CIAO DATE: 03/2013
February 2013
Government attacks on the judiciary and political dissent have accelerated Sri Lanka's
authoritarian turn and threaten long-term stability and peace. The government's
politically motivated impeachment of the chief justice reveals both its intolerance
of dissent and the weakness of the political opposition. By incapacitating the last
institutional check on the executive, the government has crossed a threshold into
new and dangerous terrain, threatening prospects for the eventual peaceful transfer
of power through free and fair elections. Strong international action should begin
with Sri Lanka's immediate referral to the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group
(CMAG) and a new resolution from the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) calling for
concrete, time-bound actions to restore the rule of law, investigate rights abuses and
alleged war crimes by government forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(LTTE), and devolve power to Tamil and Muslim areas of the north and east.
Sri Lanka is faced with two worsening and inter-connected governance crises.
Resource link: Sri Lanka's Authoritarian Turn: The Need for International Action [PDF]