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Sri Lankan sex ring in Haiti reveals cracks in UN system
Source: Associated Press
Sri Lankan sex ring in Haiti reveals cracks in UN system
By KATY DAIGLE and PAISLEY DODDS
49 minutes ago
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — The general sat on a plastic lawn chair in the garden of his mother’s home, the scent of tropical blooms filling the air as he talked about the alleged rape and sodomy of a Haitian teenager by a Sri Lankan peacekeeper.
There was no rape, insisted Maj. Gen. Jagath Dias, who was dispatched to Haiti to investigate the 2013 case. He may not have been the best choice for that job — Dias had been accused of atrocities in his own country’s vicious civil war.
Dias didn’t talk to the accuser, he told The Associated Press, nor did he interview medical staff who examined her. But he did clear his soldier, who remained in the Sri Lankan military.
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The alleged abuses committed by its troops abroad stem from a culture of impunity that arose during Sri Lanka’s civil war and has seeped into its peacekeeping missions. The government has consistently refused calls for independent investigations into its generation-long civil war, marked by widespread reports of rape camps, torture, mass killings and other alleged war crimes by its troops.
The U.N. has deployed thousands of peacekeepers from Sri Lanka despite these unresolved allegations of war crimes at home. This is a pattern repeated around the world: Strapped for troops, the U.N. draws recruits from many countries with poor human rights records for its peacekeeping program, budgeted at nearly $8 billion this year.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
By KATY DAIGLE and PAISLEY DODDS
49 minutes ago
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — The general sat on a plastic lawn chair in the garden of his mother’s home, the scent of tropical blooms filling the air as he talked about the alleged rape and sodomy of a Haitian teenager by a Sri Lankan peacekeeper.
There was no rape, insisted Maj. Gen. Jagath Dias, who was dispatched to Haiti to investigate the 2013 case. He may not have been the best choice for that job — Dias had been accused of atrocities in his own country’s vicious civil war.
Dias didn’t talk to the accuser, he told The Associated Press, nor did he interview medical staff who examined her. But he did clear his soldier, who remained in the Sri Lankan military.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
The alleged abuses committed by its troops abroad stem from a culture of impunity that arose during Sri Lanka’s civil war and has seeped into its peacekeeping missions. The government has consistently refused calls for independent investigations into its generation-long civil war, marked by widespread reports of rape camps, torture, mass killings and other alleged war crimes by its troops.
The U.N. has deployed thousands of peacekeepers from Sri Lanka despite these unresolved allegations of war crimes at home. This is a pattern repeated around the world: Strapped for troops, the U.N. draws recruits from many countries with poor human rights records for its peacekeeping program, budgeted at nearly $8 billion this year.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Read more: https://apnews.com/96f9ff66b7b34d9f971edf0e92e2082c/Sri-Lankan-sex-ring-in-Haiti-reveals-cracks-in-UN-system
