Ensure Disabled Persons Enjoy Their Rights - Ban

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">  <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">TEHRAN</span></st1:place></st1:city><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> (NNN-IRNA) -- UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in his message on the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, December 3, 2012, called on all people to ensure that persons with disabilities enjoy their rights and realize their great potential. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">According to a press release issued by the UN Information Center (UNIC), the full text of his message reads: <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"This year’s Paralympic Games were a reminder of the immense potential of persons with disabilities to soar and to inspire. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One girl wrote to a Paralympic gold-medal champion, “Watching as you overcome the difficulties of life, reaching for new victories and new heights in sports, I derive strength and inspiration.” <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"Persons with disabilities have a significant positive impact on society, and their contributions can be even greater if we remove barriers to their participation. With more than one billion persons with disabilities in our world today, this is more important than ever. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"Our challenge is to provide all people with the equality of access they need and deserve. Ultimately, this will create a better world for all. As negotiators at this year’s “<st1:place w:st="on">Rio</st1:place> 20” United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development agreed, accessibility is critical to achieve the future we want. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"Together, we must strive to achieve the goals of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: to eliminate discrimination and exclusion, and to create societies that value diversity and inclusion. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"In order to spur action to bridge the gap between well-meaning commitments and long-overdue actions, the United Nations General Assembly will hold a high-level meeting on disability and development next year. This gathering will take place as the international community works to forge a post-2015 development agenda, presenting an opportunity to ensure that the rights, concerns and contributions of persons with disabilities are fully taken into account. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"This International Day of Persons with Disabilities marks the official opening of preparations for the high-level meeting. Let us make the most of our commemoration by working to ensure that persons with disabilities enjoy their rights and realize their great potential." -- NNN-IRNA<o:p></o:p></span></div> </div>

Ensure Disabled Persons Enjoy Their Rights - Ban

  TEHRAN (NNN-IRNA) -- UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in his message on the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, Dece...

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ASEAN Leaders Adopt ASEAN Human Rights Declaration

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">  <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">By Jamaluddin Muhammad <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">PHNOM PENH</span></st1:city><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">, <st1:country-region w:st="on">Cambodia</st1:country-region></span></st1:place><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> (NNN- Bernama) -- Asean leaders today adopted the Asean Human Rights Declaration in committing themselves to further promote and protect human rights in the region. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak signed the declaration on behalf of the Malaysian Government at the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Peace</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Palace</st1:placetype></st1:place> here, during the 21st Asean Summit. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The other nine Asean leaders also signed the declaration. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The declaration, among others, protects the rights of people from all walks of life, from children to women. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The declaration is one of the important outcomes of this summit as the 10 member nations move towards establishing the Asean Community by 2015. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Speaking to reporters later, Asean Secretary-General Dr Surin Pitsuwan said the declaration was a commitment by the grouping's leaders in pursuing the promotion and protection of human rights in the region, not only based on "our way", but also conforming to the highest international standards. --NNN-BERNAMA<o:p></o:p></span></div> </div>

ASEAN Leaders Adopt ASEAN Human Rights Declaration

  By Jamaluddin Muhammad PHNOM PENH , Cambodia (NNN- Bernama) -- Asean leaders today adopted the Asean Human Rights Declaratio...

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Analysis: Sri Lanka’s long road to reconciliation

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br /> <h1 style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 3.75pt; text-align: justify;"> </h1> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <b><span style="color: maroon; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Two countries in one<o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <br /></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <b><span style="color: maroon; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Militarization of north deepens distrust<o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <br /></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <b><span style="color: maroon; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Limited efforts to bridge divide<o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <br /></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <b><span style="color: maroon; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Problem of impunity<o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizg6_tUnQyc7W8KsH39aH_oVxC-NreTaK7qnmDZQQAkRxOw-0RJqxoT17YjBnMsLVj4oyOxOsb2RL3gTBpgSv2z0T8Dr5jHNpbbGpEnt7gMyKcwObrAwR_iLoDFTyGLixFqIEoARYYPV4/s1600/201211090356510501.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizg6_tUnQyc7W8KsH39aH_oVxC-NreTaK7qnmDZQQAkRxOw-0RJqxoT17YjBnMsLVj4oyOxOsb2RL3gTBpgSv2z0T8Dr5jHNpbbGpEnt7gMyKcwObrAwR_iLoDFTyGLixFqIEoARYYPV4/s1600/201211090356510501.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal"> <i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 8.0pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/Photo/Details/201211090356510501/Genzia-Mary-a-10-yr-old-war-returnee-is-desperate-to-make-friends-with-the-bus-loads-of-tourists-who"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">Amantha Perera/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></i></div> <div class="MsoNormal"> <i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 8.0pt;">War returnee Genzia Mary<o:p></o:p></span></i></div> </td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">PUTHUKKUDIYIRUPPU (IRIN) - Genzia Mary, 10, is fascinated by the buses arriving in northern <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Sri Lanka</st1:country-region></st1:place>, their jovial travellers singing in a language that, until two years ago, was completely foreign to her.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Mary lives in Kilinochchi District, part of the country’s northern former war zone popularly known as “the Vanni”. Thousands of southerners, mostly from the majority Sinhala ethnic group, come to visit war attractions as well as a well-known Buddhist temple north of the Vanni.<br /> <br /> “There are lots of people in [the buses]. Sometimes there are old ammas [grandmothers] in them, all dressed in white,” she said. Many girls her age also visit, especially during school holidays. “But I have never spoken to anyone of them,” Mary said, disappointed. “They never talk to us.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> For years, the Vanni was cut off from the rest of the country. It was the main battle ground during two and half decades of civil war, as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels fought successive governments, demanding a separate state. The war ended in May 2009 with LTTE’s defeat.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> In late 2009, parts of the region were opened for unrestricted civilian travel, and thousands of travellers from the south began streaming in. The numbers have dropped from highs of over 100,000 a day, but they still figure in the thousands.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> These visits could help bring communities inside and outside the war-scarred region together, but, so far, that has not been the case.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> “The two communities still live in two separate cocoons. There is hardly any interaction,” said Saroja Sivachandran, head of the Centre for Women and Development, a women’s rights group in northern <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jaffna</st1:city></st1:place>. “One example of how far the gulf is: the visitors will sometimes bring their own fire wood. The only interaction with the Vanni population is if they ask for directions,” she said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> <strong>Militarization</strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><b> </b></span><b><br /> </b><br /> Mahendran Sivakumar, 61, is a retired government education officer who remained in the Vanni even during the bloodiest years of fighting. He said interaction with southern visitors is limited because mistrust lingers from the decades of bloodshed and isolation.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> “It will take another generation to break the ice. Unfortunately no one [in authority] seems to doing anything tangible to bring them together,” Sivakumar said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> He said there is still a significant military presence - mostly Sinhalese - in the Vanni’s civilian affairs, contributing to Tamil distrust. More than three years after the end of the war, the military still plays a large role in daily village life, from attending school events to repairing water distribution networks. “If the military role in civilian affairs is reduced and we see public and elected officials taking a larger role, then people will begin to feel that at last this sense of being watched is over. But it will not happen overnight.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Tens of thousands of security forces are posted in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">Northern Province</st1:state></st1:place> - at least 80,000 according to<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>analysts in the north - but there are few other Sinhalese in the region.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> Local media report that military-run businesses - from barbershops to restaurants - have distorted prices and edged out local competition, worsening the north’s already<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>bleak employment situation. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> Sivakumar said southern visitors mostly mingle with government soldiers and other Sinhalese service personnel in the Vanni. “It is obvious they feel most comfortable with those who speak the same language.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> <strong>Lack of rapprochement</strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><b> <o:p></o:p></b></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> With few chances to interact, deep divisions remain between the Tamil and Sinhalese, the country’s two main ethnic groups.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> “Most of the tour buses will travel through areas devastated by the fighting, with families living in huts. But they [visitors] don’t seem to care,” Sivachandran said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">She blamed the apparent indifference on ignorance. “The visitors are clueless as to what happened here, or only know part of the story. For those living in the Vanni, especially the interior, the tourists are alien.”<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> It does not help that there has been no national recognition of civilian deaths, stripping northerners of the chance to mourn properly, added Sivachandran. “Some of us feel like there is searing pain within that we cannot let out. The more it stays in, the more painful it is. Also, this idea of winners and losers has to end. If it’s one country, then there are no winners and losers, only survivors.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Some 40,000 civilians died in the bloodiest stage of fighting before the government declared an end to the war, according to a<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>UN expert panel.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> The furious pace of reconstruction masks the lack of rapprochement between the Tamil and Sinhalese, said Ruki Fernando, a human rights advocate who formerly headed the Human Rights in Conflict Programme at the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Law and Society Trust, a national advocacy body.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> “[Mega development projects] give a false sense that things are moving here. But nothing much has happened to make a Vanni civilian feel he can trust the south.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Officials say it may take years to finish repairs. Meanwhile, ethnic reconciliation has slipped as a priority, even though it is as essential to moving beyond conflict as physical repairs, said Fernando.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <strong>Repairing ties<o:p></o:p></strong></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> There have been few grassroots efforts to bridge the ethnic and cultural divide between Tamils and Sinhalese. But several small-scale, ad-hoc exchange programmes are helping to widen people’s perspectives.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> Since January 2011, the NGO International Alert<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>has organized three visits to <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Sri Lanka</st1:country-region></st1:place> - including the north - for the UK-based Sri Lankan diaspora. <span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Johann Rebert, the NGO’s manager in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Sri Lanka</st1:country-region></st1:place>, said the country’s diaspora can play an important role in reconciliation efforts. “Engagement with them is more sustainable, and can lead to better outcomes, than shutting them out.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> The Colombo-based NGO<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Sri Lanka Unites, has also brought together youths from both communities, most recently for a conference<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jaffna</st1:city></st1:place> this past August. <span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Prashan de Visser, the president of Sri Lanka Unites, counts some 10,000 members in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Sri Lanka</st1:country-region></st1:place>, 30 percent of whom come from the north. “We live in a very segregated society. Our focus is to allow the youth to break out [from] segregation,” he said.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /> <!--[endif]--></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><o:p></o:p></span></div> <table align="right" border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="background: #AABBDC; border: solid #336699 1.0pt; margin-bottom: 3.75pt; margin-left: 6.0pt; margin-right: 6.0pt; margin-top: -.75pt; mso-border-alt: solid #336699 .75pt; mso-cellspacing: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt; mso-table-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-table-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-table-bspace: 6.0pt; mso-table-left: right; mso-table-lspace: 8.25pt; mso-table-rspace: 8.25pt; mso-table-top: middle; mso-table-tspace: 1.5pt; width: 220px;"> <tbody> <tr> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma;"><!--[if gte vml 1]><v:shapetype id="_x0000_t75" coordsize="21600,21600" o:spt="75" o:preferrelative="t" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" filled="f" stroked="f"> <v:stroke joinstyle="miter"/> <v:formulas> <v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0"/> <v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0"/> <v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1"/> <v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2"/> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth"/> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight"/> <v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1"/> <v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2"/> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth"/> <v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0"/> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight"/> <v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0"/> </v:formulas> <v:path o:extrusionok="f" gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect"/> <o:lock v:ext="edit" aspectratio="t"/> </v:shapetype><v:shape id="_x0000_i1025" type="#_x0000_t75" alt="''" style='width:17.25pt; height:13.5pt'> <v:imagedata src="file:///C:\Users\Zainab\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\08\clip_image001.jpg" o:href="http://www.irinnews.org/images/design/quotopen.jpg"/> </v:shape><![endif]--><!--[if !vml]--><img alt="''" height="18" src="file:///C:/Users/Zainab/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtml1/08/clip_image001.jpg" v:shapes="_x0000_i1025" width="23" /><!--[endif]--><b>If it's one country then there are no winners and losers, only survivors.</b><!--[if gte vml 1]><v:shape id="_x0000_i1026" type="#_x0000_t75" alt="''" style='width:17.25pt;height:13.5pt'> <v:imagedata src="file:///C:\Users\Zainab\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\08\clip_image002.jpg" o:href="http://www.irinnews.org/images/design/quotclose.jpg"/> </v:shape><![endif]--><!--[if !vml]--><img alt="''" height="18" src="file:///C:/Users/Zainab/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtml1/08/clip_image002.jpg" v:shapes="_x0000_i1026" width="23" /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></div> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">De Visser said every year his organization takes 25 youth leaders from around the country on a month-long national tour. During this experience, he said, Sinhalese youths “finally” realize the enormousness of the destruction in the Vanni. “The three representatives from Hambantota, [the country’s southern-most district] in fact, pledged to raise Rs 300,000 [about US$2,300] for our work in the [northern] region. There is a lot of misinformation out there.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Sivchandran, the women’s advocate, welcomed these initiatives. But she warned that without government support, such efforts will have limited results. “Agencies and activists who work on advocacy issues still sometimes find it hard to work effectively in the region.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <br /> <strong>Where to start?</strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><b> <o:p></o:p></b></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> </span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> Bedevilling both activists and authorities is just where to begin to restore the community ties that existed before LTTE rebels killed 13 government soldiers in 1983, triggering widespread anti-Tamil riots in other parts of the country.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> After 18 months of investigation, the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission, set up by the government in May 2010, concluded “human rights issues are critically relevant to the process of reconciliation.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> Between January and May 2009, the government reported 2,635 missing persons were “untraceable” in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">Northern Province</st1:state></st1:place>. Between December 2009 and mid-2012, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) office in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Sri Lanka</st1:country-region></st1:place> reported 747 cases of missing children.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> “You have to answer the questions on the missing, deaths and alleged abuse truthfully, once and for all,” said human rights activist Fernando.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> He also criticized the country’s main Tamil political party, Tamil National Alliance, for making power devolution a prerequisite for reconciliation. Tamil political leaders have pushed for power decentralization to address the discrimination that they say led to the conflict. But an influential group within the government is campaigning to scrap a constitutional amendment that, in 1987, set up power-sharing provincial councils, which are now widely regarded as ineffective.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> “It is all good if effective power devolution takes place, but by focusing exclusively on that, we take away the importance of other underlying issues,” Fernando said.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><br /> Though a complicated issue, ethnic reconciliation is possible, said Sri Lanka Unites president de Visser. “We have inherited a mess, but this is also an opportunity for us to build strength among youth and foster unity.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>

Analysis: Sri Lanka’s long road to reconciliation

Two countries in one Militarization of north deepens distrust Limited efforts to bridge divide Problem of impunity ...

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Huts of 285 Dalits Set On Fire by Mob in Tamil Nadu

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br /> <h5 style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <br /></h5> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">DHARMAPURI (TN) (NNN-PTI) -- Angered by a man committing suicide over his daughter marrying a Dalit boy, a mob torched 285 huts in three Dalit colonies in the district, but there were no casualties as all the people had fled to neighbouring areas, police said.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">They said the crowd first targeted Natham, the boy's village and two other Dalit colonies Kondampatty and Anna Nagar on November 7 night, using petrol bombs to set ablaze the huts. The villagers had got wind of the impending attack beforehand and fled, they said.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">The couple had got married on October 14.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /></span></div> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Sanjay Kumar, DIG (<st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Salem</st1:place></st1:city>), said 90 persons have so far been arrested in connection with the violence and that armed police personnel had been posted in the villages.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div style="background: white; line-height: 15.3pt; text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">He said the couple is now in a safe area under police protection.<br /> <br /> Collector Lily said the situation was now under control and that the administration had made all arrangements to provide those affected with food and water. The villagers would also be provided ration cards, she said. --NNN-PTI<o:p></o:p></span></div> </div>

Huts of 285 Dalits Set On Fire by Mob in Tamil Nadu

DHARMAPURI (TN) (NNN-PTI) -- Angered by a man committing suicide over his daughter marrying a Dalit boy, a mob torched 285 huts in thre...

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PAKISTAN: Sectarian Violence Slipping Out of Control in Balochistan

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hbxvFC7akooKaqpmGFbM38aynWwFKGgljRAlNfTQnH6odYd8BLpngHXVvIMXJKBF-yigthyphenhyphen7zAg6avgrfTBjeJRS2MZnZ6QNTnSH_CJ39MMZtWgTtxoBTf3TN-9TX-1kMHgdcej501M/s1600/201111170827050625.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_hbxvFC7akooKaqpmGFbM38aynWwFKGgljRAlNfTQnH6odYd8BLpngHXVvIMXJKBF-yigthyphenhyphen7zAg6avgrfTBjeJRS2MZnZ6QNTnSH_CJ39MMZtWgTtxoBTf3TN-9TX-1kMHgdcej501M/s1600/201111170827050625.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 9.0pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">Kamila Hyat/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 9.0pt;">Relatives of missing persons stage <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 9.0pt;">a protest in Balochistan<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><br /> </div></td></tr> </tbody></table><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">QUETTA,Pakistan (IRIN) - Ethnic and religious minorities in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan have faced increasing intimidation and violence since 2009, according to a recent</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">fact-finding mission</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“Settlers” i.e. people who have settled in the province and are not of Baloch ethnicity (a term used by Balochi nationalists even for people whose ancestors came to the region before the Pakistani state was created in 1947) are being targeted.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">Heavy locks on two empty houses in a residential suburb of Quetta, the provincial capital, stand as a testimony to what is happening - in this case the occupants chose to vacate their properties quietly in the dead of night.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“These persons were `settlers’ in Balochistan, from the Punjab. They were good people; we had known them for years, but they had to leave because it is no longer safe for people from other provinces to live in Balochistan,” a neighbour who asked not to be named, told IRIN.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">With violence increasing in 2010, the central government informed the country’s Senate that</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">100,000</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">people had fled Balochistan. According to HRCP, thousands more have fled since then. At least 2,000 “settler” children have been taken out of school by their parents since 2011, the HRCP report says.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">About half of Balochistan’s 7.8 million people are non-Baloch; they live mainly in Quetta and Pakhtoon-dominated areas.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“My family has lived in Quetta since the 1930s. It is the only home I know. But things are getting too dangerous for anyone who is non-Baloch,” said Khawar Jhandro, an ethnic Sindhi.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">The teacher, 40, said he had already moved his family to Karachi, as “I was terrified about the safety of my children who were asked their ethnicity even at school.”</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">The problem, according to Tahir Hussain Khan, a Quetta-based lawyer and human rights activist, is tied to the nationalist struggle by Baloch groups, which began in the 1950s but intensified after the 2006 killing of a key Baloch nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Bugti.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">Baloch Baloch, a spokesman for the nationalist Baloch Republican Army, an armed militia fighting for autonomy of the region, told IRIN over the telephone: “We believe Balochistan should be mainly for the Baloch people and not be taken over by those who have moved in from outside and settled here… Balochistan’s resources have been taken away by the Punjab, aided by the central government.”</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">HRCP says underdevelopment is one of the factors driving the grievances. According to official statistics, the province is the country’s poorest with the lowest literacy rate (30 percent).</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">According to the</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">South Asian Terrorism Portal</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">which bases its data on media reports and is run by the New Delhi-based Institute for Conflict Management, 711 persons, including civilians, nationalist militants and personnel from security forces were killed in</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">Balochistan</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">in 2011, and 347 the previous year. HRCP reported the discovery of 57 bodies of people who had gone missing from various parts of the province in 2012 alone.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">Sectarian violence has also started to target the</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">Hazara, a Shiite minority. Sardar Saadat Ali, chief of the Hazara community in Balochistan, told IRIN: “Our protests are ignored. The extremists targeting us on a sectarian basis just escape, scot-free.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <strong><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Balochs also targeted<o:p></o:p></span></strong></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">Even the Balochi nationalists themselves have become a target and many have gone missing. “There are at least 500 or more missing persons in the province,” Baloch Baloch told IRIN. According to the HRCP report, the disappearance of 198 people has been officially recorded since 2000.</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">A</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">2010 report</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">by Human Rights Watch said the Frontier Corps (FC), a paramilitary organization commanded by Pakistan’s military, was behind many of the disappearances.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><table align="right" border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MediumShading2" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; margin-bottom: 3.75pt; margin-left: 6.0pt; margin-right: 6.0pt; margin-top: -.75pt; mso-border-bottom-alt: solid windowtext 2.25pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-table-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-table-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-table-bspace: 6.0pt; mso-table-left: right; mso-table-lspace: 8.25pt; mso-table-rspace: 8.25pt; mso-table-top: middle; mso-table-tspace: 1.5pt; mso-yfti-tbllook: 1184; width: 220px;"><tbody> <tr style="mso-yfti-firstrow: yes; mso-yfti-irow: -1; mso-yfti-lastrow: yes;"> <td style="background: black; border-bottom: solid windowtext 2.25pt; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: solid windowtext 2.25pt; mso-background-themecolor: text1; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;" valign="top"><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; mso-yfti-cnfc: 517; text-align: justify;"><b><span style="color: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-no-proof: yes; mso-themecolor: background1;"><v:shapetype coordsize="21600,21600" filled="f" id="_x0000_t75" o:preferrelative="t" o:spt="75" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" stroked="f"> <v:stroke joinstyle="miter"> <v:formulas> <v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0"> <v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0"> <v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1"> <v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2"> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth"> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight"> <v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1"> <v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2"> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth"> <v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0"> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight"> <v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0"> </v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:formulas> <v:path gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect" o:extrusionok="f"> <o:lock aspectratio="t" v:ext="edit"> </o:lock></v:path></v:stroke></v:shapetype><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_1" o:spid="_x0000_i1026" style="height: 13.5pt; mso-wrap-style: square; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt;" type="#_x0000_t75"> <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image001.jpg"> </v:imagedata></v:shape></span></b><span style="color: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-themecolor: background1;">My family has lived in Quetta since the 1930s. It is the only home I know. But things are getting too dangerous for anyone who is non-Baloch<b><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;"><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_2" o:spid="_x0000_i1025" style="height: 13.5pt; mso-wrap-style: square; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt;" type="#_x0000_t75"> <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image002.jpg"> </v:imagedata></v:shape></span><o:p></o:p></b></span></div></td> </tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">The central government is concerned that it is losing control of the region. The country’s top court,</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">hearing a case</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">regarding law and order in Balochistan brought before it by NGOs and families of the missing, has repeatedly ordered the provincial government to take action. So has the prime minister. But these interventions, backed by the military muscle of the FC are seen by some as interfering in local affairs.</span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“Basically, the FC has seized all control, follows its own plans and does not allow us to function,” a senior police officer in Quetta, who asked not to be named, told IRIN.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“The military has intervened too often in the affairs of Balochistan, handicapping civilian rule,” said I.A. Rehman, secretary-general of the HRCP. Balochistan has a long history of military intervention against those fighting for more autonomy, dating back to the 1950s.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <strong><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Fear</span></strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><b> </b></span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">The result of this administrative disarray is fear. Tens of thousands across Balochistan are affected.</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">“It is unsafe to go out of the house after 4 or 5pm. I, in fact, try not to let my college-going sons leave the house at any time, except for their studies, because I am afraid they may be `picked up’ as nationalists or get caught up in some terrorist incident,” said Shaista Bibi, a mother of three - and an ethnic Baloch.</span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span"> </span><br /> <span class="apple-style-span">An ethnic Pakhtoon mother was just as fearful. “We will have to leave here soon. It is no longer safe for my four young children,” said Ameera Gul, 30, who had moved to Balochistan from Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa Province 10 years ago. The family is now planning to leave as soon as it can.</span></span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

PAKISTAN: Sectarian Violence Slipping Out of Control in Balochistan

Photo:  Kamila Hyat/IRIN Relatives of missing persons stage a protest in Balochistan QUETTA,Pakistan (IRIN) - Ethnic and religious mino...

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GLOBAL: New ICC prosecutor vows to focus on victims

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5g9lZR2Oyv3WBYQvCw-t5vTOEELIUpZ3CMpeZD4ec6ubLwI44B5twNd5xDEXCIdGUNOec5wwWWs9TVxAz4nomwLfD67q9xs164v1yD66SwtK4O6rZFC2I97yL5-bmBnmHlcrxYm-Pkc0/s1600/201207301203450616.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5g9lZR2Oyv3WBYQvCw-t5vTOEELIUpZ3CMpeZD4ec6ubLwI44B5twNd5xDEXCIdGUNOec5wwWWs9TVxAz4nomwLfD67q9xs164v1yD66SwtK4O6rZFC2I97yL5-bmBnmHlcrxYm-Pkc0/s1600/201207301203450616.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.unmultimedia.org/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">UN Photo/Rick Bajornas</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The new ICC prosecutor has pledged that <o:p></o:p></span></div><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Mangal; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">victims of atrocities will be her priority</span></td></tr> </tbody></table><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">LONDON (IRIN) - That a war crimes court should focus on the victims of war crimes sounds like a simple concept. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">But many of those living in the African communities where most of the atrocities being prosecuted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) took place, have long complained they have been forgotten by this controversial and costly institution based thousands of miles away.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The new ICC prosecutor has pledged that victims - particularly women and children - will be her priority, but analysts worry that shrinking budgets could make her promises difficult to keep.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Fatou Bensouda said at her swearing-in speech in June that she would “focus on, and listen to, the millions of victims who continue to suffer from massive crimes…<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“The return on our investment for what others may today consider to be a huge cost for justice is effective deterrence and saving millions of victims’ lives,” said Bensouda as she took over the ICC’s highest profile job from Luis Moreno-Ocampo. Gambia’s former justice minister and attorney-general served more than eight years as Ocampo’s deputy.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Sunil Pal, head of the legal section at the Coalition for the ICC, an advocacy organization comprising 2,500 civil society groups in 150 countries, expects Bensouda to bring her own unique approach to the role of prosecutor. He welcomes her diplomatic style and focus on victims.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“The tone is very positive [with Bensouda],” he said. “There is a real emphasis on working with victims and ensuring that the process is meaningful for the direct beneficiaries of this process - the victims. It is about recognizing the importance that victims play in this process and an acknowledgement and strengthening of that role.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">On paper at least the ICC is the most victim-friendly of all the international tribunals.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Court-recognized victims are given lawyers and allowed to participate throughout a trial, including by questioning witnesses. Those who have suffered injury or harm from a crime for which someone is convicted are also eligible for restitution, compensation or rehabilitation. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The reparations process is now under way in the Thomas Lubanga case, the only trial completed during Ocampo’s nine-year reign, but awards are many months away. Lubanga was a Congolese militia leader convicted of recruiting children.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is up to the court’s registry and judges rather than the prosecutor to explain the reparations procedure to victims. But analysts say it is Bensouda who should take responsibility for improving communications with victims who have often complained about the lack of information coming from the Hague-based court about the trials.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“There has been a general insufficiency of information being passed to victims which leads to certain perceptions of how the court works which may be false,” said Carla Ferstman, director of Redress, a human rights group working with war crimes victims. “It’s not only about bad practices of the prosecutor, it’s about practices that are misunderstood.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“Bensouda does have a role in reaching out and bringing victims in. She should see them as her stakeholders. These are constituents she should be working with and getting on board.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The ICC’s focus on African cases has been controversial and has led to charges of bias from the court’s vocal critics on the continent where cooperation has been patchy at best. Eleven ICC arrest warrants for African accused remain outstanding. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Pal believes that by placing an emphasis on the importance of victims, Bensouda will bring greater relevance to the work of the ICC in the places it is investigating.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“Communications is [a] priority, ensuring the process is relevant and meaningful for victims and communicating, educating and informing victims around its decision-making process, particularly in the case of preliminary examinations,” he said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“This is about creating environments that are conducive to facilitating the court's work in-country, which will help them get buy-in and counteract accusations of bias.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><b>Reduced budget</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">But with a reduced 108 million euro budget this year and an ever increasing caseload, the ICC could struggle to meet its obligations to stay in touch with victims. States are pressuring the ICC to reduce its budget, which would impact on victim participation and communication with those on the ground. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“Outreach to victims and affected communities presents unique challenges, which will only become harder in the face of additional cuts,” said Pal.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“These activities are critical to ensuring that victims and victim communities understand what the court is trying to achieve in their name. It's also critical to facilitating their participation in proceedings, in terms of explaining their rights in the ICC process.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><b>Kenya</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Bensouda’s task of improving relations in Africa could also be complicated by the upcoming trials of four prominent Kenyans accused of orchestrating post-election violence in 2007. The case has generated huge interest in Kenya where debate has raged over whether the court is striking a blow for impunity or targeting innocent victims. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Nick Kaufman, a former ICC prosecutor turned defence lawyer who has represented Congolese clients accused of war crimes, says negotiating a smooth prosecution should be her main priority.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“I think it is a good thing there is an African prosecutor in charge of the court at the moment, because she will be able to bring her own cultural outlook to bear in the case, especially when negotiating the minefield of Kenyan politics which avidly follows the developments in the cases,” he said. “Hardly a day goes by without some sort of reference to the cases in the Kenyan media.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Lubanga case<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOZTI9_pd283kcvlXLogeY1pdqmnJZc5mz79SmnrGpfvv5nKL80jY_XXh5wRl_U3SBWctyeevS6ZBchOSEnwKN7KvovwedNrgMVfrq5CaKaAPExKE1wKJk3RnXdpJNTXOnAQVruQcvQUY/s1600/2008061923.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOZTI9_pd283kcvlXLogeY1pdqmnJZc5mz79SmnrGpfvv5nKL80jY_XXh5wRl_U3SBWctyeevS6ZBchOSEnwKN7KvovwedNrgMVfrq5CaKaAPExKE1wKJk3RnXdpJNTXOnAQVruQcvQUY/s1600/2008061923.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo" target="_blank"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">ICC-CPI/Hans Hordijk</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Former Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga’s <o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">conviction was the ICC’s first verdict<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><br /> </div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Elsewhere in Africa, Bensouda will expected to explain to victims and others the recent sentencing of the DRC’s Lubanga. Bensouda, a member of the prosecution team, was in court on 10 July as judges sentenced the militia leader to 14 years while praising him for enduring prosecution misdeeds during the trial which twice came close to collapse.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Reaction was mixed among victims, according to Bukeni Waruzi, an expert on child soldiers and the programme manager for Africa and the Middle East at the NGO Witness. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“You have some who actually are happy that at least he was sentenced,” said Waruzi. “But there are some who believe it should be more. If he was prosecuted in DRC, with the gravity of the crimes, it could have been more than 14 years.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Ocampo, in one of his final acts as prosecutor, had asked for the maximum penalty of 30 years. However, with six years already served, Lubanga could be out in less than eight.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Kaufman says this puts Bensouda in an awkward position with victims.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“She is being forced to defend a previous sentencing policy that was promoted mistakenly by her predecessor - and I say mistakenly because it was completely wrong for the prosecutor to ask for the maximum sentence, bar a life sentence, for a crime of this nature,” said Kaufman.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">He expects a different ICC under Bensouda who endured a rocky start to her tenure with the arrest by Libyan authorities of defence lawyer Melinda Taylor on charges of spying for her client Saif al-Islam Gaddafi.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“She is the complete opposite of Ocampo. I don’t think we’ll see any of Ocampo’s antics with Fatou - for example courting film stars and other totally irrelevant figures to the conduct of international justice,” said Kaufman who also represents two of Muammar Gaddafi’s children, Aisha and Saadi.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“She will be far more professional in her outlook. She’s a very competent orator and is also very courteous and respectful.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Taking on too much?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Though confidence in Bensouda is high, analysts worry she could be spreading herself too thin.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The ICC has14 cases before judges, ongoing investigations in seven countries and preliminary investigations under way in countries including Afghanistan, Colombia and Korea. On 18 July, Bensouda announced that the government of Mali had asked for an investigation into violence which erupted there earlier this year.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“How many more situations can they take on?” said William Schabas, a professor in international law at Middlesex University. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“Have they taken on already more than they can actually manage? You see how complicated this is. Look at Lubanga - one trial chamber basically full time for four years and they are not finished. They still haven’t done the reparations stuff.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Back in the Congo, where new fighting alleged to have been orchestrated by ICC fugitive Bosco Ntaganda has broken out, expectations that the new prosecutor can help end the violence and impunity remain high.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“There is a huge amount of expectations - from victims, from activists, from everyone,” said Waruzi. “This will be a challenge, how to meet those expectations while fulfilling her mandate.”<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

GLOBAL: New ICC prosecutor vows to focus on victims

Photo:  UN Photo/Rick Bajornas The new ICC prosecutor has pledged that victims of atrocities will be her priority LONDON (IRIN) - That ...

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AFRICA: “Sexual refugees” struggle to access asylum

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXg4srT0DHVyZBdspG_fGAdEvoO741wC04EOoqSC3fTuNgirLFPbtkfQq_lWgsZgNUpM0Is2Z6Upqe7j7EkWWzhUOaJIor7iVWmIbGD1gLrqT7BBgby2eVDTWv2XvhN91iErUXeN3yTaE/s1600/20080814.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXg4srT0DHVyZBdspG_fGAdEvoO741wC04EOoqSC3fTuNgirLFPbtkfQq_lWgsZgNUpM0Is2Z6Upqe7j7EkWWzhUOaJIor7iVWmIbGD1gLrqT7BBgby2eVDTWv2XvhN91iErUXeN3yTaE/s320/20080814.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">Obinna Anyadike/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">LGBTI refugees are often forced to hide their sexuality<o:p></o:p></span></span></div></td></tr> </tbody></table><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - As a gay man living in Tanzania, Cassim Mustapha could have faced imprisonment, but prosecutions under the country's Sexual Offences Act are rare, and the bigger threat came from his own community. After one of his neighbours attacked him with an axe leaving a deep wound in his head, Mustapha fled and applied for asylum in Malawi, the first country he reached.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br /> <br /> Persecution relating to an individual's sexual orientation or gender identity is increasingly recognized by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and in refugee law as grounds for claiming asylum. Most such claims are based on the 1951 Refugee Convention's definition of a refugee as someone having a well-founded fear of persecution because of "membership of a particular social group".<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> However, many lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) individuals fail to gain asylum on this basis, either because they are unaware they can do so or because the officials determining their refugee status do not recognize such claims. This was the case for Mustapha in Malawi, one of 37 countries in Africa that criminalize homosexuality. He moved on to Zambia and tried again, with the same result.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> After a third failed asylum application in Zimbabwe, another country that bans same-sex practices, he was advised by UNHCR that his best chance lay in South Africa, a country where the rights of LGBTI people are protected by the constitution and where refugee law spells out persecution relating to sexuality as grounds for asylum.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> UNHCR issued Mustapha with a temporary travel document and he presented himself at the Beitbridge border post where he told immigration officials he wished to apply for asylum based on his sexuality.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">"They just said, `Where is your passport?’ and when I didn't have it, they arrested me," he told IRIN from a cell at </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="color: windowtext;">Musina</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">police station in late January.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Assuming, there had been a misunderstanding, Mustapha made contact with Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR), an NGO which campaigns for the rights of asylum seekers, refugees and migrants in South Africa.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">"He was very open about [his sexuality]," said LHR lawyer Wayne Ncube who interviewed Mustapha at Lindela Repatriation Centre outside Johannesburg where he was transferred soon after speaking to IRIN. "He thought he was finally somewhere where his rights would be protected."<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Ncube prepared court papers requesting the Tanzanian's release but by the time he returned to Lindela four days later, Mustapha had been deported to Zimbabwe.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br /> <br /> "We haven't heard from him since," said Ncube.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><strong><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Discrimination</span></strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /> <br /> A study<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>released recently by People Against Suffering Oppression and Poverty (PASSOP), a Cape Town-based refugee and migrant rights NGO, suggests that while Mustapha's experience is not the norm, LGBTI refugees and asylum seekers drawn to South Africa from other parts of the continent by its progressive reputation and legislation, experience high levels of discrimination, not just for being gay but also for being foreign.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br /> <br /> Most of the 25 LGBTI refugees and asylum seekers interviewed by PASSOP had experienced discrimination as they sought accommodation, employment, social inclusion and documentation. The combination of xenophobia and homophobia negatively affected their interactions with landlords, employers, police and Home Affairs officials. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Shunned by the refugee community for their sexuality, their status as foreigners tended to exclude them from Cape Town's well-established gay community.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br /> <br /> The PASSOP report also found that almost half of those interviewed had not stated their sexual orientation or gender identity in their asylum claims, in most cases because they did not know this was a valid reason for seeking refugee status. Of the 14 interviewees who had stated their sexuality as the primary reason for claiming asylum, most had faced ridicule or inappropriate questions and only two had been successful in their claims.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /> <!--[endif]--><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><table align="right" border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="background-color: #aabbdc; border: 1pt solid rgb(51, 102, 153); margin: -0.75pt 6pt 3.75pt; width: 200px;"><tbody> <tr> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><v:shapetype coordsize="21600,21600" filled="f" id="_x0000_t75" o:preferrelative="t" o:spt="75" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" stroked="f"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> <v:stroke joinstyle="miter"> <v:formulas> <v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0"> <v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0"> <v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1"> <v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2"> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth"> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight"> <v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1"> <v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2"> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth"> <v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0"> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight"> <v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0"> </v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:f></v:formulas> <v:path gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect" o:extrusionok="f"> <o:lock aspectratio="t" v:ext="edit"> </o:lock></v:path></v:stroke></span></v:shapetype><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_3" o:allowoverlap="f" o:spid="_x0000_s1026" style="height: 13.5pt; left: 0; margin-left: 0; margin-top: 0; mso-position-horizontal-relative: text; mso-position-horizontal: absolute; mso-position-vertical-relative: line; mso-position-vertical: absolute; mso-wrap-distance-bottom: 0; mso-wrap-distance-left: 0; mso-wrap-distance-right: 0; mso-wrap-distance-top: 0; mso-wrap-style: square; position: absolute; text-align: left; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt; z-index: 1;" type="#_x0000_t75"> <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image001.jpg"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> <w:wrap anchory="line" type="square"> </w:wrap></span></v:imagedata></v:shape><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><strong><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">There needs to be a clear UNHCR strategy for providing access to asylum in countries where same-sex conduct is criminalized</span></strong><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><v:shape alt="''" id="Picture_x0020_63" o:spid="_x0000_i1025" style="height: 13.5pt; mso-wrap-style: square; visibility: visible; width: 17.25pt;" type="#_x0000_t75"> <v:imagedata o:title="''" src="file:///C:\Users\GHAZAN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image002.jpg"> </v:imagedata></v:shape></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div></td> </tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Recently released research<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>by the African Centre for Migration and Society (ACMS) at the University of Witswatersrand in Johannesburg which found widespread and systemic problems with the quality of refugee status determination decisions made by the Department of Home Affairs, highlighted the routine failure of Home Affairs officials to recognize sexual orientation as eligible grounds for asylum.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> "I think it’s a general problem with training and knowledge of the law," said ACMS researcher Roni Amit. "Also a lot of them replicate the same discriminatory views about LGBTI people as the general population."<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> A 2008 UNHCR guidance note<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>on refugee claims relating to sexual orientation and gender identity recommends that LGBTI applicants be interviewed by "trained officials who are well informed about the specific problems LGBTI persons face" but provides no guidance on how to fairly adjudicate claims from LGBTI people seeking asylum in countries that criminalize same-sex conduct.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> <strong>Kenya and Uganda</strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><b> <o:p></o:p></b></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> "There needs to be a clear UNHCR strategy for providing access to asylum in countries where same-sex conduct is criminalized," said Duncan Breen, who has conducted research on the plight of LGBTI refugees in Kenya and Uganda (both countries criminalize same-sex conduct) for US-based advocacy organization Human Rights First.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> <br /> He noted that in countries where UNHCR officials conduct refugee status determination, such as Kenya, asylum applications based on sexual orientation or gender identity were more likely to be recognized than in countries where poorly trained government officials make such decisions.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /> In a report<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>released by Human Rights First in May, Breen and his colleagues documented the many security risks faced by LGBTI refugees living in Kenya and Uganda and the threat of arrest if they attempt to seek police protection. Most responded either by frequently moving to new locations or by attempting to hide their sexual orientation or gender identity.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> In such cases, said Breen, LGBTI refugees struggle to access vital support and resettlement in a third country was often the only long-term solution. Currently, few LGBTI refugees from Kenya and Uganda are resettled, but Breen said there is increasing awareness among resettlement countries and UNHCR of the dangers facing this group of refugees and their need for resettlement.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

AFRICA: “Sexual refugees” struggle to access asylum

Photo:  Obinna Anyadike/IRIN LGBTI refugees are often forced to hide their sexuality JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - As a gay man living in Tanza...

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SRI LANKA: "Lot of Talking And Not Much Improvement" in The North

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><br /> </div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW550NbFwlx2uXs1AcpTKpt6yPBT6edzbzpJ3TP_nkxsJhJRNYx60qDQgK_GuqasyCiVyMGS8DBTZ7kxz7yaINfk3XfIN9m2rVt7J3-Mtz6BRya8alMXPu1lJ7jyBzVsM5O5XbqjaTQcM/s1600/2007041732.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW550NbFwlx2uXs1AcpTKpt6yPBT6edzbzpJ3TP_nkxsJhJRNYx60qDQgK_GuqasyCiVyMGS8DBTZ7kxz7yaINfk3XfIN9m2rVt7J3-Mtz6BRya8alMXPu1lJ7jyBzVsM5O5XbqjaTQcM/s1600/2007041732.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Amantha Perera/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">A Missing Husband Portrait Shown in a<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">2007 Civil Monitoring Committee</span></div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">COLOMBO (IRIN) - Sri Lankan parliamentarians in favour of acting on the recommendations in a report into the final stages of the country’s civil war by the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) are slowly gaining ground over those who are not, says a presidential peace process adviser. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The government’s initial reaction to the LLRC recommendations was positive, presidential adviser and parliamentarian Rajiva Wijesinha told IRIN, but others saw the report, released just over six months ago, as a call for regime change and were “highly critical”. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“However I now think we have equilibrium again, and the more positive forces in government seem likely to go ahead [with implementing the recommendations],” Wijesinha said, noting that many of the LLRC recommendations fell within the existing framework of the Ministry of Disaster Management and Human Rights. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“We have wasted far too much time in defending ourselves against gratuitous attacks, when a simple general appreciation of the LLRC would have taken us forward more quickly. But we have to realize that other countries play games in terms of their own interests, and we have to be sensible enough to ignore these and move forward in the interests of pluralism and peace,” he said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Sri Lanka’s president Mahinda Rajapaksa formed the commission in May 2010 to investigate the final period of a decades-long civil war between the government and separatist rebels from the Tamil ethnic group. After an 18-month inquiry, the commission submitted its findings to parliament on 16 December 2011. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Human rights groups questioned the group’s impartiality and along with the UN Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability called for an independent inquiry, which the government rejected. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Among dozens of recommendations, the LLRC called for a special commissioner to investigate alleged disappearances and criminal proceedings; an amendment to the Registration of Deaths Act, which allows a next of kin to apply for a death certificate if a person is missing due to “subversive” activity; an independent advisory committee to examine the detention and arrest of persons in custody to address concerns about indefinite detention without due process under an anti-terrorist law; and addressing grievances from minority communities, including Muslims in the north and Tamils. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tasks <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Since then there has been some progress in economic development and resettlement in the northern conflict zone, but many problems still exist, said Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, executive director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives, a Sri Lankan think-tank. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Progress also made with the rehabilitation of LTTE [Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the separatist movement] cadres, although there are reports that even after being released they are being questioned and face issues with regard to re-integration in the community,” said Saravanamuttu. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not enough has been done to reach a political settlement between the sometimes antagonistic ethnic groups of Tamils and Sinhalese, demilitarizing the north, punishing impunity, and improving governance - such as putting in place legislation that ensures the right to information - and establishing independent commissions to investigate the conflict, Saravanamuttu noted. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The LLRC called for independent investigations into the UK’s Channel 4 television broadcasts in 2011 and 2012, which examined alleged war crimes, and also into civilian massacres spanning a decade in the north’s Trincomalee District, including the 2006 murder of 17 workers of the French NGO, Action Against Hunger. Saravanamuttu said these investigations should start immediately. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thavarajah Rasiah, 63, in Jaffna District in the northern Sri Lanka, told IRIN that residents in the former war zone have been promised much, but seen little. “Lot of talking and not much improvements”. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGdmZ1J_0NpCq9WrC9Ux1DvCjEivBIrorl2miLpgl_kRFFwY6rNEEilMkt2IcUh9uNROGe8BsY8W7rNvy0KSTsUoluxMlIBd94r-dpoVAK48pQCb_aqkguj2CyA-xLY_0zDIlBqwpdzeM/s1600/20070819.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGdmZ1J_0NpCq9WrC9Ux1DvCjEivBIrorl2miLpgl_kRFFwY6rNEEilMkt2IcUh9uNROGe8BsY8W7rNvy0KSTsUoluxMlIBd94r-dpoVAK48pQCb_aqkguj2CyA-xLY_0zDIlBqwpdzeM/s1600/20070819.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Photo: UN OCHA<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">What happened there?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing"><br /> </div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Selva Sivaguru, 43, in neighbouring Mannar District, said Tamil people were exhausted by conflict and would like to find normalcy rather than more politics. “These political games have pushed the country through 30 years of conflict. I hope this will not be repeated.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The executive director of the National Peace Council, Jehan Perera, told IRIN, “While the government asserts that it is implementing the recommendations, it has not been specific as to what it is implementing,” and progress has been very limited so far. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The government does not seem keen on implementing governance recommendations that would interfere with the highly “personalized” powers of current leaders, he added. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Resistance” <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“The government is also inclined to justify its resistance to implementing the LLRC recommendations on the grounds that the international community is interfering in Sri Lanka's internal affairs,” Perera said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The ruling government has largely discredited reports of human rights abuses from international NGOs. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The LLRC recommendations included a mourning period prior to the country’s independence day celebrations on 4 February to express solidarity and sympathy with conflict victims, but nothing took place, said Ruki Fernando of the Christian Alliance for Social Action, a local NGO. Rather, pro-Sinhalese victory parades rolled out. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Fernando said there were a number of critical issues needing urgent attention, including the continued existence of a large number of “high security zones” still controlled by Sri Lankan military forces in the north, which prevent large numbers of people returning to their places of origin. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Other matters needing urgent attention were alleged attacks on the media, reports of religious harassment, issues of language discrimination, and cases of abuse of personal freedoms, including the abuse of civil liberties and human rights<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

SRI LANKA: "Lot of Talking And Not Much Improvement" in The North

Photo:  Amantha Perera/IRIN A Missing Husband Portrait Shown in a 2007 Civil Monitoring Committee COLOMBO (IRIN) - Sri Lankan parliam...

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