Opportunity to promote Lanka's domestic mechanism - Bogollagama

by Dhaneshi Yatawara

Following the resolution on 'promoting reconciliation and accountability in Sri Lanka' adopted by the United Nations Human Rights Council at its 19th session, there is a greater opportunity for Sri Lanka to pursue its goals with its indigenous mechanism, said Sri Lanka Freedom Party Chief Organiser for the Kotte electorate and former Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama.

Speaking to the Sunday observer Bogollagama said that adopting our own agenda to find a solution is what President Mahinda Rajapaksa has been reiterating in his political vision.

"President Rajapaksa has maintained this stand which emphasised that all domestic issues will be addressed by a domestic mechanism," Bogollagama said.

"What Sri Lanka needs from the international community is time and space to pursue the domestic mechanism according to the Lessons Learnt Reconciliation Commission report which is also indigenous.

The international community must understand that we have an implementing process," he said.

Though the resolution places the international community on a mode of supervision, Bogollagama says the effort of the Sri Lankan Government, doing their best to avert this situation, is very much commendable. "What we have to look out for in this resolution is to see that this supervisory role they are counting on does not arise," he added.

"The US-backed resolution found its way to Geneva to bring unnecessary pressure on the Sri Lankan Government, purely to satisfy certain quarters that seek actions against Sri Lanka rather than their own domestic interests like that of the United States and to see a friendly country such as Sri Lanka being targeted," he added.

"Indeed, we have a strong domestic agenda which we highlighted to the international community. By implementing our own strong agenda, there will be limited room for the international community to sneak into Sri Lanka's domestic issues. Thereby, the resolution would become redundant," he said.

He also stressed that Sri Lanka must keep in mind that diplomacy cannot be 'switched on and off' from time to time, but must be engaged all the time with greater dedication and wider pursuance.

"The Indian factor was much to the disadvantage of Sri Lanka. India looked at it, sacrificing their bilateral interests. They went for the multilateral forums to support the resolution, under pressure to help avert a major breakdown of the Indian Government.

That is, again giving into their domestic pressure and not for the merit of the resolution," he said.

"You have to be conscious of voting on the resolution. Indian Foreign Secretary S. M. Krishna himself said they are not going to support a country-specific resolution. Three days after that, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ordered his delegates to vote on a country-specific resolution targeting Sri Lanka merely because there was pressure mounted by sections of Tamil Nadu politics," he said.