Govt gets off high horse with EU’s GSP+ at stake
In the face of the European Union threat to withdraw the GSP concession to local exporters if Lanka doesn’t clean up its human rights record, it is welcome to note that the Government has decided to end the stand-off by getting off its high horse and agreeing to brush up its tainted human rights act.
On June 10, the European Parliament had adopted a resolution which called for the withdrawal of the GSP concession to Lanka in the absence of Government efforts to strengthen the fundamental rights of its citizens, a mandatory condition of EU’s GSP largesse. The main focal point of the EU Resolution was the controversial Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).
As the SUNDAY PUNCH commented last week on the GSP crisis, the resolution urged the Sri Lankan authorities to immediately take measures to ensure internationally recognised guarantees to the PTA detainees, and to be promptly brought before a fair trial on recognisable charges; and called on the Government to withdraw the counterterrorism regulations that permit arbitrary detention for long periods without trial; it also called for the repeal of the PTA and replace it with anti-terror regulations in line with the country’s international obligations and commitments.
In answer to this demand, on Thursday it was announced by the Foreign Office that the Government has informed the EU of action underway to revisit provisions of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, with the study of existing legislation, past practice, and international best practices.
According to the Foreign Office statement, the EU was informed of the decision made by the Cabinet of Ministers on June 21 to appoint a Cabinet Sub- committee and an Officials Committee to assist the Cabinet Sub- Committee to review the PTA and submit a report to the Cabinet within three months. Toward this end, the Officials Committee was appointed on June 24, with senior representation from the Ministries of Justice, Defence, Foreign Affairs, Public Security; and the Attorney General’s Department, the Legal Draftsman’s
Department, the Sri Lanka Police, and the Office of Chief of National Intelligence.
The resolution had also stressed the disproportionate use of the PTA -- often targeting ethnic and religious minorities -- resulting in arbitrarily detaining suspects for months and often years without charge or trial. It made specific reference to the use of the PTA pointing to the arrest of lawyer Hejaaz Hizbullah and poet Ahnaf Jazeem, among others, who have been in ‘arbitrary’ detention for over a year.
In response to this, the Foreign Office stated that the EU was further informed of the President’s Poson Poya pardon granted ‘to 16 former LTTE cadres convicted and serving sentence under the PTA’. The EU had also been apprised of the process that has been set in motion to release detainees who have been in judicial custody for a prolonged period, under the PTA.
All this portend benefits, economic as well as citizens’ rights. The GSP scheme is limited by its declared singular object: to provide duty concessions on exports to approved applicants as an incentive to protect and enhance the human rights of the applicant nation’s citizens.
The EU itself has no power to stray beyond this limited ambit.
If a low middle class country with a low per capita income of less than US$ 4035 does not wish to avail itself of this human rights oriented facility, it need not apply. It cannot creep in, clad in sheep clothing, and obtain benefits under this scheme and then cry foul when its wolfish nature is discovered.
It has taken the treasury to be beggared to its last dollar, and the prospect of losing over 500 million dollars in revenue should the GSP status be lost, for the Government to relent from its previous rigid stance on human rights; and come down a peg or two to discuss with EU officials how best to reform the PTA according to international ‘best practises’.
Government officials should realise that any attempts to delay the time line, and puerile attempts through the appointment of committees and clusters of subcommittee will be spotted and condemned as shabby attempts to pull the wool over EU eyes; and leave the Lankan Government branded with the pariah status as ‘cannot be trusted.
It should be borne in mind that it is not the sovereign rights of Governments that are enshrined in the Constitution but the sovereign rights of the people.