By Dr. Shanthikumnar Hettiarachchi
Sunday, 19 January 2014 00:00
Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee member Sen. Edward Markey (D-MA) holds up a small four-bladed remote controlled helicopter during a hearing about the future of unmanned aviation in the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill January 15, 2014 in Washington, DC. (AFP)
Pre and post CHOGM is a unique period during which key international players starting from the UNHRC head Navi Pillay in September 2013, CHOGM leaders with particular ‘quick fix attitude’ of the British premier, the sensational channel 4Macrae fiasco, the flamboyant Canadian MP Rathika Sitsabaiesan and the US ambassador for criminal Justice (a strange appointment though, to monitor whom?) Stephen J. Rapp have visited Sri Lanka. It seems like everyone is getting ready for a substantial political game in Geneva as if to crucify an enemy of the world. As if an important body like the UNHRC has been fallen into a den of politicized issues where political bickering rather than statesmanship, insightful debate and fair minded discussion are maintained. We call upon this significant UN body, UNHRC to act with honor and expediency. As a responsible institution it should also be mindful to work within its own mandate and that no sovereign nation is unduly chastised, castigated and ostracized under pressure from unsavory demands of lobbies aided and abated by the bigger nations blackmailed with electoral votes, funds and other popular political gains. All the above visitors have been welcomed into Sri Lanka even though some made negative remarks and responses. It would be expected, but to the level of embarrassing them could have been avoided and those unpalatable elements within should have been dealt with properly as they were our guest seven if they disagree with us.
Dissent
The French Enlightenment writer and philosopher,Voltaire known for his defense of civil liberties, including freedom of religion and the right to a fair trial said, “I disagree strongly with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”. Voltaire influenced both the French and the American revolutions and their leaders who considered sovereignty as an important facet where their democracies can be vibrant in different dimensions. Today the world is able to look up to the American constitution and admire its fundamentals driving to honor and respect for freedom and liberty. The French moving from absolute monarchy into a republic with distinct difference between state and religion. The British functioning with a constitutional monarchy during which history records that even Isaac Newton, the scientist and an arch critic of religion, was buried in Westminster Abbey, London. These indicate that the three sovereignties; the US, the UK and France are also the UN’s Big three out of the five need to revisit and monitor the UNHRC’s mandate and its proceedings with close proximity and restrain it being politicized or lose its credential.
Rapp’s Crime Scene
Sri Lanka is a sovereignty. The UN’s five Big players and others need to be aware that even the UN would not interfere with the internal affairs of a sovereign nation (UN Resolution 44/147 article 09, December 15, 1989). However, all states including Sri Lanka should also be aware that the UN has a specific mandate and that by virtue of being a signatory to its stipulations is bound to respect and honor them as a member state. What surprises the people in this country is that these individuals who ‘visited’ and ‘not visited’ tend to make statements as if they have been authorized by the UN to do so. The classic example is the most recent visit of the so called US ambassador for criminal justice, Rapp. People would like to know who appointed him to oversee criminal justice issues and with whose mandate was he here and to whom is he answerable after his fact finding (or fact distortion) mission. Most ridiculous declaration was this infamous photograph of him standing in the middle of St. Anthony grounds in Iranapallai and ludicrously talking about war crimes and a crime scene on the basis of material that he seemed to have gathered probably accessing propaganda in the West. Whose material has he accessed? What forensic investigation has he conducted or consulted here or abroad who have done sufficient queries to ascertain that where he stood at Iranapallai was de facto a crime scene.
US Mea Cupla
Little that Rapp has forgotten how his country’s Department of defense and the Pentagon gurus who sent the Seals to cross the borders of the sovereign state of Pakistan into Abbottabad and clandestinely kill the Al Qaeda leader and also assassinated others who were unarmed. This clandestine operation seemed to have been shamelessly watched alive by those global policemen and women who now wish to preach to the rest of the world on war crimes and identify crime scenes around the globe. The crime scenes created by the current US regime and its International allies are across the gulf and in Afghanistan through hundreds of drones attacks that have targeted civilian enclaves are numerous to note here. From Vietnam to Iraq, from arming the Mujahedeens to fight the Russian to Syrian rebels and to the secret hand in toppling of Libyan state are all known to the world. This is all done in good faith, for freedom and liberty of the civilized world. History might be the best judge of these operations and operatives.
Sri Lanka might be thinking that it cannot fight this herculean American machine. But the people of this country must remember that the United States has been proved time and time again as a nation that almost functions schizophrenically. The defense department would fund and give even military hardware from one hand to a country on the other hand the State department would call for war crimes and to be accountable. However, for the US it does not matter, ‘we bomb whom we wish to’ – Never committed war crimes, because it is collateral damage and civilian will never die as if their ammunitions simply avoid civilian fatalities. These war fairy tales and war lies of the big brothers of the UN have been now rejected by the smaller nations as they have lost confidence, partnership and mutual support.
Geneva Jigsaw
UNHRC and its chiefs and officers are conveniently silent about the interminable flouting of International law bythe Zionist ideologues. Has Mr. Rapp ever visited Ramallah, Hebron on the West bank or East Jerusalem and call for Netanyahu regime to be accountable or identified any crime scene? Ambassador Rappseems trapped in a set of unanswerable questions of his own conscience. He in fact is answerable to the people of this country and to the UN itself because by his unethical preempted judgment he has cast aspersion on Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and its cordial diplomatic relations with the United States. Mr. Rapp and other Rapps who have visited and scheduled to visit this country must know their facts, study statisticscarefully and read thirty years of criminality by the bygone outfit as well as the counter insurgency processes because the number game is going to be aggravated towardsthis year March in Geneva.
UNHRC must focus on real issues and not be hooked on to a propaganda war and become a victim of it and lose credibility as a UN body. Its head who has now visited Sri Lanka must function with unbiased principles and to ennoble the institute that she directs. Member nations must discern on facts and tragedy of war pragmatically and not embrace a policing role. Counting the dead has become a game for the LTTE proxy Diaspora groups and their incarnations in this country. What is more empathetic? To continue to count the dead or to attend to the needs of the lamenting mothers and their future in the North and the South. Global policing in counting the dead does hardly do any good to the real issues. However, allowing a nation to find solutions that fit them at their pace and supporting the processes is more like statesmanship and conciliatory rather than being punitive at every beck and call.
– See more at: http://www.nation.lk/edition/feature-viewpoint/item/24895-global-policing-and-sovereignty.html#sthash.Y3xyhaDf.dpuf