Recently, Malaysians displayed their utter anger, disgust and disapproval at the ICAPP for inviting undisputed war criminal, former Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse and against the government, particularly Dato Seri Najib Razak, to have welcomed Rajapakse with open arms in spite of the mass massacres and blatant disregard for human rights of the people of Sri Lanka in the bloody 30 year civil war, orchestrated in the later stages by Rajapakse’s regime. His hands are still fresh with the blood of innocent murdered Sri Lankans and yet he is still walking free amongst the international community without a thread of conscience or guilt. As both Malaysia and Sri Lanka have not signed and ratified the Rome Statute to bring any country to the International Criminal Court how else can Sri Lanka be made accountable for its numerous war crimes?
How can Malaysia as a nation, as a people and as a government hold a nation or a government accountable on war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing?
After a 15 year absence, Malaysia has returned to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), as a non-permanent member, representing the Asia Pacific region from 2014 to 2016. Malaysia’s priorities include strengthening UN’s peacekeeping operations, peace building, mediation, promoting the Global Movement of Moderates (GMM) and reforming the UNSC.
However, Malaysia’s membership in the United Nations Security Council is coming to an end in less than 4 months and this is a golden opportunity for Najib’s administration to redeem itself after being grossly insensitive to welcome a Sri Lankan war criminal in Malaysia.
Currently China, France, the Russian Federation, the UK and the US are permanent members of the UN Security Council whereas Malaysia is amongst the 10 non-permanent member nations, together with Angola, Egypt, Japan, New Zealand, Senegal, Spain, Ukraine, Uruguay and Venezuela. As such, Malaysia as a non-permanent member, must effectively use this platform to lobby to refer the Sri Lanka regime to the International Criminal Court to be investigated for atrocities during the civil war. The four international crimes consist of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression under the Rome Statute, all of which have been executed successfully by Mahinda Rajapakse when he was President of Sri Lanka and by the former Presidents as well. The Security Council’s powers under the UN Charter are the legal basis upon which the International Criminal Court can investigate such crimes without any consent requirement by the states involved.
As a responsible member of the international community, the only way for Malaysia to fix past mistakes and to regain respect and to restore confidence in the eyes of the global community after constantly being humiliated and ridiculed after the mammoth 1MDB scandal, is to stand firm against any form of extremism and genocide by war criminals, starting with Mahinda Rajapakse, putting aside any monetary gains from bilateral ties between the two countries.
Najib as the Prime Minister must uphold his word, and not lose his moral compass on being a champion of moderation and rejecting all forms of extremism by using Malaysia’s position as a non-permanent member in the United Nations Security Council to lobby for Sri Lanka to be referred to the International Criminal Court to be investigated for war crimes.
Malaysia must make its membership in the UN Security Council worthwhile by lobbying to pass a resolution to refer Sri Lanka to the International Criminal Court for war crimes, crimes of aggression, genocide and crimes against humanity on the bloody massacre of over 200,000 Tamil Hindus, Christians and Muslim Sri Lankans by the Rajapakse regime.