Sri Lanka's real human rights record - 28 January 2010

The recent Guardian article by a Human Rights Watch officer exemplifies what EM Forster described as the world of telegrams and anger. Today, he would have used the term "soundbite", and this is what HRW has engaged in relentlessly against Sri Lanka, with no attention to accuracy, nor to engagement.

This is not the first time we have found HRW seeking to further its own agenda by adopting a selective approach to evidence. Not only this, but it seems ready to overlook the real progress that is taking place in Sri Lanka. Before outlining the key plans we are undertaking to improve Sri Lanka for the benefit of all, let me provide some background on our own grievances against HRW.

In 2007, HRW issued a press release referring to "indiscriminate attacks on civilians", regarding a report about the liberation of Sri Lanka's eastern province from terrorists. The report only cited a single example of civilian casualties in these operations, and our forces, in granting this, explained that it had happened because of their use of mortar-locating radar. The HRW report conceded that the Tamil Tigers (LTTE) had used weaponry in a civilian encampment, but claimed that this was not heavy weaponry and therefore they could not be held responsible. After one casuistic reply to our reasoned protest, they stopped answering letters.

After one meeting with a new representative in Geneva in September 2007, we were promised a response, but none was forthcoming. Since then, HRW has avoided discussion altogether, refusing to meet government representatives in Geneva, cancelling a meeting in the House of Commons when it heard the Sri Lankan government was sending someone who would refute its allegations. It claimed to our High Commission that it did not want to be "rubbished", but the way to avoid being rubbished is to refrain from lies, not dodge reasoned discussion.

Typically, while refusing to talk – quite unlike Amnesty International, which readily discusses problems at length – in 2008, HRW issued a glossy booklet that claimed abductions were on the increase in Sri Lanka. This report distorted the reality: it contained only three examples from 2007, with the rest of the 90-odd cases recorded dating from 2006.

We accept there were problems in 2006, largely arising from diminishing LTTE domination following years in which it had freely killed members of Tamil groups opposed to them – their claim to represent Tamils clearly did not extend to those who challenged their supremacy. By 2007 however the situation was better and, in the last couple of years, instances of abduction have fallen still further – though even a single case is one too many and we are working to prevent this in its entirety.

Now, with regard to the pronouncements of Philip Alston, the UN independent expert who explained to me why he feels obliged to "behave like a bulldog" towards Sri Lanka, HRW pronounces on a controversial video on which he bases his report that the "government has consistently claimed the video is fake, without providing any evidence that the gruesome scene was staged or the footage tampered with."

This is simply untrue. Even Alston's three experts declare that a moving leg of a supposedly dead person is strange. The experts note, too, that there "are unexplained characteristics of this file, the most troubling of which appears in the final 17 frames of video", while they are equally unable to explain why the date on the footage is six months later than the incident was supposed to have taken place (and after the battle had been concluded). The claim that there may be a legitimate explanation remains simply a claim, with no effort to justify it. Thankfully, the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, has adopted a more measured approach. Earlier this month, Ban distanced himself from the report – something not as widely reported as Alston's claims – suggesting that Alston "acted alone" and that his report does not represent the view of the United Nations.

We are also accused of refusing to investigate allegations of human rights abuses. And yet this is precisely what we are doing. In response to the US State Department report, presented in a balanced manner last October, on alleged incidents during the military action last year, President Rajapaksa appointed an independent commission to investigate. The report will be provided in April.

The problem with all this sound and fury is that it detracts from the real problems with human rights issues that Sri Lanka does face, and to which it can now devote attention. While it could be argued that the authoritarianism of the government of the 1980s contributed to the growth of terrorist movements, this cannot be said of more recent administrations. None the less, the first priority of government had been to ensure security and defeat terrorism once and for all.

Alongside this, we have moved apace on much-needed reforms, which are now being introduced to the north and east. In consultation with the police authorities, we have helped with reinforcing training programmes to enforce rights that suffered during a decade of increased recruitment. The new inspector-general of police has begun a policy of improving women and children's desks in areas of particular vulnerability and, through the ministry of child development and women's rights, we are strengthening community structures to enhance protection capacity.

During the relative quiet of election day, I was able to go through the draft action plan for human rights, a monumental effort by eight consultative committees, including some of the most vociferous critics of government. We were also able, last November, to present to the president, fulfilling an earlier campaign pledge, a proposed bill of rights, prepared by a group of independent experts who consisted of four Sinhalese, two Tamils and two Muslims. The ministry – before I became its secretary – had picked eight admirably qualified people, who represent the pluralistic society we were, and will be, without the corrosive divisiveness of terrorism.

This is the real picture of human rights in Sri Lanka. We are happy to receive and respond to criticism, but we do expect proper engagement and an attempt to understand the full picture. There is enormous promise for Sri Lanka over the decade ahead and we know that all Sri Lankans must benefit from sustained peace in our country after nearly three decades of terrorist threat. Organisations that seek to stoke division and not engage will not help us meet this goal.