Attempts to force int'l probe on SL wrong - Russian FM

Attempts to force an international probe on Sri Lanka, into civilian deaths and rights abuses during the final months of the island nation's civil war, are unacceptable, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a meeting with his Sri Lankan counterpart, Prof. G.L. Peiris.

In May 2009, Sri Lanka's military defeated the Tamil Tigers, a rebel group, after an offensive in the North and the East that ended decades of separatist warfare. Since the beginning of the conflict in 1983, violence had killed more than 70,000 people, damaged the economy and harmed tourism in one of South Asia's potentially most prosperous societies.

"We believe, attempts to force an international investigation on Sri Lanka without the sovereign State's permission and bypassing the UN Security Council are absolutely wrong, they also contradict our aspirations in the human rights sphere," Lavrov said.

He emphasised that Sri Lanka has forged its own trustworthy commission to look into alleged war crimes.

Courtesy: Gulf Times