‘Compassionate Council will decide on amnesty’ for war crimes says Sri Lankan prime minister

Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said a “Compassionate Council”, composed of Buddhist monks and other religious leaders, will decide on whether those accused of international humanitarian law violations would be granted amnesty.
Speaking to the Straits Times Mr Wickremesinghe said the “bulk of cases” will be dealt with by a Truth Commission. “And from there starts the role of the Compassionate Council,” he said. “They will be the key people.”
“Truth Commission, in many cases will forward the reports to the Compassionate Council, which can decide whether they qualify for amnesty,” he added.
The prime minister downplayed the role of foreign judges in an accountability process, saying “a judicial mechanism with foreign judges participating will perhaps go into a few cases”. “But they will deal with far less than cases with the Truth Commission,” he added.
He also said it had yet to be decided whether foreign judges would act as “an adviser or a judge” in the forthcoming accountability mechanism. “It is (the manner of) participation of foreign judges,” said the prime minister. “So, we have to decide how it is to be done.”
Stating that the number of deaths from the final phase of the armed conflict “looks like it could be less than 40,000,” Mr Wickremesinghe said “people want to know the truth… punishment is a different matter”.