No vote on US Resolution

Adoption unanimous:

FM to attend debate on September 30:

by Manjula Fernando

The US Resolution on Sri Lanka scheduled to be moved in the UN Human Rights Council shortly after the report of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is tabled, will not be taken up for vote, but adopted unanimously.

“There will not be a vote on the Resolution as no one is contesting it,” authoritative sources said.

The OHCHR report on Sri Lanka will be officially tabled at the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Wednesday, September 30. However, Foreign Minister Mangala Smaraweera will not travel to Geneva from New York, but will take part in the debate on the report on Sri Lanka’s human rights abuses on September 30, after the official tabling of the report.

He said the Minister has decided not to proceed to Geneva from New York where he is currently accompanying President Maithripala Sirisena, who is attending the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).

Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative in Geneva, Ravinatha Aryasinha, will represent Sri Lanka’s interests on September 30 when the report is taken up for debate by the Member States.

The first draft of the US Resolution with 24 preambular paragraphs and 26 operative paragraphs has undergone several amendments after Sri Lanka objected to certain wordings in the text at the first informal held among the US, Sri Lanka, the core group and interested parties, on Monday.

In a statement on Friday (25) issued post the first draft of the US- sponsored resolution, Minister Samaraweera said: “We have achieved a path-breaking success in the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva at the current 30th Session,” adding that the Resolution was a recognition that Sri Lanka has shown commitment for meaningful reconciliation.

“We have succeeded in winning over the once divided Human Rights Council to work with the Government of Sri Lanka in its efforts to achieve meaningful reconciliation through truth, justice, reparations and guarantees of non-recurrence to ensure peace and prosperity for all our people,” he said.

Earlier, Sri Lanka’s head of mission Aryasinha, expressed that certain references in the first draft of the resolution were judgmental, prescriptive and counterproductive to the ongoing reconciliation efforts, adding that it would result in further polarization of communities, protesting over certain intrusive language used in the first draft. President Maithripala Sirisena is scheduled to address the UN General Assembly on September 30.