Over 200 Sri Lankan FTZ workers remain in hospital

Photo courtesy: Unions.lk

Sunday Times Online
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More than 200 Free Trade Zone workers were still in hospital after being injured in clashes with the police on Monday while five of the workers are in police custody, a spokesman for the Trade union said.

The workers are planning a major protest tomorrow (01). Fifteen policemen were also injured in the clashes.

The FTZ at Katunayaka will remain closed tomorrow as well.

© Sunday Times Online

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Sri Lanka: Police used live bullets against workers

By Nabbeela Hussein | Daily Mirror
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The Inter Company Employees Union today alleged that live bullets were used to disperse protesters against the private pension scheme in Katunayake this afternoon.

ICEU President Vasantha Samarasinghe said that Trade Union action will be taken and called for the release of protesters in police custody.

More than 40 persons were injured in the police attack and being treated at the Ragama and Negambo hospitals, the ICEU said. The union said that they would continue to escalate action if the government did not withdraw the bill.

The Union also said that the attack was a planned attack and that they had provoked the employees who in turn had retaliated by staging a walk out. The Union said that the employees were then dispersed using tear gas and batons by the police and STF.

Meanwhile Inspector General of Police Mahinda Balasuriya stated that a special investigation has been initiated by the CID and a team has been sent to probe the clash which took place in Katunayake.

© Daily Mirror

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Sri Lanka: Free Trade Zone shut down, pension scheme suspended

Sunday Leader Online
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The Government Information Department has stated that Central Committee of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party has decided last evening to suspend the proposed private pension scheme for the private sector.

Meanwhile, the government has decided to shut down the free trade zone (FTZ) in Katunayake today.

The government has said the decision was made to establish industrial peace in the zone following yesterday’ protest.

© Sunday Leader Online

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Over 100 hurt in Sri Lanka workers' protests

AFP | Yahoo! News
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More than 100 factory workers were hurt in Sri Lanka on Monday as police fired fired live bullets and used teargas to break up protests in the country's main free trade zone, officials said.

Workers pelted stones when police moved into disperse protesters demanding the withdrawal of a controversial pensions bill, a police official said.

"At least one person is in a very serious condition and more than 100 people have suffered injuries," the police official, who did not wish to be named, said. Fifteen constables were also injured.

The teargas upset hives of wasps and caused more mayhem as they stung both protesters and police at Katunayake Free Trade Zone, just next to the country's only international airport, police said.

The street battles blocked the main access road to the airport and forced air travellers to take lengthy detours, police said.

© AFP

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Sri Lanka shares war tactics as war crimes alleged

Photo courtesy: R.K. Radhakrishnan | The Hindu

AP | Seattle PI
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Sri Lanka is sharing the counter-terrorism strategies it used to win a decades-long civil war as it hosts an international defense seminar amid allegations it committed war crimes.

Nearly 60 senior military officials from 42 countries are attending the three-day seminar starting Tuesday, but leading invitees including the United States, Britain and Australia were absent. Human rights groups called the seminar a farce.

Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa told the participants the seminar will help not only to study the tactics that proved successful in Sri Lanka but also to question war crimes allegations.

"Over the next few days you will meet many field commanders involved in the operations, who will be able to discuss the tactics used to achieve victory," Rajapaksa said.

"At a time so many countries the world over are facing the problem posed by domestic and international terrorism, we believe that sharing lessons learnt from the Sri Lankan experience ... is important," he said.

A U.N. investigator's report released Monday said videos showing the army executing captured men and women in May 2009 are authentic and prove war crimes took place. Sri Lanka says the videos are not real.

A previous report compiled by three U.N experts said allegations were credible that both government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels committed serious human rights violations.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said the conference only "seeks to legitimize the unlawful killing of thousands of civilians" and urged the invitees to stay away.

"Sri Lanka's self proclaimed 'model' of counterinsurgency included repeatedly shelling civilians, targeting hospitals, and trying to prevent the world from finding out about it," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch in a statement last week.

"This conference is nothing more than a public relations exercise to whitewash abuses. No professional, law-abiding military should take part in this farce."

The reasons why the U.S., Britain, and Australia were absent from the conference were not given.

The U.N. has estimated 80,000 to 100,000 people may have been killed in the 26-year civil war, but rights groups say the number could be much higher. According to U.N. documents, at least 7,000 ethnic Tamil civilians were killed in the final months alone.

Christof Heyns, a South African law professor who is also the U.N.'s independent investigator on extrajudicial killings, said Tuesday the video first aired by Britain's Channel 4 television provides prima facie evidence for war crimes and should be used to start legal proceedings.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said he would need a mandate from either the Sri Lankan government or the U.N.'s Human Rights Council, Security Council or General Assembly to initiate a war crimes inquiry.

© AP

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Sri Lanka claims UN probe on execution video biased

Photo courtesy: UN News & Media

AFP | Google News
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Sri Lanka sought Tuesday to discredit the findings of a UN expert who concluded that a video allegedly depicting Sri Lanka troops executing Tamil Tigers was authentic.

"It is respectfully submitted that the process adopted in regard to the publication of the videos and subsequent steps taken ... is tainted with the fundamental vice of bias and partiality," said Mohan Pieris, Sri Lanka Attorney-General.

"The facts that the contents of the video were not made available to the Sri Lankan government by Channel Four lends support to the suspicion that the broadcast of the videos was for a collateral purpose," he added.

Christof Heyns, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, had concluded after examining a video provided by Britain's Channel Four, that the footage was authentic.

His investigation drew from findings by a forensic pathologist, two forensic video analysts, as well as a firearms expert, and came to the same conclusion as that of his predecessor Philip Alston, who had earlier looked at extracts of the video.

Pieris drew attention to the experts consulted by Heyns, noting that three out of four were the same as those used by Alston. The attorney-general claimed that engaging the same experts could have led to a "general reaffirmation of the conclusions" of Alston.

He took aim particularly at one of the experts, saying that he is a technical representative for a software brand "which was used to enhance the 2009 video."

"This procedure does not augur well for the concept of independence as after all justice... should not only be done but should appear to be done," he said.

Pieris also complained that the images contained in Heyns' report were "blurred and illegible" and "not of a quality that could be examined and therefore precluded the government from making a proper assessment."

The footage shot during the final stages of the Sri Lankan army's battle against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists, is available online on the special rapporteur's webpage.

It depicts naked, blindfolded men being executed by soldiers in an open field.

The disturbing images also pan over bodies of several men, as well as showed a soldier removing the cloth covering the upper body of a female corpse. Another segment has the camera focusing around the genital area of another partially naked female corpse.

Asked how he could be sure that the video was indeed shot in the conflict area in Sri Lanka, Heyns noted that the language spoken by the soldiers in the video is Sinhalese, and that one of the victims is a known Tamil journalist.

In addition, the Sri Lanka government has not disputed the location where the footage was claimed to have been shot.

"The only thing that has been placed in dispute in interaction with the government, is aspects of the reports of specialists.

"If there are issues with, say the background that is being used, the vegetation, those sort of things could be picked out if it is not authentic to the particular area.

"None of that has been placed on the table. The only thing placed in dispute is comparison of what the experts say and of what they say on their side," said Heyns.

"The combination of all these different factors together indicate to us that there is at least a prima facie case, a case that must be answered, that this happened indeed as it has been claimed in that particular conflict," he added.

The UN expert also urged Sri Lanka to carry out a credible probe into the video, saying that it has thus far done little more than poke holes at the UN's report.

"The approach of the government has largely been to look for holes in our report. What we're certainly asking is for the government to undertake its own investigation," said Heyns.

© AFP

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Sri Lanka war atrocities video credible: U.N. envoy

To read the report of the Special Rapporteur click here

By Barbara Lewis | Reuters
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Video footage of summary executions apparently committed during the Sri Lankan civil war appears to be convincing evidence of "serious international crimes," a U.N. special envoy said on Monday.

The charge adds to pressure on Colombo to submit to an international inquiry into allegations that thousands of civilians were killed at the end of its 25-year war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

Sri Lankan authorities have rejected the video as falsified and responded angrily to U.N. criticisms, accusing the body of bias and of meddling in Colombo's domestic processes.

It has acknowledged some non-combatants were killed, but says the numbers have been inflated by LTTE supporters.

A video provided by Britain's Channel 4 television shows naked people with their hands tied behind their backs being executed against a backdrop of corpses of other men and women.

Since late last year, the United Nations has studied the video that allegedly showed acts committed during the civil war that ended in 2009.

"I conclude on the basis of the extensive technical evidence we obtained from independent experts that what is depicted in the video indeed happened," Christof Heyns, the U.N.'s special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, told the Human Rights Council in Geneva. "I believe that a prima facie case of serious international crimes has been made," Heyns said. The evidence should be investigated by an international panel, he said.

He did not say what he meant by serious international crimes, which can be war crimes or crimes against humanity.

The video is a five-minute version of a minute of footage previously studied by the United Nations. Heyns said the longer version resolved "unexplained elements" in the first video.

Propaganda War

Sri Lanka and the pro-LTTE diaspora have engaged in a propaganda war since well before the conflict ended, with numerous groups offering what they say is realistic footage or photographs of atrocities. Many later proved to be doctored.

The United Nations in April published the findings of a three-member panel Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon appointed to advise him on "issues of accountability."

The Sri Lankan government on Monday again accused the United Nations of seeking to pre-empt its own Lessons Learned and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), which it noted predated the U.N. panel.

"It is disconcerting to note the haste with which some have sought to usurp the government of Sri Lanka's prerogative in deciding its domestic process," Minister of Plantation Industries Mahinda Samarasinghe, the head of the Sri Lankan delegation, told the Human Rights Council.

"We firmly believe that our home-grown process is capable of addressing the nuances of our unique situation," he said.

He also said the U.N. system needs to be free from bias.

"It is of paramount importance that high offices of the U.N. system are scrupulously impartial, independent and transparent and are seen to be so," he said.

Barely a month after the civil war ended, Sri Lanka shocked Western governments by engineering the adoption of a U.N. Human Rights Council resolution that praised its victory over the Tamil Tigers, a group on more than 30 nations' terrorism lists.

That defeated a European-backed resolution condemning the civilian deaths at the war's end, pushed by nations angry that Sri Lanka refused pressure for a ceasefire in the final months.

The United States has warned that failure to investigate credibly the allegations and establish genuine reconciliation could lead to an international war crimes investigation.

Diplomats involved with Sri Lanka see that as unlikely, given the backing it has from China and Russia on the U.N. Security Council, but the Human Rights Council could still move for an inquiry.

© Reuters

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