Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

Stephen Timms Excerpts

Thursday 14th July 2022 Ministerial Corrections

The following is an extract from the urgent question on Sri Lanka on 13 July 2022.

[Sir Stephen Timms]

When David Cameron was Prime Minister, he visited Sri Lanka in 2013. After that, the UK, with Sri Lanka, jointly moved a resolution at the United Nations Human Rights Council setting out a mechanism for resolving the legacy of the issues that we have heard about. Sri Lanka has largely ignored its obligations under that resolution since then, and it has not even paid lip service to them in the past three years. Will it be a requirement of the medium-term support that will be needed for Sri Lanka that it comes back into compliance with its obligations under the decisions of the UNHRC?

[Amanda Milling]

Through our leadership in the UN Human Rights Council process, we have been encouraging Sri Lanka to respect democratic and international human rights standards as it makes its political transition. In March this year, the UK Government and our core group of partners led an ambitious new resolution on Sri Lanka at the UNHRC.

[Official Report, 13 July 2022, Vol. 718, c. 350.]

Letter of correction from the Minister for Asia and the Middle East:

An error has been identified in my response to the right hon. Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms).

The correct response should have been: