Tamil National Alliance leader R Sampanthan has written to members of the United Nations Human Rights Council, calling on them to denounce Sri Lanka’s failure to investigate mass atrocities and that it has “not taken any steps to address the Tamil National Question”.
In a letter sent last week, Sampanthan stated that the Sri Lankan government “continues a programme of repression of Sri Lankan Tamils”, listing moves such as militarisation, arrests and surveillance of political activists.
The TNA leader also highlighted the issue of land grabs by the Sri Lankan state, labelling it “the most serious danger the Tamil people face”.
“These actions of the Sri Lankan Government are intended to defeat the concept accepted both domestically and internationally that the Tamil people are a people within a united and undivided Sri Lanka inhabiting the Northern and Eastern provinces as their area of historical habitation, and thereby progressively transform the Northern and Eastern provinces into (a) majority Sinhala areas,” the letter continued.
“We urge the member states to clearly articular that Sri Lanka has failed in its obligations to investigate allegations of violations and not taken any steps to address the Tamil National Question as the only sure means to ensure non recurrence.”
Read the full text of the letter here.