Sri Lanka

Anthony Mangnall Excerpts

Thursday 18th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anthony Mangnall (Totnes) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) on securing this debate and on her work in raising this matter both in this Chamber and in Westminster Hall debates. It is a pleasure to be able to take part. I also associate myself with the words of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) in relation to the Magnitsky Act and making sure that we use its full potential to ensure that we can bring to justice people who are committing human rights violations. As ever, it is a pleasure to be in the same debate as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), and I appreciate what he said.

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the preventing sexual violence in conflict initiative, I would like to address how we could use the PSVI to tackle some of the human rights violations and abuses that have been identified by so many Members. As many have said, the progress that has been made since 2009 has been incredibly limited. In fact, the Sri Lankan Government’s decision to reverse their position is of grave concern.

In recent weeks and months, we have heard the Foreign Secretary talk about the need for the UNHCR to restore its reputation to make sure that it acts on human rights violations. I would say that we, too, can do well to listen to that advice. The international community, at a point at which it is fractured and divided, could again become united and stand together in addressing the violations of human rights of countries around the world, and Sri Lanka would be a good place to start.

A recent report from the UN states that there continue to be

“credible allegations, through well-known human rights organizations, of abductions, torture and sexual violence by Sri Lankan security forces since the adoption of Human Rights Council resolution 30/1, including during the past year”.

The preventing sexual violence in conflict initiative was set up on the basis of helping those who, as its name says, have endured sexual violence in conflict and crisis zones. The UK, when it set it up in 2012 and 2014, was able to engage international co-operation to be able to ensure not only that resolutions in the UN could pass, but that documentation could be provided of crimes that are going on across the globe, that survivors could be supported, and that potential prosecutions in future years could be delivered. If the organisations that are currently set up are failing to deliver that, I suggest that we push forward to create on our own new international body that can help to document these crimes, support survivors, and lead international prosecutions. Out of every great conflict and crisis that has happened throughout mankind, great new reforming bodies have come, and this should be no exception.

I want to make two final points. First, this year there is the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwanda, and, as has always been the case, we should be able to speak truth to our friends. It would be a missed opportunity for us to not speak clearly at the CHOGM about what has happened in Rwanda to ensure that there can be co-operation in order to address the human rights violations that have happened. Secondly, we must make sure that we raise these issues at the G7 in order to provide support for those who have endured human rights violations, and to ensure that the perpetrators are brought to justice and the culture of impunity is shattered. We have an opportunity—I do not believe this to be bravado—to lead the international community to take action to help safeguard human rights and to lead by example, and I hope that we can do so.