Lanka's Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission sessions begin tomorrow

The Sri Lankan Commission on Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation appointed by President Mahinda Rajapaksa is to commence sittings tomorrow (11) morning at the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute for International Relations and Strategic Studies in Colombo 7.


The Commission was appointed by the President under Section 2 of the Commission of Inquiry Act to inquire and report on several areas between the period of February 21, 2002 and May 19, 2009.
The Commission is to meet from August 11 till the 25th. Sessions on August 14th and 15th are to be held in Vavuniya.
The matters that are to be inquired by the Commission are the facts and circumstances that led to the failure of the ceasefire agreement (CFA) operationalized on February 21, 2002 and the sequence of events that followed thereafter up to May 19, 2009; whether any person, group or institution directly or indirectly bear responsibility in this regard; the lessons we would learn from those events and their attendant concerns in order to ensure that there will be no recurrence; the methodology whereby restitution to any person affected by those events or their dependents or their heirs could be affected and the institutional, administrative and legislative measures that need to be taken in order to prevent any recurrence of such concerns in the future and to promote further national unity and reconciliation among all communities and to make recommendations.
The Commission has also called on members of the public who wish to make submissions to it to contact the Commission via telephone or by writing.