There were sharp differences of opinion on human rights issues when the Minister of Human Rights Mahinda Samarasinghe held a joint press conference with Arbour just before her departure.
The Government bluntly turned down an offer by the United Nations to establish an office in Sri Lanka to monitor human rights violations.

Minister of Human Rights Mahinda Samarasinghe categorically told Arbour that Sri Lanka will not welcome such a request. He noted, “We are not willing to discuss a UN presence in Sri Lanka for monitoring purposes or even willing to allow an office of the High Commissioner.”

Journalists were able to witness differences of opinions between the High Commissioner and the Minister on addressing human rights violations in Sri Lanka at the Press conference when the two started responding to each other’s comments at the head table.

Arbour said, “There is a disturbing lack of investigation that undermines the confidence in the institutions set up to protect human rights. The application of international treaties in domestic law has been questioned by the Supreme Court in the Singarasa case.”

The visiting High Commissioner also urged Sri Lanka to maintain a good human rights record while applying international treaty standards. She also called on Sri Lanka to ratify the Rome Treaty which created the International Criminal Court.

She expressed her concern over the large number of killings, abductions and disappearances which occurred in the country though the Government says initiatives had been taken to address these issues. “There has yet to be an adequate and credible public accounting for the vast majority of these incidents”, she noted.

She said that the weakness of the rule of law and prevalence of impunity is alarming in the context of the armed conflict and emergency measures taken against terrorism in Sri Lanka.
The High Commissioner stated that there are credible allegations of human rights violations that deserved to be investigated, though authorities had tried to dismiss them as LTTE propaganda. She also noted, “I regret that I did not have the opportunity to visit Kilinochchi where I would have liked to convey directly to the LTTE my deep concern about their human rights violations and humanitarian law, including (forced) recruitment of children into armed conflict and abduction of adults and political killings”.

She also said that she is very concerned about the reports she received on the serious violations by the Karuna faction and other armed groups. Samarasinghe said that the High Commissioner was barred from visiting Kilinochchi for her own safety and that when former UN Secretary General Koffi Ananan visited Sri Lanka, the Government prevented him also from visiting Kilinochchi due to security reasons.

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