On
Banning of
Film on Sri
Lanka, Ban
Says Its Up to
States, As
Silva
Lectures?
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
February 25 –
Ban Ki-moon's
UN's
ambivilent
approach to
war crimes in
Sri Lanka
continues.
Last week,
Ban's
spokesman told
Inner City
Press Ban
is aware of
the
photographs
showing the
Army's
execution of a
12 year old
boy in 2009.
The photos are
in the new
Channel 4
film, “No Fire
Zone: Killing
Fields of Sri
Lanka.”
Now
the government
is trying to
ban the film
from the
session of the
UN
Human Rights
Council that
opened today.
Inner City
Press asked
Ban's
deputy
spokesman
Eduardo Del
Buey if Ban
thinks the
film should be
blocked from
screening in
UN premises.
Del
Buey had a
prepared
statement,
which used the
word
“accountability”
but again
referred to a
"national
process" and
said it is up
to member
states. Video
here, from
Minute 21:40.
This is what
Ban told Inner
City
Press when asked why he
accepted Sri
Lankan general
Shavendra
Silva
as Senior
Adviser on
Peacekeeping
Operations:
"it was the
member states
that decided,"
he told Inner
City Press: in
that case, the
Asia Group of
states.
(Now
when the Asia
Group is
Palestine as
one of its
three vice
presidents
for the
upcoming Arms
Trade Treaty,
Inner City
Press is
reliably
informed that
a
representative
of Ban's
Secretariat
opined in
closed
door informal
consultations
that Palestine
despite the
November
General
Assembly vote
that it is now
a non-member
observer STATE
should have no
more right to
participate
that last
summer, when
it
sat in the
corner. Why
isn't THIS up
to the Asia
Group and
member
states?)
Sri
Lankan sites
are abuzz and
a-Tweet
with a photograph
of Shavendra
Silva with US
military
personnel,
alternatively
called Naval
or Marines,
giving a
talk about
defeating
terrorism.
Where did it
take place?
Did the US
government
allow it?
Footnote:
The
last “Killing
Fields of Sri
Lanka” film
was not
screened
inside the UN
in New York,
though Sri
Lanka's
Mission to the
UN
including
Shavendra
Silva were
invited in to
present what
they called
their
rebuttal. Click
here for
coverage by
the Sri Lanka
Campaign.
This outrage reverberates
still.
Watch this
site.
, 
