Minister of Public Enterprises Development Kabir Hashim said that any allegations raised against a Sri Lankan citizen over a domestic issue must be dealt with only under local laws.

“We will not allow a domestic issue to be dealt with internationally owing to outside pressure, he said.

In an appeal to US President Barack Obama last week, two major Tamil groups in the United States, the ‘Tamils for Obama’ and ‘American Tamil Forum’ have urged the United States to arrest Rajapakse who was reported visiting the US at the time.

“Gotabaya Rajapakse is one of the main architect – along with the former President and the current President – who were responsible for the large scale killing of Tamils and rape of Tamil women. According to United Nations internal review report around 70,000 Tamils were killed in six months during the early part of 2009 and the abuses committed by the Sri Lankan forces amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Some international legal experts believe that there are elements of these abuses that could amount to Genocide,” the two organisations said.

The Tamil groups said that the US should not miss the opportunity to arrest and prosecute one of the main war criminals in recent times visiting the US adding that failure to do so would encourage others to commit abuses amounting to war crimes.

The UN Human Rights Council, led by the US, last year passed a Sri Lanka resolution to hold a credible investigation to punish those responsible for these killings.

“United States should take the same leadership it took at the UN to initiate investigation for the visiting Sri Lankan war criminal,” said these two organizations.

(colombogazette.com)