Welcoming the UN resolution passed at the 19th session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Thursday, the US Secretary of State, Hiliary Clinton said,

"The United States, together with the international community, sent a strong signal that Sri Lanka will only achieve lasting peace through real reconciliation and accountability,"

"And the international community stands ready to help,"

Extracts from the editorial Friday of The Hindu, which has hisotircally been a vocal supporter of President Rajapaksa’s regime and its predecessors:

“The wording of the resolution was tweaked by India to say the implementation assistance the United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights will provide must be with Sri Lanka's 'concurrence'.

“Yet, Colombo must not misread this concession.

Comments by Juliette De Rivero, advocacy director at Human Rights Watch, on the UN Human Rights Council’s resolution on Sri Lanka on Thursday:

“The Human Rights Council's vote demonstrates broad international dissatisfaction with Sri Lanka's accountability efforts in the three years since the end of the war.

Sri Lankan Minister Mervyn Silva has threatened human rights activists who attended the 19th UN Human Rights Council Session in Geneva, where a resolution about Sri Lanka was adopted yesterday.

Speaking at a protest against the resolution on Friday, Silva singled out activists Sunila Abeysekara, Nimalka Fernando and Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu and journalists Sunanda Deshapriya and Poddala Jayantha for betraying Sri Lanka and threatened them with violence.

The US state department has eased restrictions on defence exports to Sri Lanka on Thursday, the same day as the passing of a resolution on Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council, AP reports.

Tensions between the countries are high, as Sri Lanka rejected the US-sponsored resolution and condemned the interference into what it says are internal matters.

The state department said that the move to lift some restrictions, namely the exports of equipment for aerial and maritime equipment, is unrelated to the resolution.

Dayashri Jayasekara, an MP with Sri Lanka’s main opposition United National Party (UNP), told parliament that Rs. 6.35 million sent as aid to areas highly affected by floods in the East of Sri Lanka in 2011 had been misappropriated.

Jayasekara stated during a debate that several officials involved with the bank had been involved with embezzlement.

Writing in The Guardian on Tuesday, UK MPs, including former UK foreign secretaries, Douglas Alexander MP, David Miliband MP, Jack Straw MP and Margaret Beckett MP, urged member states to back a resolution tabled at the UNHRC.

Extracts reproduced below:

New evidence has emerged detailing the sequence of events that led to the killing of the senior LTTE commander, Colonel Ramesh, after in the custody of the Sri Lankan army, The Global Mail reports.

"Of the mass of available evidence, the most compelling trail is that of Colonel Ramesh. His death provides a crack of light that illuminates the deaths of thousands of others, and the motives of the probable perpetrators."

In an interview to the Debrief news channel, Robert O'Blake, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Central and South Asia, warned of renewed violence in Sri Lanka if the government failed to take "real concrete action".

Asked by the presenter why the US was tabling a resolution at the UN Human Rights Council, despite Sri Lanka giving assurances, as a sovereign country, that it will act towards reconciliation, Blake said,