Sri Lanka has announced that all state owned land in the North-East, part of the former war zone, will now be up for grabs, as the government looks to sell them commercially.

Four international human rights groups, working against the use of torture, submitted a joint report to the UN Committee Against Torture (CAT) to rival the committee's customary third periodic report of Sri Lanka, due to be discussed next month.

The 22 page report was compiled by Asian Legal Resource Centre (ALRC) based in Hong Kong, REDRESS Trust in London, Rehabilitation and Research Centre for Torture Victims (RCT) in Denmark and Action des chrétiens pour l'abolition de la torture (ACAT France) in France.

The report condemns the widespread torture practised in Sri Lanka, the government's failure to adequately investigate such allegations and the "inadequate legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures taken to prevent acts of torture in territory under Sri Lanka’s jurisdiction".

The groups urged the UN to act, in order to ensure accounability and justice, given Sri Lanka's ongoing failure to make any meaningful progress on the issue.

"Should Sri Lanka continue to fail to take the requisite measures despite the availability of credible evidence of torture and ill-treatment, it is the responsibility of the United Nations and its organs, as well as the treaty bodies, to do their utmost to ensure accountability and justice for the victims of these violations."

"It is now the next logical step to call for a full implementation of the Panel’s recommendations.

"This could build on previous precedents where UN bodies have urged the Secretary-General to call for the establishment of an international accountability mechanism, namely the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

"Conversely, a failure to take action would compound the climate of impunity in Sri Lanka and would constitute a betrayal of the Convention against Torture, which was adopted ‘to make more effective the struggle against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment throughout the world’."

The Sri Lanka President younger brother, Basil Rajapaksa, has been appointed electoral organiser of Kolonnawa on Tuesday. Basil Rajapaksa also a senior adviser of the President and Minister of Economic Development.
 
The role will involve being responsible for all political and development activities of the Kolonnawa elections.

A trust set up by Liam Fox supposedly to help Sri Lanka’s development appears to have achieved nothing other than to pay for his trips to the country, one of his allies has told the Financial Times.

See the report here.

Award-winning journalist Allison Pearson writes in her column for The Daily Telegraph on the Fox-Werritty saga:

These are extracts of The Times’ editorial on Wednesday Oct 12:

The Times newspaper reports Wednesday that Liam Fox is to face new questions over his links to Sri Lanka after it emerged that three of his trips there were funded by a mysterious trust that is not registered as a charity or a company.

Sri Lanka's ambassador to Belgium, Luxemburg and the EU, Ravinatha Aryasinha, called the screening of 'Sri Lanka's Killing Fields' today an "indecent hurry" that is part of a wider "obsessive attack".

Amnesty Secretary-General Salil Shetty met with Kevin Rudd and pressed him to back calls for an independent international investigation into war crimes.

Defence Secretary Liam Fox’s friend Adam Werrity has been accused of discussing arms deals with the Sri Lankan Government, Channel 4 reported tonight.

Three ‘highly placed sources’ in Sri Lanka have independently told Channel 4 news team that Mr Werrity discussed ‘arms deals’ with a senior figure in Mahinda Rajapakse’s regime.

Speaking to the Indian foreign secretary, Ranjan Mathai, during his 3 day visit of Sri Lanka and the North-East, Anandasangaree of the TULF, Sitharthan of the PLOTE and Sritharan of the EPRLF, condemned the Sri Lankan government's attempt to "change the demographic pattern of the North-East".

Mr. Adam Werritty, the close friend of British Defence Secretary Liam Fox whose working relationship with the minister is under investigation by the Ministry of Defence and at the centre of a media storm, was a frontman for Dr.

A senior source at the British Foreign Office told The Times Sunday night that there had been disquiet at Defence Secretary Liam Fox’s links to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa since late last year.