Why these UN reps are a bane to reconciliation

Ben Emmerson, the UN special rapporteur on counter terrorism and human rights, who visited Colombo last week criticized Sri Lanka for the slow pace of the transitional justice process and warned that the international community was running out of patience. He demanded that the government repealed the Prevention of Terrorism Act, but also insisted that the proposed counter terrorism legislation that was meant to replace the PTA should do away with admissibility of confessions to police as court evidence, which, by the way, is admissible in Britain, his home country.   
Earlier another UN special rapporteur Mónica Pinto on the independence on judges and judiciary noted that the independence of courts had improved since the new government came to power, but then upon leaving the country, dropped a bombshell at the UN Human Rights Council, flaying the judiciary of many real and imaginary ills.   

Nonetheless, Sri Lanka should not shut itself to international scrutiny as Mr Rajapaksa did

The problem with these folks is that they come here with preconceived notions and on their arrival, they meet a bunch of people who share the same beliefs: NGO captains, widows of dead LTTEers, lawyers appearing for hard-core terrorist suspects in detention, and in general lobbyists of fringe sections of Tamils. Thus this whole affair of UN visits is an incestuous cycle. Every UN rep after a few days in the country, proudly reaffirms his or her predisposed notions and rubs it on our faces very publicly. (Do that in Turkey or nowadays in Philippines, you get kicked out.)  

Those visits have done little good to this country. On the contrary, they deepen and effectively exploit fault lines in our society. They overplay grievances and imperfections, some of which are, indeed, genuine. But they stemmed from an extreme security vulnerability that the country was faced with in the past. They need to be addressed, but that cannot be done at the whims and fancies of Emmerson or other UN big shots.  

Worse still, those unsolicited interventions risk triggering defensive mechanisms of the majority Sinhalese. A sizable section of them hold reservations about on-going constitutional reforms and can easily be mobilized by the detractors by tapping into their primordial impulses. They could also be made to believe that the Tamil demand for accountability was a pretext to avenge the defeat of the LTTE, a sort of consolation prize for losing the Eelam war.  

It was only last month that a high-pitched Muslim campaign over perceived Islamophobia and unsubstantiated claims of 200 attacks on Evangelical Christians, woke up the long dormant Maha Nayakas. The danger is when such a dynamic is kicked into action, it triggers ripple effects running from the high temples in Kandy or anywhere else to the average folks on the streets, effectively radicalizing the grassroots and hardening Sinhala positions. That complicates the reconciliation process and makes any political concessions to address minority concerns harder to come by. Some vocal and divisive advocates of minority rights would not mind that. They make a living off by festering old wounds of ethnic divisions. Mr. Emmerson, the UN envoy and many of his fellow travellers have been meeting too many of those folks and regurgitate what they hear from them.   

Mr Emmerson says suspects had been arrested and tortured under the PTA even as recently as the last year. He says torture is ‘endemic and routine’. But when asked for more details, he refuses to divulge- for him however, his sources were reliable. He says Tamils were disproportionately targeted by the PTA. The reason should be self- explanatory: the Eelam war was waged by a separatist ethnic Tamil terrorist group. That is no different from the majority or all Islamist extremists rounded up in Britain or France being Muslims.   

Worse still, those unsolicited interventions risk triggering defensive  mechanisms of the majority Sinhalese. A sizable section of them hold  reservations about on-going constitutional reforms and can easily be  mobilized by the detractors by tapping into their primordial impulses

Monica Pinto, the other UN bigshot who recently graced us with her presence criticized the judiciary, for lacking ethnic diversity, which is a fair observation, but she would not say that about the United States Supreme Court. Lopsided ethnic representation in high offices was a function of the three decades of war. In the early 80s, when the Tamil insurgency was in its infancy, the IGP, Chief Justice and Attorney General were all Tamil. However, that did not stop Shiva Pashupathy, the Attorney General during much of the JR Jayawardene administration from becoming an advisor to Velupillai Prabakaran after he domiciled in Australia.  

This government has gone on an overdrive to appease the UN Human Rights Council ( which Donald Trump’s America has threatened to pull out from over its anti-Israeli posture.) At one point of time, when the country was facing near international isolation, appeasement was justified. However, the external vulnerability of the state has since declined. Non-compliance itself does not extract a heavy cost in the changed status quo in Mr Trump’s new world order.   

Nonetheless, Sri Lanka should not shut itself to international scrutiny as Mr Rajapaksa did. But the government should set out a set of basic guidelines which may include sharing detailed information of those allegations of right violations, which the UN envoys claim as have occurred. That would help the government to investigate potential abuses and also ensure a degree of scrutiny for claims made by the UN rapporteurs.   

Some in the government mistakenly believe that the UN Human Rights Council is the fountainhead of its legitimacy while at home its popularity is in fact plunging. The government’s obsession with contentious constitutional and political reforms (which funnily though had not been acknowledged by those UN busy bodies) has mixed up the country’s priorities. A survey by the Social Indicator of the Centre for Policy Alternatives, a think tank, reveals that the Southern public no longer considers constitutional reforms as a priority. Rather they care about decent jobs and decent wages. The government has failed to deliver economic prosperity. Its vacillation and indecisiveness risk another lost decade akin to that of Chandrika Kumaratunga. Even the commonsensical foreign diplomats allude that the government is bereft of a sense of urgency. (See Kelum Bandara’s interview with Korean Ambassador in Sri Lanka on July 14)  

Granted that Sri Lanka should strengthen fundamental rights of its people. However, harping on that such guarantees be retroactive would make sure that the country was trapped in the past. Sri Lankan democracy is mature enough to evolve and better itself during the time of peace without being arm-twisted by the foreigners. It survived two insurgencies in the South. However, a protracted and vicious terrorist campaign in the North left severe strains on it. Those scares like those in the past would heal with the passage of time.   

Some in the government mistakenly believe that the UN Human Rights  Council is the fountainhead of its legitimacy while at home its  popularity is in fact plunging. The government’s obsession with  contentious constitutional and political reforms has mixed up the  country’s priorities

There is another point. Democracy enshrined in charters can only take a country so far. South Africa is a classic case of how a model democracy is crumbling in the face of widening social inequalities, corruption and economic dysfunction. Similarly our government’s inaction on the economic front makes our democracy less sustainable and less effective in the long run.  In the immediate term, the failure to deliver prosperity would make it harder for the government to persuade the Sinhalese majority to support its constitutional and political reforms. That would mean Mr Emmerson’s type can spend another decade harping on Sri Lanka.   

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