U.N. Panel Faults Sri Lanka Over Presidential Powers

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/01/world/asia/un-panel-faults-sri-lanka-over-presidential-powers.html

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COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — A United Nations human rights panel urged Sri Lanka on Friday to repeal a constitutional amendment that critics say gives the country’s president too much power.

The United Nations Human Rights Committee criticized the amendment in its most recent report on how well Sri Lanka is complying with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The report said that the 18th Amendment, adopted by the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa in September 2010, violated the principles of the covenant because it “empowers the president to dismiss or appoint members of the judiciary and other independent bodies.”

The committee said Mr. Rajapaksa’s firing of the country’s chief justice in January 2013 raised serious doubts about whether that power was consistent with basic principles of due process and judiciary independence.

The Sri Lankan government rejected the committee’s views and accused the panel of bias. Keheliya Rambukwella, the country’s media and information minister, told reporters on Friday in Colombo, the capital, that the committee had ignored much more significant threats to civil and political rights posed by the insurgents of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who fought the government for decades. In particular, he cited claims that the insurgents massacred 700 Sri Lankan police officers in 1990, at the height of the conflict.

“That shows very clearly how biased they are,” Mr. Rambukwella said of the committee. “There were 700 policemen who were killed, blindfolded after being asked to surrender. Have they mentioned about that? I can mention 101 cases like that.”

During the Geneva-based committee’s review of Sri Lanka, the country’s representative, Ravinatha Aryasinha, asked the panel to “judge Sri Lanka in proportion to the challenges Sri Lanka has continued to face as a country emerging from a 30-year terrorist conflict.”

Besides the power over judicial appointments, the 18th Amendment also repealed a two-term limit on presidential tenure, allowing Mr. Rajapaksa to run for re-election indefinitely.

The United Nations committee said that in addition to repealing the amendment, Sri Lanka should take legislative steps to protect judges from political interference and from other pressures.

The panel’s report also called on the country to cooperate with an investigation of alleged human rights abuses, including the disappearances of journalists, clergy members, aid workers and rights activists. The report expressed concern that a commission appointed by Mr. Rajapaksa to look into the issue had been given too narrow a mandate and was moving too slowly.