US backs Ban Ki-moon
July 7, 2010 07:14 am
The
State Department spokesman Mark Toner said that the
“To that end, we welcome UN Secretary (General) Ban’s announcement of a panel of experts to provide advice on relevant best practices for investigations into alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law,” Toner said.
Protesters, who included Housing Minister Wimal Weerawansa,
shouted anti-UN slogans outside the UN office in
Ban last month named a UN panel, headed by Marzuki Darusman, a former Indonesian attorney general, to advise on “accountability issues” during the war between government forces and the Tamil Tiger separatists.
The Sri Lankan government has refused to cooperate with the
panel, which some see as a precursor to a full-blown war crimes investigation.
The Tiger guerrillas were defeated after decades of conflict in May 2009, and the UN has said that at least 7,000 ethnic Tamil civilians were killed in the first four months of last year.
The
AFP