Wanting in credibility

The Disaster Management and Human Rights Ministry states that the US State Department’s 2009 Country Report on Human Rights Practices pertaining to Sri Lanka was a conflation of historical background, repetition of statements in earlier reports, unverified assertions and falls short of the high standards that the State Department professes to uphold. Issuing a release in response to the March 11, 2010 release of the 2009 Country Report on Human Rights Practices pertaining to Sri Lanka compiled by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour of the United States’ Department of State, the Ministry stated that the basis of many assertions are ‘reports’ that are mainly attributed to anonymous “NGOs”, “international sources”, “human rights groups”, “observers” and other unnamed sources. It says in the past, few (if any) of these allegations have been made known to the Government of Sri Lanka. Accordingly, the Government’s position, reaction or response to these assertions are not reflected in the report, making it a less than objective assessment.   www.dailynews.lk/2010/03/16/news03.asp