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WGHR urges the Government of India to Vote in favor of the Resolution on Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council

21 March 2013

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The Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN (WGHR)

Press Release

20th March, 2013

The Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN (WGHR), New Delhi, in a letter to the Minister of External Affairs, Mr. Salman Khurshid, urged the Government of India to vote in favor of the Sri Lanka resolution at the current session of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC).

India’s vote in favour of the Sri Lanka resolution at the UNHRC in 2012 was a significant and welcome departure, indicating that India recognized its role and responsibility in the international community regarding the need for human rights accountability wherever human rights violations occur.

While WGHR welcomes India’s vote in favour of the 2012 resolution, India shielded Sri Lanka in 2009 at the UNHRC from international condemnation as well as from direly needed international investigations. One of the consequences of the inability of the UNHRC, at that time, to hold Sri Lanka accountable for human rights violations is that these violations remained unaddressed. India’s bilateral efforts to get Sri Lanka to address concerns have so far been met with patent intransigence from the Sri Lankan regime.

The world is now keenly watching how India votes on the Sri Lanka resolution at the UNHRC. Many countries are likely to wait and hear India’s position before deciding upon their own. Indian and international public opinion will measure India’s capabilities and its credibility on human rights and diplomacy by its ability to stand again, as it did in 2012, for justice and accountability in Sri Lanka.

India’s moral stance in favor of human rights should not be considered ‘against’ the government of Sri Lanka but rather be viewed as a further step in its assistance to that country aimed at cementing peace and assuring justice to all those scarred by the recent conflict.

WGHR urges the Government of India to vote in favor of the resolution and use its leadership position to convince other states at the UNHRC to include the demand for an independent and credible international investigation into alleged violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law in Sri Lanka.

For further information contact:

Mr. Miloon Kothari – WGHR Convener & Former Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, UNHRC
E-mail: miloon.kothari@gmail.com Mobile: 9810642122

Mr. Henri Tiphagne – Forum-Asia, Chairperson
E-mail: henri@pwtn.org Mobile: 09894025859

For further communication please contact us at joanna@wghr.org or vikash@wghr.org

WGHR - Letter to Salman Khurshid on Sri Lanka Final.pdf WGHR - Letter to Salman Khurshid on Sri Lanka