By Daniel Flitton and Michelle Grattan | The Age
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Mahinda Rajapaksa defied calls for Colombo to be stripped of the right to host the next Commonwealth leaders' meeting, telling a gathering in Perth yesterday that reconciliation after Sri Lanka's brutal civil war was well under way.
''When the next CHOGM is held in Sri Lanka, it is my firm belief that it will be a memorable experience for you, my dear friends,'' he told the Commonwealth Business Forum.
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Greens leader Bob Brown yesterday said that Australia should boycott the 2013 CHOGM in Colombo if Sri Lanka did not adequately address issues of human rights and democracy.
Senator Brown said the government should follow Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who has threatened that Canada will stay away unless Sri Lanka acts. He said the Commonwealth was trying to make itself relevant - and Sri Lanka was a big challenge to that relevancy. ''If CHOGM is held in Colombo with nothing done about the war crimes and civil rights, that could be the end of the Commonwealth,'' Senator Brown said.
''It would raise a big question mark over the Commonwealth if it can't bring Sri Lanka to do the right thing.''
More than 7000 people are estimated to have been killed in 2009 in the final months of the three-decade conflict with the separatist Tamil Tigers.
But despite a UN finding that credible allegations of war crimes should be answered on both sides, Mr Rajapaksa defended the military crackdown.
''An end to terrorist violence was absolutely essential to moving the country forward along the path of economic and social development. We suffered for 30 years,'' he said.
Sri Lanka has refused to allow an independent investigation of the conflict, leading Canada to threaten to pull out of the 2013 CHOGM summit.
Colombo has set up its own inquiry on the conflict with a report expected next month.
Mr Rajapaksa said almost 11,700 of 12,000 captured Tamils had been released after time in rehabilitation camps.
Mr Rajapaksa said the Sri Lankan economy had grown 8 per cent annually and war-torn regions in the north and east of the country had grow by 22 per cent.
Meanwhile, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak called on Australian politicians not to make his country part of the domestic political crossfire. Mr Najib, who met Prime Minister Julia Gillard yesterday, said that the ''Malaysia solution'' had been unfairly characterised because ''it's actually a Malaysia-Australia solution''.
He said that the ball was now in Australia's court, ''but please don't make Malaysia part of your crossfire''. Hopefully, the government would get enough support in Parliament for the arrangement to go through, he said.
He also had a swipe at criticisms from the Coalition. ''I'm not against the opposition per se, but as leader of the country I have to set the record straight - that asylum seekers and refugees are treated well in Malaysia and that's a fact recognised by the UN.''
Last night, Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma played down the prospect of CHOGM adopting the Eminent Persons Group's proposal for a commissioner for human rights, democracy and the rule of law.
© The Age
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