COLOMBO: A UN official has suggested that in addition to Tamil victims in Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict, a list of all victims still awaiting justice should be drawn up.

“Transitional justice is meant for all victims of war irrespective of ethnicity, and not just the minority Tamils as is popularly felt by a cross-section of Sri Lankans,” UN special rapporteur Pablo de Greiff said on Monday at the end of his 14-day visit to Sri Lanka.

Those other victims include Marxist rebels, victims of LTTE terrorist attacks, the family members of over 600 policemen gruesomely murdered in 1990 by LTTE and Mus-lims forced out of Jaffna in 1990.

“The majority Sinhalese community, which opposes questions of truth, justice, reparations, and guarantees of non-recurrence, does a great disservice to the country,” de Greiff said, adding that these issues were not a matter of interest to “just one community alone”.

Published in Dawn, October 24th, 2017