cphr.net

By Charles Haviland, BBC News, Colombo.
A Sri Lankan cabinet minister has threatened violence against journalists and human rights activists who he says have been opposing the government.

Mervyn Silva also admitted forcing a journalist to flee two years ago. The remarks come one day after the UN Human Rights Council passed a resolution critical of the country's rights record. A police spokesman told the BBC that officers would now investigate Mr Silva's remarks.

The United Nations Human Rights Council has backed a resolution urging the Sri Lankan government to prosecute commanders guilty of misconduct during its civil war against Tamil insurgents.

It voted in favour of a resolution calling on Sri Lanka to initiate "credible and independent actions" to ensure justice and accountability over alleged violations of international law during its civil war against ethnic Tamil insurgents.

The Hindu. Footage is part of documentary Sri Lanka's Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished.
Britain's Channel 4 on Tuesday insisted in comments to The Hindu that its footage purporting to show that the slain LTTE chief Velupillai Prabakaran's 12-year-old unarmed son Balachandran Prabakaran was "brutally executed" by Sri Lankan forces in May 2009 even as he was preparing to surrender was "authentic".

The footage is part of a documentary, Sri Lanka's Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished, to be screened on Wednesday.

Footage of atrocity committed at the end of the government's war with the Tamil Tigers is revealed.

It is a chilling piece of footage that represents yet another blow for the beleaguered Sri Lankan government in its attempts to head off a critical resolution at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva this week. 
The short clip dates from the final hours of the bloody 26-year civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the secessionist rebels of the Tamil Tigers, the LTTE.

After Carefully consideration of the draft resolution, Promoting Reconciliation and Accountability in Sri Lanka, submitted to Human Rights council of Sri Lanka, the Asian Human Rights Commission is of the view that the resolution is conducive to promote the rule of law in Sri Lanka and will enhance the betterment of all communities by promoting reconciliation and accountability.

".....you dislike doctrines, you have a horror of systems, as for principles, you deny that there are any in political economy; therefore we shall call it your practice — your practice without theory and without principle." Frédéric Bastiat (1801-1850)
[Open letter to the French Parliament, originally published in 1845]

The operation in Geneva has been accomplished, the hyperbole declared by the government during the weekend, after the inelegant drama on the streets of Colombo and in the suburbs where President Rajapaksa's critical political situation has been changed.