Row over Sri Lanka rights 'damages' Commonwealth
Summit was dogged by allegations that Sri Lankan troops had killed as many as 40,000 civilians in the 37-year conflict
Sri Lankan President Mahindra Rajapaksa speaks to journalists during a press conference at Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall in Colombo on November 17, 2013. PHOTO: AFP
COLOMBO:
A bitter division at a weekend summit over allegations of war crimes by its Sri Lankan hosts damaged the Commonwealth, a post-colonial club already struggling for relevance, according to observers.
Sri Lanka had hoped the three-day summit in Colombo would showcase its post-war revival, while the Commonwealth wanted to focus on equitable economic growth and debt relief for smaller countries, among other issues.
Instead the summit was dogged by a public dispute between Britain's David Cameron and Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse over allegations his government's troops killed as many as 40,000 civilians at the end of the country's 37-year ethnic conflict.
"It was not a success," said Ronald Sanders, a former Caribbean diplomat from Guyana who is now a senior research fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies in London.
"No conference dominated by fatal dissension among Commonwealth members about its venue (and) its chairmanship (Rajapakse)... could be counted as a success," Sanders, who was part of a team of experts compiling recommendations for a Commonwealth charter on common values, told AFP.
"Instead, it weakened the Commonwealth."
Leaders of three countries - Commonwealth heavyweight Canada, India and Mauritius - stayed away from the summit, which is held every two years, in protest over Sri Lanka's rights record against ethnic minority Tamils.
David Cameron then stole the limelight by repeatedly threatening to push for an international probe through UN bodies into the allegations, unless Rajapakse's government completed its own investigation by next March.
Cameron travelled to the island's former warzone of Jaffna to draw attention to the issue and flew out of Sri Lanka before the summit ended.
Rajapakse in turn warned he would not be pushed "into a corner" on the issue, while the mostly pro-government Sri Lankan media said Cameron's ultimatum had colonial overtones.
Although the issue dominated the headlines, the Commonwealth's lengthy final communique released on Sunday did not mention the war crimes allegations.
Instead it restated the commitment of the 53-member bloc of mainly former British colonies to its set of common values which includes human rights, democracy and the rule of law.
At a final heated press conference, media ignored Commonwealth spokesman Richard Uko's plea not to focus on the rights issue, while the editor of a pro-government Sri Lankan newspaper accused Uko of a "sinister conspiracy" of only taking questions from the foreign press.
Charu Lata Hogg, from international affairs think-tank Chatham House in London, said the Commonwealth's decision not to tackle the issue head-on damaged its credibility.
"The fact that there wasn't even a public statement about the situation of human rights and democracy in Sri Lanka gives a strong signal about the state of the Commonwealth," said Hogg, associate professor at the group's Asia programme.
She said the the group had taken action in the past against member nations including South Africa and Zimbabwe over rights abuses.
"By remaining silent, the Commonwealth has given its acquiescence of rights violations committed by Sri Lanka," she said.
The Commonwealth had plenty of notice of member states' concerns given that Canada announced its boycott of the summit back in April, she added.
Only 27 leaders turned up for the summit, while Canada pointedly only sent its parliamentary secretary to the ministry of foreign affairs and for international human rights.
The Commonwealth's top official defended the summit saying members worked together through diplomacy to advance "our shared values."
"Even the government of the United Kingdom has said that it is a great sense of purpose and belief in the Commonwealth that makes them attend," Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma added.
As an institution set up 64 years ago with its roots in the British Empire, the Commonwealth has long been accused of struggling to remain relevant in the 21st century.
The Commonwealth, encompassing two billion citizens from countries of vastly different stages of development, announced a series of reforms at its last summit in 2011 after commissioning a group to make recommendations.
But Sanders, a member of that group, said that given the disastrous weekend summit Commonwealth leaders urgently needed to to decide "what they want the Commonwealth to represent in the world" and how to achieve it.
"The Commonwealth is in danger of becoming irrelevant unless its leaders recommit themselves to making the association work," he said.
A bitter division at a weekend summit over allegations of war crimes by its Sri Lankan hosts damaged the Commonwealth, a post-colonial club already struggling for relevance, according to observers.
Sri Lanka had hoped the three-day summit in Colombo would showcase its post-war revival, while the Commonwealth wanted to focus on equitable economic growth and debt relief for smaller countries, among other issues.
Instead the summit was dogged by a public dispute between Britain's David Cameron and Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse over allegations his government's troops killed as many as 40,000 civilians at the end of the country's 37-year ethnic conflict.
"It was not a success," said Ronald Sanders, a former Caribbean diplomat from Guyana who is now a senior research fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies in London.
"No conference dominated by fatal dissension among Commonwealth members about its venue (and) its chairmanship (Rajapakse)... could be counted as a success," Sanders, who was part of a team of experts compiling recommendations for a Commonwealth charter on common values, told AFP.
"Instead, it weakened the Commonwealth."
Leaders of three countries - Commonwealth heavyweight Canada, India and Mauritius - stayed away from the summit, which is held every two years, in protest over Sri Lanka's rights record against ethnic minority Tamils.
David Cameron then stole the limelight by repeatedly threatening to push for an international probe through UN bodies into the allegations, unless Rajapakse's government completed its own investigation by next March.
Cameron travelled to the island's former warzone of Jaffna to draw attention to the issue and flew out of Sri Lanka before the summit ended.
Rajapakse in turn warned he would not be pushed "into a corner" on the issue, while the mostly pro-government Sri Lankan media said Cameron's ultimatum had colonial overtones.
Although the issue dominated the headlines, the Commonwealth's lengthy final communique released on Sunday did not mention the war crimes allegations.
Instead it restated the commitment of the 53-member bloc of mainly former British colonies to its set of common values which includes human rights, democracy and the rule of law.
At a final heated press conference, media ignored Commonwealth spokesman Richard Uko's plea not to focus on the rights issue, while the editor of a pro-government Sri Lankan newspaper accused Uko of a "sinister conspiracy" of only taking questions from the foreign press.
Charu Lata Hogg, from international affairs think-tank Chatham House in London, said the Commonwealth's decision not to tackle the issue head-on damaged its credibility.
"The fact that there wasn't even a public statement about the situation of human rights and democracy in Sri Lanka gives a strong signal about the state of the Commonwealth," said Hogg, associate professor at the group's Asia programme.
She said the the group had taken action in the past against member nations including South Africa and Zimbabwe over rights abuses.
"By remaining silent, the Commonwealth has given its acquiescence of rights violations committed by Sri Lanka," she said.
The Commonwealth had plenty of notice of member states' concerns given that Canada announced its boycott of the summit back in April, she added.
Only 27 leaders turned up for the summit, while Canada pointedly only sent its parliamentary secretary to the ministry of foreign affairs and for international human rights.
The Commonwealth's top official defended the summit saying members worked together through diplomacy to advance "our shared values."
"Even the government of the United Kingdom has said that it is a great sense of purpose and belief in the Commonwealth that makes them attend," Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma added.
As an institution set up 64 years ago with its roots in the British Empire, the Commonwealth has long been accused of struggling to remain relevant in the 21st century.
The Commonwealth, encompassing two billion citizens from countries of vastly different stages of development, announced a series of reforms at its last summit in 2011 after commissioning a group to make recommendations.
But Sanders, a member of that group, said that given the disastrous weekend summit Commonwealth leaders urgently needed to to decide "what they want the Commonwealth to represent in the world" and how to achieve it.
"The Commonwealth is in danger of becoming irrelevant unless its leaders recommit themselves to making the association work," he said.