WOMENS AND MINORITY RIGHTS IN

SRI LANKAS TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE

PROCESS

The team: Speakers and few others posed for a phtograph after
the side event. (c) s.deshapriya.
On Friday 17th March at the 34th session of the UN Human Rights
Council, the International Movement Against All Forms of
Discrimination and Racism (IMADR), jointly with Franciscans
International and Minority Rights Group International (MRG), held
a side event titled Womens and Minority Rights in Sri Lankas
Transitional Justice Process.

22/03/2017
The event was moderated by Ms. Anastasia Crickley, Chair of the
UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD)
default_external link. Following three civil society representatives
from Sri Lanka, Dr Nimalka Fernando, Ms. Saroja Sivachandran
and Ms. Jensila Majeed, Ms. Rita Izsk-Ndiaye, the UN Special
Rapporteur on minority issues shared her findings from the
country visit to Sri Lanka in October 2016. When opening the
event, Ms. Crickley noted recent changes in Sri Lanka, and she
informed the audience that the event aims to identify challenges
and steps to be taken at the Sri Lankas transitional justice
process through the lenses of women and minorities.

Rita Izsk-Ndiaye speaking at the side event (c) Sunanda

Deshapriya
Dr. Fernando welcomed the panel consisted of Sinhala, Tamil and
Muslim activists from Sri Lanka who raised resources by
themselves to participate in the Human Rights Council. She
shared the difficulties of Sri Lankan women who are actually the
majority in the population (approx. 52%). According to her, even
though womens rights are guaranteed in the Constitution,
women have not been enjoying these rights in terms of political,
social, and economic and civil environments because of the
patriarchal dynamics, military, and the ethnic conflict. She
pointed out that patriarchal, political, and cultural dynamics have
made women to become a minority. Militarisation exacerbated the
problem. Wars were always fought on the body of women. Sharing
her experiences as a Sinhala Christian woman from a certain
caste, an ethnic majority but a religious minority, she highlighted
multiple forms of discrimination faced by Sri Lankan women. She
stressed that forms of discrimination differ to Tamil or Muslim
women. While noting the absence of a representative of the
plantation Tamil women in the panel, she reminded the audience
that they continue to suffer the particularly severe discrimination
such as malnourishment, the lack of access to health and labour
exploitation. She encouraged everyone to hold the Special
Rapporteurs report and ask hard questions on the issue of
plurality. She put an emphasis on the importance of womens
participation in the transitional justice process. She criticised
gender inequality in Sri Lanka which ranges from the burden on
women to preserve the culture to the lack of substantial political
participation. In closing, she put an emphasis that experience of
every woman including Sinhala women should be taken up as
everyone has suffered at the hands of patriarchal culture and
religions.
Anastasia Crikley speaking at the side event (c) Sunanda
Deshapriya
Ms. Crickley welcomed that the women human rights defenders
from the ground were represented in the panel. She reminded the
audience that a dominant group does not always mean the
largest group as it was seen in South Africas apartheid. She
reiterated that cultures change in direction to reinforce womens
human rights, or sometimes not. She emphasised the important
role of women in transitional justice.
While describing the Sri Lankas transitional justice process, Ms.
Sivachandran pointed out that transitional justice is a new
concept for the country and for most Sri Lankans. Among the four
pillars of transitional justice, she expressed her reservations for
the justice component because of the countrys culture of
impunity. As mechanisms differ in each country, she stressed that
Sri Lankas transitional justice needs to be designed based on the
countrys specific context including the history and institutions.
She emphasised the need of civil society involvement in
transitional justice mechanism. She reminded the audience that
women have suffered the most from the war, therefore they need
to be consulted properly. She drew attention to unresolved issues
such as enforced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, land
return, and sexual violence against women and girls. She was
alerted by the statements by the President and the Prime Minister
which led to question the implementation of the Human Rights
Council resolution 30/1. According to her, reparations can take
different forms including compensations, return of lands and
resettlement, as well as memorialisation, but so far these have
not happened or for in very little. In ending her remark, she
questioned the governments political will to implement the
transitional justice process with the 2 years extension of the
OHCHR monitoring.

J.Majeed speaking at the side event(c) Sunanda Deshapriya

As a Muslim person, Ms. Majeed shared her communitys

experience of forced displacement by the Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1990. She pointed out the lack of will from
both the government and the Tamil community representatives to
resettle the displaced Muslims after the end of the war. As a
result, Muslims in the Northern Province have had to struggle to
return home. Compare to the other four districts of the Northern
Province, only Muslims in Mannar district got lands. She
highlighted the importance of land for Muslim women as a source
of income generation. She also spoke of the issues associated
with land such as the loss of voting rights and registration.
Furthermore, she pointed out that while the issues of Tamils are
discussed in the minority rights perspective, Muslims and their
challenges are overlooked. She said, Challenges of the Muslim
community are unheard and submerged in the Tamil minority
issues. She stressed that Muslims in the North are a minority
among minorities. She recommended to the government to:
recognise the issue of forced displacement as an atrocity against
Muslims by the government and Tamil political parties; ensure
that resettlement policy and a commission are formed in order for
Muslims to get justice; rebuild the relationship among the Tamil
and Muslim communities in the North for reconciliation; and
reform the Muslim Marriage Divorce Act to eliminate polygamy
and increase the minimum age of marriage to 18 years old.
Ms. Izsk-Ndiaye shared with the audience her thoughts on Sri
Lanka based on the country visit. While appreciating the
governments cooperation in enabling full access to different
areas, she described the visit as a very rich and emotional
mission because of overwhelming testimonies she heard. She
reiterated that the story of Sri Lanka is not just the story of
Sinhalese or Tamils, but of all the religious and ethnic groups
including Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Telugus, Veddas, Malays,
Burghers and Sri Lankan Africans. She shared her astonishment
by the countrys diversity when everyone from different smaller
minorities she met spoke with great pride of being Sri Lankans.
They also spoke of the importance to preserve their languages.
She stressed their desire for being kept in the loop and having
spaces for dialogue. She identified militarisation as one of the
main challenges to transitional justice. Since they are almost
homogenously Sinhala Buddhists, the army is seen as an
occupying force in the land which are held without consent of the
local communities. She shared her concern on the armys
commercial activities which local businesses cannot compete. The
stigmatisation of Tamils in the North due to the presence of the
military was also touched upon. She stressed the need to transfer
the power to civilian forces from the army. Furthermore, she
referred a threat to the identity by Sinhalisation of minority
areas. Despite psychological impacts of the war are severe
manifested in cases of PTSD, alcohol dependence and abuse,
breakdown of social network, domestic abuse, and suicide, she
realised that there is very little psychosocial support available to
affected persons. Referring to the separate section in her report
on minority women, she identified the challenges faced by
minority women are complex and need a special attention such as
female heads of households, war widows, and women searching
for family members. She was alerted by testimonies that sexual
favours were demanded in exchange for papers, harassment of
former female LTTE combatants, late night visits and phone calls
by the security personnel. She identified the lack of evidences
and accountability is a challenge to address the issues of minority
women. She highlighted the historical marginalisation of
plantation Tamil women who are excluded from the partriacal
decision-making process. She recommended the reform of Muslim
personal laws in order to comply with international human rights
standards. According to her, minority women are often fall in
between the minority rights discourse and the womens rights
discourse, since minority rights movements are led by minority
men and the womens rights discourse is dominated by majority
women. She was particularly alarmed by the high level of
polarisation in the Sri Lankan society. She encouraged Sri Lankans
to work for social cohesion instead of dividing themselves into
their own groups. She expressed her hope for the Sri Lankas
future because of the high level of awareness of people on human
rights issues. In ending her speech, she suggested the need for a
joint advocacy planning by civil society, member States and the
UN human rights system as a next step for Sri Lanka. In addition,
she put an emphasis on the need to have diverse government
institutions which are represented by minorities to establish trust
between communities and the government.
Ms. Crickley thanked the Special Rapporteur for the
comprehensive intervention. She reiterated that many concerns
raised by the panellists and the Special Rapporteur were also
taken up in the concluding observations of the CERD. She
stressed that the task in the side event was to consider areas
where joint-cooperation is possible.
In the interactive discussion, some participants shared their
experiences in Sri Lanka which they witnessed the struggles of
women and minorities including due to the militarys presence in
the North. A question was asked to the Sri Lankan panellists to
suggest one top priority measure that will help reinstalling the
trust in the authorities.
While Ms. Sivachandran said that the question was also question
for her, she stated how the issues of minorities and minority
women are taken into consideration should be observed.
Ms. Fernando answered that seeing 50% of Parliament consisted
of women is her dream. Yet, she pointed how the Constitution
making process will open doors for women as well as for power
sharing.
Ms. Majeed reiterated the internal marginalisation of Muslim
women within their own community, therefore the Muslim
personal laws need to be amended.
One activist from Sri Lanka pointed out the core issue that even
minority political parties do not recognise the participation of
women, which keeps minority women being marginalised.
The Special Rapporteur shared her experience in Sri Lanka which
she had to make sure that no men were present in her
consultations with minority women, because they feared reprisals.
She had to install security measures even some women were in
exile. She was very alarmed by this experience. Her
recommendation to the government would be to have women-
only meetings belonging to different groups to forge solidary and
establish open spaces for dialogue.
In concluding, Ms. Crickley described the discussion as a key
moment to reinforce the transitional justice process to take on
board the complexities of the issues of women and minorities
across the situation. Lastly, she emphasised that it is important in
many ways to look at joint-advocacy planning.
-Special thanks to IMADR
Posted by Thavam