Renowned US war crimes lawyer joins Tamil peoples' council team

Prof. Francis Anthony Boyle | P.K.Balachandran- 06th June 2016

COLOMBO:   Francis A Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois and a renowned expert on human rights, war crimes, genocide, and the Right to Self-Determination, has joined the Tamil Peoples’ Council’s team to fight for an international Judicial Mechanism to investigate and try war crimes cases in Sri Lanka.

The TPC was set up with the blessings of C.V.Wigneswaran, Chief Minister of Sri Lanka’s Tamil-majority Northern Province, to highlight and fight for issues allegedly sidestepped by the Tamil National Alliance (TNA). The TNA  believes in cooperating with the Maithripala Sirisena government’s bid to address the Tamils’ grievances and meet their aspirations as expressed in the elections of January and July 2015. But the TPC feels that the TNA is party to the government’s prevarication on these issues.  

  

In a statement announcing the induction of Prof.Boyle on Sunday, the TPC said that in a situation in which the Lankan government has ruled out foreign judges in the proposed Judicial Mechanism, and the international community and the  “Tamil leadership” are part of a plot to ensure that investigations into the “genocide” of Tamils do not take place, Boyle’s entry will come as some relief to the Tamils and pose a major challenge to those conspiring to deny justice to them.

Boyle Sought Independence For Hawaii

Boyle is a doughty fighter for the cause of oppressed peoples across the world from Bosnia and Herzegovina, to Palestine and Hawaii. He served on the Board of Directors of Amnesty International between 1988 and 1992, and represented Bosnia - Herzegovina at the World Court. In the early 1990s, he represented Libyan leader Col.Gaddafi in the World Court in a case which restrained the US and UK from taking military action against Libya over the spurious allegation that  Gaddafi was responsible for the Lockerbie bombing.

In 2006, Boyle asked Iran to sue the US, UK, France, Germany, Israel and several other European countries at the International Court of Justice to stop any further sanctions on Iran. In 1993, Boyle urged native Hawaiians to declare full independence and regain their sovereignty which they lost 1893 to the US.  Against all laws, including the US constitution, the US had grabbed Hawaii from native Hawaiians, Boyle said.

Author of "Bio-warfare and Terrorism”, in 2014 Boyle alleged that the Ebola outbreak in West Africa originated in US bio-warfare laboratories located there. He asserted that the Ebola virus has been turned into a biological weapon. In February 2016, he said that the Zika virus had been upgraded to be a bio-weapon.

Tardy Progress

Tamil radicals like the TPC are getting impatient over the slow implementation of the promises made by the Lankan government to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in September 2015, especially the pledge to set up a Judicial Mechanism to investigate and try alleged war crimes cases.

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is to give the UNHRC an “oral update” in June. But as of now, all that the OHCHR can say is that Colombo is holding consultations on the Judicial Mechanism.