UN not sure whether Expert Panel will interview Shavendra Silva

After New York Times published an article critical of the Sri Lankan Government’s appointment of Major General Shavendra Silva as the Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN a journalist yesterday queried the Acting Dpt. Spokesman of UN Chief Ban Ki-Moon whether Silva will be interviewed by the expert panel.

The United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed a panel of experts to advise him on Sri Lanka’s alleged violations of human rights and humanitarian law during the last stages of the war against LTTE.

To which the spokesman said, “The Deputy Permanent Representative to the Mission is an employee of the Government of Sri Lanka, so I would refer those questions to the Government of Sri Lanka. As you are well aware, we haven’t been putting out a day-by-day summary of the people from whom the Panel gets information.  They will report to the Secretary-General once they have their advisory report ready.  And at that point we’ll have some information on that.”

Also questioned on whether the final report of the findings of the Expert Panel will be made public, the Farhan Haq, Acting Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General said that, “We’ll have to see.  As you know, it is an internal body, but it will be up to the Secretary-General to determine what he makes public once he received that information.”