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Message: <blockquote data-quote="lkdood" data-source="post: 7662599" data-attributes="member: 92282"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_cx8jKS7af_I/SzAGocQJ9nI/AAAAAAAAAPA/2HnDNRIAkdU/s320/Philip+Alston.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial executions Philip Alston has  accused the Sri Lankan government of double standards for rejecting an  international investigation over alleged war crimes in the island but  backing a similar probe on Israel.    In an email interview with Daily Mirror online, Alston said that the  mandate given to the local Commission on Lessons Learnt and  Reconciliation appointed by President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the  commissioners appointed fall short of being independent and impartial.          “It is also interesting to contrast the Government’s insistence in the  UN Human Rights Council that it should be left entirely alone to conduct  its own inquiry, with its strong support for an international  investigation into Israel’s killing of nine people in the raid on the  Gaza flotilla carrying humanitarian aid. Sri Lanka apparently feels so  strongly that international measures are needed in relation to Israel  that its ambassador to the UN in New York is the Chairman of the  so-called Group of Three currently carrying out an international  investigation into Israel’s activities.  I believe there are strong  grounds for international action in both cases,” Alston told Daily  Mirror online.         The UN envoy, who had authenticated a recording shown on UK’s Channel 4  TV allegedly of troops killing unarmed LTTE cadres during the war, said  Sri Lanka’s capacity to heal and forge a unified national identity  which embraces all of its different ethnic groups will require a genuine  examination of the past sooner or later.         “Well, first of all, the Commission on Lessons Learnt and  Reconciliation has not, as you suggest, been appointed to look into  alleged war crimes.  As an article on the website of the Ministry of  Defence summarizes its purpose, it is “to find out the root causes of  the terrorist problem”.  There is not a single mention of “human  rights”, “humanitarian law”, “violations”, “war crimes”, or any  comparable term. The mandate accorded by the Government very carefully  avoids any of these issues.  Instead, the President has indicated that  the Commission should look forward, which is generally a way of saying  that past violations should be ignored.  Consistent with this he has  spoken of restorative justice designed to further strengthen national  amity, which is another way of making the same point. Even if the  mandate were to be changed, the question would then be whether the  commission meets international standards for a credible inquiry into  alleged human rights violations,” he said.         Alston noted that Sri Lanka has an unparalleled track record of  ineffectual commissions of inquiry of this kind and it is precisely  because such inquiries have been utterly unconvincing that they have not  succeeded in drawing a line under the contentious issues of the past  that need to be addressed before they can be transcended.dailymirror</blockquote>

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