AN impartial inquiry into the human rights abuses in the war against the Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka in 2009, as demanded by the UN, will only be the first step toward accountability and reconciliation without which there will be neither peace nor stability in the island nation. In a long-awaited, nearly 300-page, report submitted on Wednesday, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) accused both the government and LTTE of atrocities, especially during the final stages of the war. One UN estimate puts the number of Tamils killed in the final army offensive at 40,000. The UN human rights office postponed the planned publication of its report in March, after Mahinda Rajapaksa lost the presidential election to party rival Maithripala Sirisena in January. This was to give the new government time to settle in office and organize public opinion in favor of an inquiry acceptable to UN and Sri Lanka's Western backers. The new government won another major concession too. Instead of a full international inquiry, the UN is now calling for setting up a "hybrid special court integrating international judges, prosecutors, lawyers and investigators" to try war crimes and crimes against humanity. The Tamil groups and human rights activists abroad were for a fully international probe but they would welcome one dominated by non-Sri Lankan judges. The Sirisena administration, however, seems to have opted for a domestic process, with only advisory role for international experts. Addressing the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva on Monday, Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera said the government was planning to set up, by next month, a domestic mechanism to probe the human right violations committed during the war. The inquiry will be completed within 18 months. The Tamil groups and human rights groups in Sri Lanka and abroad may overlook inadequacies of the probe mechanism if they are convinced that the government is sincere and serious about efforts to address their other grievances — some a result of the anti-Tiger war and some that gave rise to the emergence and popularity of Tigers in the first place. The Sirisena government has already taken some tentative steps in this direction. Apart from deciding to constitute a reconciliation commission with advice from South Africa, it has proposed the creation of an Office of Missing Persons to identify the fate of people who disappeared during the civil war, and an Office of Reparations to address compensation. The government has begun returning land to the Tamil families whose property is still being used by the military, as well as resettling those remaining in displacement camps or living with relatives. Authorities are also trying to find ways to help the large number of war widows. But Tamil leaders feel Sirisena's moves are only symbolic aimed at warding off economic sanctions and Western pressure for an international inquiry into the war atrocities. The government is yet to address issues such as the Tamils' desire for greater autonomy and the withdrawal of troops from Tamil areas. Sirisena should avoid the mistakes committed by his predecessor. Rajapaksa is the only leader in recent history who can claim to have led a counterinsurgency campaign to a successful conclusion. What he destroyed was the most powerful and the most ruthless terrorist organization in the world but unfortunately he did not realize that battlefield victory should be followed up by imaginative gestures and meaningful concessions to the Tamils at the negotiating table. Sirisena's electoral victory will also prove hollow if the root cause of ethnic problem in Sri Lanka remains unaddressed. The decimation of LTTE does not mean an end to the Tamil problem. Though LTTE has suffered a crushing defeat, its support base continues to remain intact. Any organization claiming to be the protector of Tamil interests can draw on that support and revive the conflict though they may not adopt LTTE's brutal but failed tactics.
