebel Tamil Tigers before their defeat, as "hundreds of screaming" protesters and police mobbed Cameron. Nick Robinson of the BBC describes in more detail:

On one side of the road, there was a group of clearly pro-regime demonstrators who, amusingly, carried almost identical printed signs written in English.

When I approached this group I could not find a single one of them who spoke English.

They were calling for an inquiry - not into the crimes of the civil war, or the alleged war crimes of their own president, but into colonial abuses, Britain's behaviour here many decades ago.

Their rival group, composed largely of women, was equally well-organised. As the prime minister arrived they rushed forward to try to see him and were held back by a group of soldiers.

They were carrying in their hands identically laminated pictures of their loved ones, the so-called disappeared - sons, daughters, mothers and fathers who went missing during the civil war.

Just hours before Cameron's visit, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse said in his opening speech as host that the Commonwealth should not be a "judgmental body" and warned against other nations' attempts to impose "bilateral agendas," reports the Times of India.

"If the Commonwealth is to remain relevant to its member countries, the association must respond to the needs of its people and not turn into a punitive or judgemental body," he said in a speech ahead of the formal opening of the summit by Britain's Prince Charles.

But Sri Lanka's long, bloody civil war has left many unresolved questions, The Christian Science Monitor reports. Human rights groups have repeatedly called for an independent inquiry into alleged murder and torture by the Sri Lankan military during and after the civil war. And the UN, which says some 40,000 people were killed in the war's closing stages, has singled out Mr. Rajapakse's government for its failure to investigate the abuses.

Steve Crawshaw at Amnesty International told the Monitor that it's important Cameron speaks out in favor of an international inquiry into alleged war crimes.

“The worst thing that can happen is to go there and not say anything,” Mr. Crawshaw says. “There needs to be international pressure from many governments, not just Britain, and the conference is a good opportunity to put pressure on Sri Lanka and change their attitude.”

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Commonwealth Summit: Can it 'shine light' on abuses at end of Sri Lanka civil war?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/terrorism-security/2013/1115/Commonwealth-Summit-Can-it-shine-light-on-abuses-at-end-of-Sri-Lanka-civil-war
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe