A panel of UN experts on Tuesday handed over a report on alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka against Tamil separatists to UN leader Ban Ki-moon, his spokesman said.
But the United Nations would not say whether the panel was allowed to go to Sri Lanka, which publicly had refused to recognize the three-member panel.
"During a meeting today in New York, the secretary general received the members of the panel of experts established to advise him on accountability issues with respect to the conflict in Sri Lanka," said deputy spokesman Farhan Haq.
"He will study the report carefully and will determine his next steps in the coming days," Haq told reporters.
A copy of the report has been sent to the Sri Lankan government "as a matter of courtesy before making it public," the spokesman added.
Haq would not say whether the panel had been allowed to go to Sri Lanka, declaring only that details would be in the report when it is released.
The United States has led calls for a full investigation into the deaths of civilians in the final months of fighting between Sri Lankan troops and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Troops wiped out the rebels in May 2009, ending decades of civil war. The United Nations said at least 7,000 civilians perished in the final fighting, while international rights groups have put the toll at more than 30,000.
The United States said last week that future cooperation with Sri Lanka depended on improvements in its human rights record and an accounting of the bloodshed at the end of the war.
(AFP)
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Terrorism is a Global phenomenon and it is a network. It is camouflaged as radicals, freedom fighters, or you name it. To finance the terror, it gets one’s suffering, puts in a showcase and solicits those who sympathize its cause. It makes sure that the cash flow is there to procure illegal arms and to propagate its mask by lobbying the institutions like the UN and even the NGOs who are lighting up the fire on Fundamental Rights and Human Rights. Also, it extorts and exploits the weaken one to obtain the needed aid in forms of funds, labor, and even in forms of soul to sacrifice. It acts in a faceless manner in the places where it wants to get total control. To eradicate it, the collective effort of the whole World is badly needed as it could happen anywhere in the Globe. As I witnessed and experienced this in my homeland called Sri Lanka, the only nation courageously fought back and defeated the LTTE terror, never let the sovereignty of this island nation interfered by terror nurtured LTTE Nationalism ..
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