2ND LEAD (Includes text of the resolution)

"Accessories after the fact to acts of Genocide"

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 May 2009, 02:00 GMT]
Condemning the sponsorship, by twelve states, of a self-praising resolution submitted to the United Nations by the Government of Sri Lanka, before the scheduled UN Human Rights Council emergency session scheduled for Monday, Professor Boyle, an expert in International Law said Friday that these states have become accessories after the fact to the numerous acts of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes that the Government of Sri Lanka has perpetrated upon the Tamils.

Labelled “Assistance to Sri Lanka in the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights,” Sri Lanka’s proposed text is co-signed by Indonesia, China, Saudi Arabia, India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Bahrain, Philippines, Cuba, Egypt, Nicaragua, and Bolivia, reported UN Watch, a non-governmental organization based in Geneva whose mandate is to monitor the performance of the United Nations.

"Their sponsorship of this Resolution means that the above-mentioned states have thereby all become ACCESSORIES AFTER THE FACT to the numerous acts of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes that the Government of Sri Lanka has perpetrated upon the Tamils in violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention, the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Two Additional Protocols of 1977, as well as the rules of customary international criminal law, including humanitarian law and the laws of war," Prof. Boyle said.

"By definition, violations of international treaties, genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes cannot possibly fall within the domestic jurisdiction of a State.

"That Principle goes back to the Nuremberg Charter of 1945 and the Nuremberg Judgment of 1946 concerning the prosecution of the Nazis," Boyle added.

"This Resolution constitutes a total debasement and perversion of everything the United Nations Charter and the U.N. Human Rights Council are intended to stand for," Boyle said.

By contrast, the upcoming Monday session was initiated by the council’s European Union members and supported by Argentina, Bosnia, Canada, Chile, Mexico, Mauritius, South Korea, Switzerland, Ukraine and Uruguay, UN Watch said.

"Sri Lanka’s action today constitutes an outrageous abuse and show of contempt for the international human rights process," said Hillel Neuer, an international lawyer and the executive director of UN Watch, a Geneva-based human rights monitoring group.

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