Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Question 11: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will indicate the response he proposes to make to the Report of the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal on Sri Lanka. [20929/10]

Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Question 21: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the position regarding the situation in Sri Lanka; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20868/10]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 11 and 21 together.

The first Parliamentary elections in Sri Lanka since the end of the civil war were held on 8 April. The campaign was quite peaceful by local standards although there were serious irregularities in two constituencies which necessitated new elections on 20 April. The United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA), the party of President Rajapaksa, secured a landslide victory, though it did not secure the two-thirds majority it had sought. Nevertheless, following his own re-election as President on 26 January, President Rajapaksa now has the parliamentary backing to undertake a major initiative on national reconciliation. I hope he will take this opportunity so that real change can be secured for the Tamil minority and for all the people of Sri Lanka.

In the first instance, the humanitarian situation must be addressed. While conditions have considerably improved in the camps in the year since the end of the war, with approximately 93,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) remaining in Vavuniya, the conditions facing those who have returned home (some 100,000 former IDPs) remain a cause for real concern. In addition, a remaining legacy of the conflict is the approximately 10,500 former Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fighters who continue to be held in closed camps.

In parallel with humanitarian measures, a genuine process of dialogue and reconciliation must be initiated in Sri Lanka with a view to securing sustainable peace for all the people of the island. Without reconciliation there can be no return to long-term security or prosperity for Sri Lanka. Such a process should involve the UN and others in the international community. In this context, I hope that the Sri Lankan Government will facilitate the long-awaited visit of Lynn Pascoe, the UN Under Secretary-General for Political Affairs, to the country as soon as possible.

The Permanent People's Tribunal on Sri Lanka was held in Dublin in January 2010. It was an NGO-led exercise which concluded that the Government and military of Sri Lanka were guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the civil war. The conclusions support the widely held view that serious breaches of international humanitarian law occurred during and after the final stages of the civil war.

While Ireland welcomes the recommendations made by the Tribunal, it is disappointing that the Tribunal considered only the actions of the Government and military of Sri Lanka and did not examine the actions of LTTE forces, thereby leaving its work open to criticism by the Government of Sri Lanka and others.

As reported to Deputies on 16 February, the recommendations made by the Tribunal are supported by the Government. One of these is for a UN-led inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated during the war between the Sri Lankan armed forces and the LTTE. Others include the need for IDPs and detainees to be allowed to return to their homes without delay and the need to continue working on a sustainable peace process addressing all issues of concern, with an international role in monitoring and supporting the process.

Ireland will continue with its efforts, both bilaterally and with our partners in the EU, to support the peace process in Sri Lanka and to work towards remedying the plight of the IDPs and other detainees still in the camps. During 2009 and 2010, Irish Aid has allocated a total of €478,000 in humanitarian funding to Sri Lanka. Our allocation in 2010 includes support for the post-operative rehabilitation of people severely injured in the conflict. A member of Ireland's Rapid Response Corps has recently returned from his second deployment to Sri Lanka, where he was working as a field officer with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).