[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 926 Introduced in House (IH)]
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118th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 926
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives in support of the
peaceful, democratic, and economic aspirations of the people of Sri
Lanka.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
December 12, 2023
Mr. Krishnamoorthi (for himself and Mr. Johnson of Ohio) submitted the
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign
Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives in support of the
peaceful, democratic, and economic aspirations of the people of Sri
Lanka.
Whereas in recent years, Sri Lanka has undergone a political, economic, and
humanitarian crisis causing millions of Sri Lankans to live in dire
conditions, with the World Food Program estimating that 17 percent of
the population is experiencing food insecurity and severe shortages of
medicine and fuel;
Whereas the crisis in Sri Lanka stems from factors such as corruption, financial
mismanagement, and failures in the rule of law, further exacerbated by
the Government of Sri Lanka entering into expensive projects involving
predatory lending by entities associated with the People's Republic of
China;
Whereas, beginning in March 2022, tens of thousands of Sri Lankans participated
in largely peaceful protests lasting more than 100 days, leading to the
resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and the appointment of Ranil
Wickremesinghe as the new President of Sri Lanka;
Whereas the Wickremesinghe government, citing economic constraints, indefinitely
postponed local elections scheduled for March 9, 2023, in violation of
the Constitution of Sri Lanka;
Whereas, on February 20, 2023, thousands of largely peaceful protestors
demonstrated against the decision to postpone local elections, to which
the Sri Lankan police responded by firing tear gas and water cannons;
Whereas the Government of Sri Lanka continues to repress dissent and protest,
conduct surveillance and harass members of civil society, and use the
Prevention of Terrorism Act to target political opposition members of
ethnic and religious minority groups, activists, and journalists;
Whereas the Government of Sri Lanka continues to participate in and facilitate
the illegal appropriation of land in the North and East, areas of
historical habitation of Tamil speaking peoples and various ethnic and
religious groups;
Whereas the Government of Sri Lanka refuses to conduct transparent and
independent investigations into credible allegations of corruption,
historic atrocities, and other gross violations of human rights against
Sinhalese, Tamil, and Muslim communities, and the United Nations and
others have recognized that longstanding impunity for corruption and
other human rights violations and abuses is a root cause of the current
crisis and that many actors responsible for the current crisis have been
implicated in abuses dating back to the civil war and the JVP
insurrection;
Whereas for more than 30 years, Sri Lanka was enveloped in a civil war in which,
according to United Nations reports, tens of thousands of Sri Lankans
died and thousands more were raped, tortured, forcibly disappeared, or
went missing;
Whereas United Nations reports maintain that members of the Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and members of the Government and security services
of Sri Lanka were implicated in horrific atrocities and human rights
violations and abuses against Sri Lankan civilians during the civil war;
Whereas on multiple occasions, the Government of Sri Lanka has publicly
committed to pursuing meaningful justice and accountability for
conflict-related crimes and grievances, including in President Mahinda
Rajapaksa's May 2009 joint statement with United Nations Secretary-
General Ban Ki-Moon and in the government of then-Prime Minister Ranil
Wickremesinghe's cosponsoring of United Nations Human Rights Council
resolution 30/1, committing to a holistic transitional justice strategy,
including a commission for truth, justice, reconciliation, and non-
recurrence and a judicial mechanism to prosecute violations and abuses
of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law;
Whereas in January 2016, under then-Prime Minister Wickremesinghe, the
Government of Sri Lanka established a Consultation Task Force on
Reconciliation Mechanisms led by respected members of Sri Lankan civil
society, which spoke to more than 7,000 Sri Lankans and issued a 700-
page report with findings and recommendations about what the Sri Lankan
people wanted from the Sri Lankan government in relation to justice and
reconciliation, including recommendations supporting international
involvement in certain transitional justice mechanisms;
Whereas successive Sri Lankan governments have failed to live up to those
commitments and address the desire of Sri Lankan victims and survivors
for meaningful justice and accountability for the atrocities, and in
March 2020, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's administration withdrew the
Government of Sri Lanka's commitment to implement Human Rights Council
resolution 30/1;
Whereas the majority of the LTTE leadership were killed or disappeared during
the civil war and therefore cannot stand trial for their crimes, and
despite evidence implicating Sri Lankan government officials and
security forces in atrocity crimes committed against Sri Lankan
civilians during the war, no such officials or forces have faced justice
for their crimes;
Whereas in 2020, 2021, and 2022, the Department of State imposed visa
restrictions against Sri Lankan officials for their involvement in gross
violations of human rights, including torture and inhumane punishment
during the civil war, but successive Sri Lankan governments have
promoted and empowered those same individuals;
Whereas in 2021 and 2022, the United States cosponsored United Nations Human
Rights Council resolutions 46/1 and 51/1, mandating that the United
Nations collect, analyze, and preserve information and evidence of gross
violations of human rights and serious violations of international
humanitarian law in Sri Lanka for future accountability processes; and
Whereas in September 2023, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights, Volker Turk, issued a report that noted, ``The 2022 economic
crisis is a demonstration of the indivisibility of human rights and how
impunity, corruption and the weakening of democratic and rule of law
institutions ultimately impacted the economic situation. In order to
achieve a path to recovery and sustainable development Sri Lanka will
need to address the longer-term serious governance and accountability
deficits, as well as the continuing legacy of the armed conflict.'':
Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) supports the peaceful, democratic, and economic
aspirations of the people of Sri Lanka;
(2) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to hold free and fair
local and provincial elections without further delay;
(3) urges the Government and security forces of Sri Lanka
to respect the rights of all Sri Lankans, including the right
to protest peacefully, associate freely, and commemorate their
dead;
(4) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to institute
meaningful security sector reform, including by reducing the
deployment of security forces across the North and East to
appropriate peacetime levels, and ensure those credibly
implicated in human rights abuses are removed from positions of
authority;
(5) calls on the Government of Sri Lanka to promote an
inclusive, pluralistic Sri Lanka through structural reforms and
confidence-building measures to address corruption, nepotism,
outsized expenditures on the military, minority
disenfranchisement, impunity, and other issues that hamper the
long-term potential growth of Sri Lanka;
(6) welcomes Sri Lanka's newly passed anticorruption
legislation and calls on the Government of Sri Lanka to ensure
that investigations and prosecutions of corrupt officials can
move forward independently and impartially;
(7) calls on the Government of Sri Lanka to strengthen the
rule of law, including by respecting and reinforcing the
independence of the judiciary and independent institutions;
(8) welcomes the October 2022 passage of the 21st Amendment
package by the Parliament of Sri Lanka as an initial step
toward reducing centralized power and encourages further
measures to alleviate a lack of meaningful checks and balances;
(9) welcomes the initial agreement by the International
Monetary Fund to loan Sri Lanka $3,000,000,000 to help address
the ongoing economic crisis and urges the Government of Sri
Lanka to address the recommendations of the International
Monetary Fund's September 30, 2023, staff report, which notes
that the ``absence of visible progress on addressing corruption
and holding officials to account for past behaviour raises
popular concerns that officials will continue to enjoy impunity
for their misconduct'';
(10) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to immediately
repeal or amend the Prevention of Terrorism Act and ensure that
the Act or any counterterrorism laws passed to replace it are
aligned with international norms and reflect inclusive
consultation with Sri Lankan civil society;
(11) calls for an immediate moratorium on the appropriation
of land facilitated by the Government of Sri Lanka in the North
and East and restitution of appropriated lands in a way that
guarantees effective access and productive use;
(12) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to fully implement
the Constitution of Sri Lanka, including the 13th Amendment's
commitments to devolve specified powers over land, the police,
education, health, agriculture, housing, and finances to the
provinces;
(13) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to reach a consensus
with opposition parties on behalf of all Sri Lankans, including
Tamils, Indian-origin Tamils, Muslims, and members of other
religious and ethnic minority groups, to address longstanding
issues, including those relating to human rights violations and
abuses, disenfranchisement, justice, and accountability, and
work toward a sustainable political solution that promotes
reconciliation;
(14) calls on the Government of Sri Lanka to accept and use
Sri Lanka's own Consultation Task Force report as the basis for
taking action in support of justice, accountability, and
reconciliation, and further calls on the government to design
and implement all justice measures, including a potential truth
commission, with input from, the participation of, and support
from victims and survivors; and
(15) urges the Government of Sri Lanka to engage positively
and cooperatively with the United Nations' Human Rights
Council, agencies, and special procedure mandate holders and
facilitate the implementation of their recommendations on good
governance, rule of law, corruption, justice, accountability,
and human rights.
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