Factum Perspective: Sri Lanka’s Vanishing Votes at the UN Human Rights Council
By Sanja de Silva Jayatilleka
On the 6th of October 2022, a resolution on Sri Lanka was adopted at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva, by a vote of the 47 members of the Council, with 20 votes for the resolution, 7 against, and 20 abstentions. Resolution HRC/51/L1/Rev1 is the 9th resolution to be adopted on Sri Lanka at the Council since 2009.
All of the resolutions on Sri Lanka at the Council since May 2009 have been primarily on post-war reconciliation, devolution of political authority and accountability for alleged human rights violations and transgressions of international humanitarian law by both sides to the conflict.
The latest resolution however, drafted in the aftermath of an unprecedented people’s uprising against the government which saw the dramatic overthrow of the President following the resignation of the entire cabinet including the Prime Minister, introduces for the first time an economic dimension, calling upon the government to address the economic crisis and to investigate and prosecute corruption, in addition to the usual war-related concerns. The uprising popularly referred to as the “Aragalaya” (Struggle), had as its main grievances the corruption of the ruling elite and its mismanagement of the economy, which plunged the country into bankruptcy.
Predictably, the resolution was vehemently rejected by Sri Lanka’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Sabry, participating at the 51st session in Geneva on behalf of the government of Sri Lanka. The government having elected its long-time political opponent Ranil Wickremesinghe (who lost his parliamentary seat at the last elections) as President to replace the ousted Gotabaya Rajapaksa, recovered its composure and continues to insist that the economic crisis was a result of the Covid pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and that its role in the collapse of the economy was marginal.
Neither its own citizens nor the international community are buying it. There are daily manifestations of protests, probably indicating that the country is on the cusp of another ‘Aragalaya’. Following close on the heels of the resolution, the Supreme Court has granted leave to proceed on three Fundamental Rights cases holding the former President, former Prime Minister and former Finance Minister (the most politically prominent members of the Rajapaksa family) in addition to their Cabinet and top officials, naming 39 individuals as responsible and accountable for the economic crisis. Together, these developments may lead the IMF and the creditors in negotiations with the government of Sri Lanka on debt restructuring, and other stakeholders, to insist on early elections to obtain a fresh mandate from the people.
The disproportionately repressive methods being sought to be implemented by the security bureaucracy as pre-emptive measures against a repetition of the uprising are only proving to be propellants of their worst fears. Most recently, an attempt to declare several areas in and around the city as High Security Zones was challenged and in the courts and withdrawn by President Wickremesinghe. The arrests and continued detention of high-profile protesters under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) which gets a mention in the Geneva resolution, has increased public suspicion and the unpopularity of the government.
The Foreign Minister was grossly in error in his criticism that the Council had neither the mandate nor the expertise in economic matters. In the founding document of the UNHRC, Resolution 60/251 of the General Assembly specifically clarifies that all human rights, including civil and political rights are indivisible and should be regarded with the same attention.
The Council has long appointed international experts known as Special Procedures, who are experienced in the relevant fields to report to the Council on diverse matters. These Special Rapporteurs conduct field visits, consultations with stakeholders, collect evidence and present their reports both to the Council in Geneva and to the General Assembly in New York. As of 2021, there are 45 thematic Special Procedures of the Council ranging from experts on Climate Change to Arbitrary Detention and Executions, Equitable International Order to Extreme Poverty, Education, Water and Sanitation.
Significantly for Sri Lanka, there is also a Special Procedure called “the Independent Expert on the effects of foreign debt and other related international financial obligations of States on the full enjoyment of all human rights, particularly economic, social and cultural rights”.
At the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the membership of 47 is assured of equitable geographic representation, with each region proportionately representing its share of humanity and each member holding an equal vote, with no veto held by any member. It’s composition attempts to reflect world opinion fairly.
The story of the resolutions and their voting records in Geneva reflect Sri Lanka’s relationship with the world community and its conduct of international relations. The results of the votes at the UNHRC stand as independent witness to Sri Lanka’s capacity for negotiating its national interest in the world system.
The first resolution was adopted at a Special Session of the Council on the 27th of May 2009, just over a week after the Sri Lankan state prevailed over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, a powerful separatist-terrorist militia, bloodily ending a three decades old war. It is remarkable that in 2009 Sri Lanka managed to get 29 votes in its favour (over 60% of the membership) at such a time, the immediate aftermath of the war, by far the greatest number it has ever managed, when the lowest number was gained 13 years after the war ended and in peacetime.
Sri Lanka’s votes at the Council have declined steadily since 2009, never managing to get more than 15 and going down to just 7 in 2022.
The numbers are important because they are clearly reflective of an important underlying factor of Sri Lanka’s conduct of international affairs. The highest votes were achieved when Sri Lanka regarded the Human Rights Council as well as the United Nations system as deserving of full engagement and unstinting support, becoming an active participant in shaping the role that the Council would play in the UN system. Scholarly studies have described this variety of Sri Lankan diplomacy as “norm entrepreneurship”, i.e., influencing the “norms” by which the Council operates, challenging the old and helping shape the new.
This was a critical contribution at a time when the old way had discredited the Human Rights Commission as biased, causing it to be closed down by the member states and replaced by the new Human Rights Council in 2006. At the time, Sri Lankan diplomacy did not regard the promotion and protection of human rights as contrary to its national interest.
Despite propaganda conducted at the time locally by those who contrived to discredited Sri Lanka’s success in 2009, its diplomacy engaged with every country, every human rights organization, every NGO including those representing the views of the LTTE, in open discussions and debate at events held on the sidelines of the Council, while standing confidently for the enlightened national interest, using persuasion to convince and building firm coalitions of states to prevail in a vote. This approach saw most of Asia, Latin America, and Africa vote with Sri Lanka with only the collective vote of the EU (12) voting against. In retrospect, this approach has proven to be rare, and its achievement unique.
The vertical drop in numbers came when the Council and at times the UN system as a whole were regarded by Colombo with hostility, and its diplomacy became a reflection of the prevailing administration’s self-image, at times overconfident and at others seeing itself as a victim of a global conspiracy either of the member states or the Tamil Diaspora. Colombo’s discourse became hostile as it failed to convince the Council of its position, having also failed to make significant progress on the wartime and postwar promises made by its leadership and restated at the Council.
The Human Rights Council is not an alien or abstract idea imposed on other countries. It is composed of UN member states and as such its membership is open to persuasion by a state’s conduct and discourse. The hegemonic powers have a distinct advantage in many matters as they largely control the global media and fund many UN initiatives through voluntary contributions.
It is however as an equal member of the United Nations that Sri Lanka can contribute to minimizing those advantages. One such proven achievement was the initiative of the Global South for the ‘equitable geographic distribution’ of the Council’s membership. Even though regularly used, the “powerful countries” argument made by Sri Lanka to explain its poor performance in Geneva is hardly convincing when it overcame those obstacles in 2009 by creative diplomacy at the worst of times. However, in the absence of healthy respect for human rights by the state itself, diplomacy however skilled, can only play a limited, increasingly marginal role.
Sanja de Silva Jayatilleka is the author of “Mission Impossible – Geneva” (Vijitha Yapa, Colombo, 2017)
Factum is an Asia Pacific-focused think tank on International Relations, Tech Cooperation and Strategic Communications accessible via www.factum.lk