The Governing Council of the Inter-Parliamentary Union,

Referring to the case of Mr. Thiyagarajah Maheswaran, a member of the Parliament of Sri Lanka who was assassinated on 1 January 2008, as outlined in the report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians (CL/189/11(b)-R.1), and to the resolution adopted at its 188th session (April 2011), referring also to the report of the on-site mission to Sri Lanka carried out by the Committee in February 2008 (CL/183/12(b)-R.2),

Taking into account the information with which Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, Special Envoy of the President of Sri Lanka for Human Rights, provided the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians at the hearing held during the 125th IPU Assembly; also taking into account the information which the source provided on 16 October 2011,

Recalling the following information on file:

• The source has from the outset emphasized that Mr. Maheswaran voted against the budget on 14 December 2007 and that, soon after the vote, the number of security guards assigned to him was cut from 18 to two; he openly made several statements to the effect that the reduction of his security detail put his life seriously at risk and made repeated requests to the Government to enhance his security, but to no avail; on 1 January 2008, while attending a religious ceremony in a Hindu temple in Colombo, he was shot and later died in a Colombo hospital; the source has stated that the attack came after he had said in a television interview that, upon the resumption of parliamentary sittings on 8 January 2008, he would describe in detail the terror campaign that the Government was pursuing in Jaffna, particularly how abductions and killings were managed;

• The authorities arrested Johnson Collin Valentino alias "Wasantha" from Jaffna, who had been identified as the gunman on the basis of a DNA analysis; the investigators concluded that the assailant was a Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) activist who had been trained and sent to Colombo to kill Mr. Maheswaran; he confessed to the crime and his parents too confirmed that he was an LTTE member; according to the police progress report forwarded in August 2008, the Attorney General filed an indictment and the case was to be called on 19 August 2008; according to the police report of October 2009, the case was to be called on 16 October 2009 for the purpose of serving the indictment on Johnson Collin Valentino for murder and listing the case for hearing;

• According to the information provided by Minister Samarasinghe in April 2011, the Attorney General had served the indictment and the case was proceeding before the High Court of Colombo, Court No. 02; further evidence of witnesses and forensic evidence confirmed the complicity of the assassin,

1. Thanks Minister Samarasinghe for his cooperation;

2. Is concerned that, close on four years after the alleged assassin was arrested and confessed to the crime, there still seems to be no progress made to identify the instigators and motives behind this crime;

3. Trusts that the authorities are doing everything they can fully to elucidate and establish accountability for the murder, and notes that earlier concerns that the crime may be related to Mr. Maheswaran’s criticism of the Government can only be dispelled once full light has been shed on the murder;

4. Wishes to ascertain whether Parliament has taken any action following the concerns raised by Mrs. Vijayakala Maheswaran regarding the investigation into her husband’s murder;

5. Recalls in this regard that Parliament, in the exercise of its oversight function, is entitled to follow an investigation, especially when it concerns one of its members; wishes therefore to ascertain the views of Parliament on taking such an initiative;

6. Requests the Secretary General to convey this resolution to the Speaker of Parliament and to Minister Samarasinghe, inviting them to provide the requested information and to keep the Committee informed of the proceedings;

7. Requests the Committee to continue examining this case and report to it at its next session, to be held during the 126th IPU Assembly (March/April 2012).

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