Protest photo by Geeshan Bandara
Today’s UN Human Rights thing vote is largely symbolic, and it means different things to different people. The government has framed it as a vote against Sri Lanka. Rump Eelamists also. Most Sri Lankans are like ‘eh’? So WTF is going on?
Eh?
Before the US introduced a UNHRC resolution to pressure the Sri Lankan government, the government was actually under significant pressure. There were serious protests every day over economic issues. Bus strike, gas strike, seriously, it was like a Kinks song. Now there are protestors in the street for the government. Hell, I even support the GoSL on this.
Private sector peeps in the streets. Photo by Geeshan Bandara
Recently a bunch of people from the private sector left the A/C to take to the streets. Every Johnny’s nephew is updating their FB status with how great the military is and how much the US sucks. What the US must surely get is that the vast majority of Sri Lankans will support their country and troops. I do.
The best description of WTF is going on came from David Blacker in the comments section here:
Actually, the whole tone of the “debate” has been set by the GoSL.
- It set up an LLRC to fact-find, then criticized the facts and the method of finding them.
- Then, when the US pushed us to implement the LLRC recommendations, we resist, and call them nasty names.
- The US invites us to be a part of drafting a document that will ask us to do what our own commission recommends, but we refuse, in spite of the fact that human rights activists condemn the resolution as pointless.
- Then we complain about the wording that we refused to help write.
- We take a hard stand against the resolution as if it is a damning indiction, when in reality it means little. We badger our allies to oppose it.
- Our badgering convinces the diaspora that the resolution is a useful one and they lobby their own governments to support it, scenting a victory, ironically a pyrrhic one.
IF the resolution is now passed,
- The diaspora will declare victory and call for an investigation on the strength of the resolution, not understanding that they’ve been screwed over by the US.
- We claim that the resolution is a toothless one, and half-heartedly implement some of the LLRC recommendations, thereby looking cooperative to the naive international audience, but losers to the naive locals who protested the resolution.
- Our allies scratch their heads and carry on.
IF the resolution fails,
- We declare victory, pissing off the diaspora further but winning points with the locals, and stall on the LLRC recommendations until next time.
- Our allies scratch their heads and carry on.
So basically, the end result is almost guaranteed head scratching with a high likelihood of bullshit.
So What Will Happen?
I dunno. This resolution is largely a padashow, with no teeth. Poor mixed metaphors there… Uh, I dunno how the vote will go. Either way it’s not especially binding, there’s no sanctions or whatever, but like the UN/Darusman report, even this officially unofficial stuff gets politicized by both sides.
I honestly think this whole thing is a damned distraction from the good work actually going on. It’s just disingenuousness all around. That said, I’ve also heard more about reconciliation in the past month that I heard for the past year. The negatives may outweigh the poz, but there is some positive. I honestly have little regard for what the international community or government is doing. It’s like fucking Turf Accountants (where people bet on horses they never see), symbolic and shambolic. Shit is real in the field and real reconciliation has to come from the people of Sri Lanka. And I think it is. Coming that is.
DBS Jeyaraj just posted saying that Sri Lanka is now negotiating on the resolution to save face, via India. He’s always worth a read for insight. Into a horse race, but nonetheless..
All of this is simply making mahinda more powerful. Whenever people see an existential threat to sri lanka they will back someone like mahinda. My dad for example is UNP guy, but the moment he heard of this he unequivocally expressed support to mahinda.
It’s a win-win for the GoSL really. The resolution basically asks them to implement the recommendations of their own LLRC, with a bit more on accountability, but nothing with teeth. So it would actually be easy for the govt to comply with what it already said it would comply with (but hasn’t)… the US has categorically stated no economic sanctions will be applied, so no harm there. The main players all have diplomatic immunity anyway and those that don’t might choose to travel to fewer countries in future, no big deal.
If they lose the vote, there will be defiant low-intellect speeches raising the rabble by flying patriotic colours as a mask for genuine failures of governance. If they win the vote, there will be defiant low-intellect speeches raising the rabble by flying patriotic colours as a mask for genuine failures of governance.
Already Chilaw seems a distant memory. GoSL win.
Is the actual text of the resolution available anywhere?
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.RES.84:
It’s gone through. 24 for, 15 against and 8 abstaining.
resolution passes 24-15 with 8 abstentions. India voted against us.
This may seem like a crazy thought but don’t you guys think its possible that the government is secretly behind the resolution against Sri Lanka. Do you think that the analysts for the foreign countries couldn’t foresee that this would boost the MR regime? Like indi said, people were protesting against the government prior to this but now they are all backing the government.
any break down on the voting
If we let the moron (the US) put its head in, in no time we shall see the whole thing in. That’s what we saw in Libya and many other places before that. So, let keep the devel out.
lol. The text gotten watered down even further
3. Encourages the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and relevant special procedures mandate holders to provide, [b]in consultation with, and with the concurrence of, and the Government of Sri Lanka to accept,, advice and technical assistance on implementing the above-mentioned steps[/b];, and requests the Office of the High Commissioner to present a report on the provision of such assistance to the Human Rights Council at its twenty-second session.
I feel the ame way.
There was something more, about going beyond LLRC recommendations.
That because in a complex situation like this, things have various side effects. Same thing happened when killing fields -2 came out. Those LTTE morons in Europe (who wants praba alive) were very upset about it. Iranians who don’t like the current regime were all against a US or foreign intervention.
Lot of people may hate or dislike MR, but does that mean they really like US poking at our internal things???
I think the resolution itself is not difficult to comply with.
Will there be a bigger issue next year, if they fail to comply?
All in all a monumental waste of this country’s time. America comes off rather silly and impotent given how much they had to water thier own resolution down, India comes off as as mumbling baffon that got bullied by the tamil nadu politicians. MR’s international image maybe tarnished a little. But won a new supporter in my dad.
Now that pillay woman can’t do anything without asking for our approval in this matter.
If this one does not have teeth its not because US want to go soft on us. More like they can’t get something with teeth passed on the relevant UN body (which is the security council). Remember US + west did try to introduce something in the security council (through a proxy) but it was a failure (during the end of the war period).
And btw its not easy for the government to comply with the LLRC recommendation. Furthermore i don’t know how wise to implement all the recommendations. Removing the military from the north (too quickly) and leaving the police (which is undermanned) in charge of the north will be the start of the eelam war V. Provide police power to the Provincial council placing the provisional police head under the chief minister and it will be sooner.
Those two recommendations will never get implemented. And no international body is going force us to do that.
It is quite striking that India is the only Asian country to vote for this resolution.
The Ministry of External Affairs of India has come out with their justification:
http://www.mea.gov.in/mystart.php?id=530119138
I just think that in a gradual process, Sri Lanka should move towards ending India’s role in any rehabilitation projects in the north of the country. India’s involvement in number 4 of its statement should be curtailed.
Then remove the SL High Commission from Chennai (no big loss really) and ask them to kindly close their Jaffna, Kandy and Hambantota embassies as the one in Colombo is more than enough.
Of course these shouldn’t be done overnight, but over the course of the year.
India got its arm twisted from within. It’s pretty clear the central government of india didn’t want to vote for this.
At the very least India could have abstained, but they didn’t. Infact, if India had abstained the resolution would not have passed as exactly 24 votes were required for it to pass. This is actually quite a dramatic move from India, and Izeth Hussein could have been right all along – that it was India and not the US that was really behind the resolution.
While cutting ties would be absolutely foolish, I do think that Sri Lanka should provide much less space for India in Sri Lanka. Start by reducing India’s involvement in northern Sri Lanka. Any rehabilitation projects should be taken care of by other agencies, and not Indian ones. Any further offers of Indian aid should be met with a polite thank you but a refusal.
The US resolution would never have been allowed to proceed without India’s approval. SL is in India’s sphere of influence and the US will only act against SL with India’s tacit complicity. Dr DJ predicted this in 2010.
“If India stops supporting us, not even the Non Aligned Movement will defend us fully, because they take their cue from respected Third World states such as India.”
..”As a top Chinese diplomat and official once told me “You must help us to help you. Sri Lanka must give its friends something to help Sri Lanka with”.
http://transcurrents.com/tc/2010/06/for_india_sri_lanka_is_not_ind.html
If the US really wanted to, it could break the SL economy in a matter of weeks. i.e. look how the Iranian oil sanctions ramification are hurting the ordinary man in the street. This is a Mafia-style warning from the US. At some point the US or India will make SL an an offer it can’t refuse :)
I don’t think it’s their interest to screw us over. What they really want is a military base in trinco.
Nah! i think india was going to vote against this. The indian foreign secretary initially said that they were not going to support nation specific resolutions. Then the DMK pulled the fuss.
The central government of india is very weak at the moment. They can’t afford to loose thamil nadu
I think the whole thing was pre-planned. The Indians were always going to vote for it, but had to pretend to abstain, then let the TN/DMK crowd do their stunts and eventually reluctantly to be ‘forced’ to vote for it.
I don’t think so at all. The DMK pulled the same stunt back in 2009 but the Indian government did not buckle and intervene to stop the war. I really doubt the USA would have introduced this resolution by itself without Indian backing. The whole resolution is likely an Indian idea that was suggested to the US. India could have easily managed the outcome by simply getting two or three other countries to either abstain or vote against the resolution.
The Indian government was as weak in 2009 – but protests from Tamil Nadu which were much louder did not have any effect on the central government. This was essentially an Indian-sponsored resolution but brought to the fore by the US so that India wouldn’t get blamed/lost complete influence in Sri Lanka.