GHRD delivered the oral statement at the Palais des Nations during the Council’s 63rd session, under agenda item 2 on the High Commissioner’s oral update. In its statement, GHRD noted that the High Commissioner’s report, A/HRC/63/18, does not reflect the Office’s previous leadership in advancing accountability, truth, justice, reparations, and guarantees of non-recurrence, a leadership that had been evident in earlier reports, A/HRC/57/19 (2024) and A/HRC/60/21 (2025).
While welcoming the High Commissioner’s recognition of the NPP Government’s response to the Easter Sunday attacks, a devastating cyclone, and the spillover effects of armed conflicts in Western Asia, GHRD expressed deep concern that accountability for alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide committed by the Sri Lankan State and its armed forces appears to have been deprioritised.
The organisation pointed to the OHCHR Sri Lanka Accountability Project, which has reportedly preserved more than 123,000 items of information originating from over 500 witnesses and sources. GHRD stressed that more than 17 years after the end of the civil war, and following decades of entrenched and oppressive rule, the NPP Government has made little tangible progress toward resolving Sri Lanka’s longstanding ethnic conflict. GHRD further raised concerns over the High Commissioner’s decision not to recommend referring the matter to the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court.
The intervention forms part of GHRD’s ongoing engagement with the Human Rights Council on Sri Lanka, where the organisation continues to call for accountability mechanisms commensurate with the scale and severity of the violations documented.