Sri Lankan ambassador dismisses IJC allegation as "blatant falsehood"

At the on-going 7th session of the Human Rights Council held in Geneva, Ambassador Dayan Jayatilleka, exercising his right of reply during the interactive debate on the report of the Special Rapporteur on Torture Mr. Manfred Nowak on Tuesday 11th March 2008, said that the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) has engaged in a blatant falsehood in claiming that Sri Lanka has refused to let the Working Group visit Sri Lanka. He said that "Sri Lanka has no intention of shutting itself off" and has engaged and cooperated extensively with various UN mechanisms.

He also said that it was curious that Switzerland permits the commemoration of the "Black Tiger Day", which is the day dedicated to the commemoration of Tiger suicide bombers, while calling for universal jurisdiction to be applied to one ex-Tiger terrorist already facing British justice.

Responding to the League for Rights and Liberation of Peoples, he said there was no mention in this entire disquisition on torture of the underground prisons run by the Tamil Tigers who admitted to draining the blood of army captives until they died.