A new infographic created by the advocacy organisation Sri Lanka Campaign highlights that as many as 147,000 people could be unaccounted for after the end of the armed stage of Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict.
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Noting that “a wider pattern of mass violence in Sri Lanka” had resulted in the death of thousands on the island “but particularly Tamils over many decades,” a briefing report by the Sri Lanka campaign provides new infographics and insight on Sri Lanka for the UN Human Rights Council's 30th session.
In a briefing outlining the organisation’s stance on the UN report into Sri Lanka’s mass atrocities, (OISL), Sri Lanka Campaign, said,
“There is now no doubt that war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by both sides of Sri Lana’s civil war, and that many of the tens of thousands of civilians who died in the early months of 2009 were murdered by their own government. The single most positive step the new government of Sri Lanka could make is accept this basic truth.”
“With tens of thousands dead or unaccounted for, 2009 saw the worst violence Sri Lanka has ever seen, and most of the victims were Tamil. Sadly, this tragedy is part of a wider pattern of mass violence in Sri Lanka which has resulted in deaths of tens of thousands of people from all ethnicities, but particularly Tamils over many decades.”
“The only way to end this cycle of violence and to build a lasting peace in Sri Lanka is with prosecutions that will break the prevailing culture of impunity. The survivors of Sri Lanka’s civil war have made it clear that these prosecutions must be led by the international community.”
