British Prime Minister David Cameron has rejected calls to boycott a Commonwealth summit in Sri Lanka next month because of concerns over the country’s human rights record, but said he would raise difficult issues at the talks.

Rights groups have urged world leaders to stay away from the meeting in Colombo to protest against what they have described as a “human rights crisis” in the former British colony, suggesting attendance could help legitimise the situation.

In particular, campaigners want the Sri Lankan government to allow an independent investigation into allegations that government forces committed war crimes towards the end of a civil war that ended in 2009 after almost three decades.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Monday he would not attend the summit, citing reports of “incarceration of political leaders and journalists, harassment of minorities, reported disappearances, and allegations of extra judicial killings”.

But Cameron told the British parliament on Wednesday he had decided to attend as he thought the best policy was engagement rather than staying away.

“It is right for the British prime minister to go to the Commonwealth conference because we are big believers in the Commonwealth,” Cameron told lawmakers, referring to the organisation whose members are mostly former British colonies.

“But I think it is right in going to the Commonwealth conference we should not hold back in being very clear about those aspects of the human rights record in Sri Lanka that we are not happy with.”

If he didn’t go, he couldn’t raise such issues in person, he said.

Chitranganee Wagiswara, Sri Lanka’s high commissioner to Canada, told Reuters that the rights situation had improved over the last four years and that Colombo did not accept Harper’s comments.

Mr Cameron has pledged to raise human rights abuses with the Sri Lankan President following the murder of a British aid worker in Tangalle.

Khurum Sheikh, a 32-year-old Red Cross workers from Rochdale, had been in Sri Lanka to rest after an assignment in Gaza, when he and his Russian girlfriend were attacked by eight men in a hotel bar. One of the men accused of the attack is a prominent figure in the Sri Lank Freedom Party.

Simon Danczuk, the Labour MP for Rochdale, had raised the case of Mr Sheikh at Prime Minister’s Questions. He said: “Justice continues to be denied and the key suspect is a close ally of the Sri Lankan President.

“Is the Prime Minister comfortable meeting this president at the Commonwealth head so of Government next month and what will he say to him?”

Mr Cameron replied: “Thank you for the question. I think it is right that for the British Prime Minister to go to the Commonwealth conference because we are big believers in the Commonwealth and making that organisation work well and indeed work for us.
“But I think that it is right in going to the Commonwealth conference we should not hold back in being very clear about those aspects of the human rights record in Sri Lanka that we are not happy with.

“If he gives me the details of that case I will make sure that along with other cases and other arguments those points are properly made. Of course those are points that you can’t make if you don’t go.” – Agencies