Sri Lanka summons Canadian ambassador over sanctions of high-ranking officialsJanuary 11, 2023

Sri Lanka has summoned Canada’s envoy over Ottawa’s resolution to sanction 4 high-ranking officers for alleged human-rights breaches.

That nation’s authorities is accusing Ottawa of caving to Tamil diaspora politics in sanctioning two former presidents and two navy officers.

The choice “units a harmful precedent,” the South Asian state’s foreign-affairs ministry mentioned in a Tuesday information launch.

Ottawa introduced Monday that it was barring two former presidents from entry to Canada – Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who resigned final July, and his older brother Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The pair had been in energy when Sri Lanka’s military defeated Tamil separatists who had waged a bloody, 26-year civil warfare with the nation’s majority Sinhalese inhabitants.

Gotabaya quickly fled his nation final summer time amid mass protests over dwelling prices, whereas Mahinda resigned from his publish as prime minister final spring.

Ottawa additionally sanctioned two senior navy officers.

One is Sunil Ratnayake, whom a courtroom sentenced to demise for his position in a bloodbath of Tamils in 2000, solely to be pardoned by Gotabaya. The opposite is navy commander Chandana Prasad Hettiarachchi, who has been accused of abducting civilians who had been later killed.

Along with the entry ban, the 4 can not make monetary dealings inside Canada. The announcement gained substantial media consideration in South Asia.

Sri Lanka International Affairs Minister Ali Sabry summoned the Canadian Appearing Excessive Commissioner Daniel Bood over the transfer Tuesday and urged Ottawa to “evaluation the choice.”

Sabry mentioned in a press release that the sanctions had been primarily based on “unsubstantiated allegations” and “home political compulsions” and will hinder postwar reconciliation inside the nation.

He mentioned the transfer “units a harmful precedent and is inimical to Sri Lanka’s curiosity” because it tries to work with elected Tamil representatives on a devolution and peace plan.

Sabry’s ministry went on that the choice leaves democratically elected leaders “susceptible to arbitrary, exterior selections” that aren’t primarily based on due course of.

Haiti’s former prime minister Laurent Lamothe made the identical argument in a December courtroom submitting, contesting Canadian sanctions that Ottawa primarily based on his alleged assist for violent gangs.

The workplace of International Affairs Minister Melanie Joly argued all 4 of the Sri Lankan officers being sanctioned are chargeable for “the mindless lack of human lives,” and mentioned Canadian officers use a radical course of to judge who deserves sanctioning.

“Victims and survivors of gross human-rights violations deserve justice,” spokesman Adrien Blanchard mentioned in a press release.

“We’re sending a transparent message that those that have dedicated gross human-rights violations in Sri Lanka should reply for the struggling they’ve brought about.”

Sri Lanka’s present president, Ranil Wickremesinghe, took workplace final July after financial turmoil that led to an increase in baby malnutrition and a scarcity of medical tools.

Final month, Wickremesinghe mentioned his nation has “undergone the bleakest of instances, immense hardships” as a result of final yr’s “abject financial collapse.”

Sri Lanka’s international ministry mentioned it was poor timing for Ottawa to implement the sanctions, and argued the transfer “was in contravention of established diplomatic observe, disregarding present channels of normal bilateral interplay.”

It mentioned that Canada has a task to play as peacemaker, given its personal massive inhabitants with Tamil roots.

But Joly’s workplace doubled down Tuesday, suggesting the nation isn’t doing sufficient.

“We proceed to name on Sri Lanka to take concrete actions to uphold its human-rights obligations and to determine a significant accountability course of,” Blanchard mentioned.