Sri Lanka must ensure nearly 300,000 people who fled their homes in the final throes of its civil war receive the aid they need, the United States and other governments said today.
At a special session of the 47-member UN Human Rights Council, dozens of countries also called for Colombo to give its minority Tamils and Muslims a political voice to ensure lasting peace in a country where Sinhalese are an ethnic majority.
Sri Lanka's minister of disaster management and rights, Mahinda Samarasinghe, told the Geneva forum his government recognised the need to help those displaced in its drive to crush Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists.
"It is our duty to give them not only minimal standards but decent standards," he said, thanking Sri Lanka's allies China and India for their donations of tents and other supplies.
He dismissed concerns raised by the Red Cross and other aid groups who have been kept out of camps like Manik Farm, which holds about 210,000 people uprooted by the war.
"Access of course we will provide. And we have been doing so. And we intend to continue with it," the minister said.
Sri Lanka has balked at the Human Rights Council's decision to turn a spotlight on its conflict which ended last week when Colombo declared it had killed the LTTE's leaders.
On Tuesday, Mr Samarasinghe had said his government was sick and tired of foreign pressure.
Sri Lanka presented a resolution along with Russia, Iran, Pakistan, Venezuela, Myanmar and other developing countries stressing its right to act without outside interference and also appealing for financial support for post-war reconstruction.
But Switzerland and Western states supported another text which called for "full, safe and unhindered access of humanitarian assistance to all persons in need throughout the country" and compelled Sri Lanka to investigate all allegations of abuses in the conflict and to bring perpetrators to justice.
The United Nations has estimated Sri Lanka's civil war killed between 80,000 and 100,000 people since it erupted in 1983. Sri Lanka has said it lost 6,200 troops and killed 22,000 Tigers in the nearly three years of the war's final phase.
Reuters