Lanka’s role in Israel committe has no bearing on UN panel - Dr. Kohona

by Manjula FERNANDO

Sri Lanka’s role in the UN committee on Israel has a history of over 30 years and has no bearing on the UN advisory panel on the country, Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the UN Dr. Palitha Kohona told Sunday Observer. Dr.Kohona who was in Sri Lanka on a brief visit left yesterday for New York.

Asked of his role in the panel and related adverse news reports Dr. Kohona said, “Sri Lanka is the ex-officio Chairman of the UN committee on Israeli practices in the occupied territories.”

He said Sri Lanka has occupied this position for the past 30 years or so and added that Permanent Representatives of Sri Lanka automatically become the Chair of the Committee. The other members are Malaysia and Senegal.

The committee visits Egypt, Jordan and Syria annually and presents a report to the UN General Assembly to facilitate appropriate action.

Dr. Kohona led a 13-day fact-finding visit to Cairo, Amman and Damascus, during which the Committee heard from witnesses from the occupied Palestinian territory and the occupied Syrian Golan, their first-hand experiences of life under occupation.

At the end of the visit the committee called for an end to human rights violations by Israel in the occupied territories of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and the Syrian Golan Heights, the UN reported

The people have expressed their inability to reconstruct homes and schools destroyed during Israel’s 2009 military offensive, due to the three-year-old blockade imposed on Gaza, and the alarming situation of the water and sanitation systems, which has serious implications on the health of Gaza’s 1.5 million residents.

Dr. Kohona said the findings of the report would be presented in September and will be released by the UN ‘somewhere in October’.