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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 COLOMBO 000121 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/INSB 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/17/2019 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PREF PHUM PTER EAID MOPS CE
SUBJECT: 2007 IWOC AWARDEE FIGHTS UPHILL BATTLE ON JUDICIAL 
 
REFORM 
 
COLOMBO 00000121  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
Classified By: DEPUTY CHIEF OF MISSION VALERIE C. FOWLER.  REASONS: 1.4 
 (B, D) 
 
¶1. (C) SUMMARY: Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena, 2007 Sri Lankan 
recipient of the Secretary's International Women of Courage 
Award, related frustration with the presidential election, 
the Rajapaksa family, and a weak Sri Lankan civil society. 
She also discussed her recent report on post-war justice, 
which argued that large-scale judicial reform would better 
serve justice than creation of a Commission of Inquiry.  END 
SUMMARY. 
 
A ROUGH ROAD AHEAD 
------------------ 
 
¶2. (C) Poloff met with Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena, 2007 
recipient of the International Women of Courage Award, to 
discuss her post-election outlook and her recent report 
"Post-War Justice in Sri Lanka: Rule of Law, the Criminal 
Justice System and Commissions of Inquiry" (Report for the 
International Commission of Jurists (ICJ).  Pinto-Jayawardena 
is a prominent attorney, journalist, and human rights 
advocate in Sri Lanka. 
 
¶3. (C) Pinto-Jayawardena expressed deep frustration with the 
recent presidential election.  While she was pleasantly 
surprised by the minimal violence, she was confident that 
results had been rigged.  She lamented that Sri Lanka had a 
history of democratic elections, even during conflict times, 
and that this election's lack of credibility had shaken Sri 
Lankans' confidence in the system.  Characterizing voting as 
an affirmation of citizenship, she predicted low voter 
turnout in the April parliamentary elections and said she did 
not intend to vote herself. 
 
¶4. (C) In Pinto-Jayawardena's view, the threat of the LTTE 
had been replaced by a "totalitarian" government, dangerous 
in its family ties.  She argued that President Rajapaksa 
might let go of the reins a bit if he were on his own, but 
the desire to pass control down the family tree even when he 
left office precluded good governance.  (NOTE: one of the 
President's sons is standing for the April parliamentary 
elections in the family's home district. END NOTE.)  She 
warned that international pressure would be ineffective and 
that a "Burma-like situation would not be impossible."  She 
expressed concern over Sri Lanka's future, describing a 
"vacuum" in civil society.  Unlike neighboring countries, Sri 
Lanka lacked strong voices and organizers willing to demand 
change.  Instead, Sri Lanka had only political parties, and 
even academia had become politicized. 
 
JUDICIAL REFORM KEY TO ACCOUNTABILITY 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶5. (C) Unlike many human rights advocates, Pinto-Jayawardena 
argued against establishing a Commission of Inquiry (COI) to 
investigate war crimes and human rights violations committed 
during the final phases of the war, calling instead for 
widespread judicial reform.  Her Report posited that COIs, as 
statutorily designed in Sri Lanka, were not equipped for 
large-scale inquiries into gross human-rights violations and 
had been used to protect perpetrators and institutions from 
accountability. 
 
¶6. (C) As detailed in the Report, the Commission of Inquiry 
Act of 1948 (Act) did not address whether disclosures must 
lead to individual prosecutions in the court system.  A 
review of COIs from 1977 to 2001 found that most COI 
recommendations to prosecute had not been followed.  The Act 
also did not address protection of victims or witnesses or 
 
COLOMBO 00000121  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
the rights of the accused.  At the same time, cases brought 
directly to the criminal justice system had resulted largely 
in non-indictment, acquittals, and withdrawals because of 
systematic flaws in the investigatory and prosecutorial 
process, lack of judicial independence, and gaps in criminal 
law itself.  The solution was legal reform and adherence to 
rule of law. 
 
¶7. (C) Despite the Report's sharp criticism of Sri Lanka 
accountability mechanisms, Pinto-Jayawardena noted that the 
Government of Sri Lanka  had not responded negatively.  She 
attributed this to the Report's reliance on concrete examples 
and meticulous documentation which left little for the GSL to 
refute. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶8. (C) Our meeting with Pinto-Jayawardena highlighted once 
again the pitfalls of pushing hard on accountability.  As she 
noted, Sri Lanka has a long but unsuccessful history of 
inquiry commissions that often covered up or excused more 
than they revealed.  Attempts to create such a commission now 
to investigate war crimes -- which may have involved top 
leaders of the country, including the president's brother -- 
would not likely be any more successful than past 
commissions.  A more fruitful approach in this case could be 
to quietly encourage foreign law enforcement and judicial 
officials and NGOs to amass evidence of suspected crimes that 
could be used in a formal judicial process.  On the Sri 
Lankan domestic side, little appears possible in the short 
term, particularly following the president's January 26 
re-election and in advance of the April parliamentary 
elections.  In the longer term, Pinto-Jayawardena's plan for 
judicial reform and strengthening the independence and 
professionalism of the judiciary offers hope for ending the 
cycle of crimes and impunity. 
BUTENIS