IV 
118TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. RES. 427 
Recognizing 14 years since the end of the war in Sri Lanka on May 18, 
2009, honoring the lives lost, and expressing support for justice, account-
ability, reconciliation, reconstruction, reparation, and reform in Sri Lanka 
to ensure a lasting peaceful political solution and a prosperous future 
for all people of Sri Lanka. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
MAY 18, 2023 
Ms. ROSS (for herself, Mr. JOHNSON of Ohio, Mr. NICKEL, Mr. DAVIS of 
North Carolina, Mr. JACKSON of North Carolina, Ms. LEE of Pennsyl-
vania, Mr. DAVIS of Illinois, and Mrs. MCBATH) submitted the following 
resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs 
RESOLUTION 
Recognizing 14 years since the end of the war in Sri Lanka 
on May 18, 2009, honoring the lives lost, and expressing 
support for justice, accountability, reconciliation, recon-
struction, reparation, and reform in Sri Lanka to ensure 
a lasting peaceful political solution and a prosperous 
future for all people of Sri Lanka. 
Whereas May 18, 2023, marks the 14-year anniversary of the 
end of the 26-year armed conflict between the Govern-
ment of Sri Lanka and various armed Tamil independ-
ence organizations, including the Liberation Tigers of 
Tamil Eelam; 
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•HRES 427 IH 
Whereas all communities suffered from violence and counter-
violence during the ethnic war; 
Whereas the Tamil people of Sri Lanka suffered tens of thou-
sands of deaths, disappearances, abuses, and displace-
ments; 
Whereas the ethnic war was marked by credible allegations 
of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and acts of vio-
lence committed by the Sri Lankan Government, includ-
ing through the military’s deliberate shelling of civilians 
in government-designated no fire zones during the war’s 
final months in 2009, in which 40,000 to 170,000 Tamils 
were presumed to have been killed; 
Whereas in the absence of Sri Lanka implementing the rec-
ommendations of its own Lessons Learned and Reconcili-
ation Commission or instituting a credible justice mecha-
nism to investigate serious crimes committed during and 
after the war, the United States sponsored resolutions in 
the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in 
2012, 2013, and 2014 calling in ever stronger terms for 
domestic action and reconciliation; 
Whereas the United Nation’s Office of the High Commis-
sioner for Human Rights issued a report in 2015 (the 
OISL Report) that outlined the occurrence of war crimes 
and crimes against humanity and violations of inter-
national humanitarian law during the war in Sri Lanka; 
Whereas following a change in government in Sri Lanka, the 
release of the OISL Report, and the recommendations of 
the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United 
States cosponsored with Sri Lanka a UNHRC resolution 
in 2015, HRC 30/1, which was reaffirmed in 2017; 
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•HRES 427 IH 
Whereas under HRC 30/1, the Sri Lankan government made 
transitional justice commitments for postwar reconcili-
ation including— 
(1) an accountability mechanism with a special court 
inclusive of Commonwealth and foreign judges, prosecu-
tors, lawyers, and investigators; 
(2) a truth commission; 
(3) an office of missing persons; 
(4) an office of reparations and institutional reforms 
aimed at nonrecurrence; and 
(5) a number of confidence-building measures; 
Whereas, in continued demonstration of impunity for human 
rights violations and despite serving as a cosponsor of the 
resolution, Sri Lanka withdrew from HRC 30/1 in 2020; 
Whereas the northeastern region of the country, the tradi-
tional Tamil homeland, remains heavily militarized with 
up to one soldier for every two civilians in the most war- 
affected regions; 
Whereas Sri Lanka has passed laws aimed at limiting the 
freedom of expression of the Eelam Tamil community; 
Whereas, in 2018, the Northern Provincial Council of Sri 
Lanka adopted resolutions calling for an international in-
vestigation into alleged war crimes committed during the 
armed conflict and for a United Nations-monitored ref-
erendum in the northeastern region of the island to sup-
port the development of a permanent political solution; 
Whereas the Government of Sri Lanka has postponed provin-
cial elections for multiple years, denying all Sri Lankans, 
including the Tamil people in the Northern Province and 
the Eastern Province, their democratic right to local rep-
resentation; 
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•HRES 427 IH 
Whereas Richard Boucher, Assistant Secretary of State for 
South and Central Asian Affairs, said during a visit to 
Sri Lanka on June 1, 2006, that ‘‘There are legitimate 
issues that are raised by the Tamil community and they 
have a very legitimate desire, as anybody would, to be 
able to control their own lives, to rule their own destinies 
and to govern themselves in their homeland; in the areas 
they’ve traditionally inhabited.’’; 
Whereas a 2021 report from the United Nations High Com-
missioner for Human Rights found that the Government 
of Sri Lanka has, over the past year— 
(1) elevated individuals implicated in war crimes to 
senior governmental positions; 
(2) pardoned a convicted war criminal; 
(3) reversed key democratic reforms and consoli-
dated power behind the office of the President; 
(4) obstructed efforts to investigate and prosecute 
perpetrators of war crimes; 
(5) promoted majoritarian and exclusionary rhetoric; 
(6) engaged in surveillance and harassment of civil 
society organizations and human rights advocates; and 
(7) allegedly employed security forces to abduct and 
torture dissidents; 
Whereas the report warns that ‘‘Sri Lanka’s current trajec-
tory sets the scene for the recurrence of the policies and 
practices that gave rise to grave human rights viola-
tions’’; 
Whereas the United States cosponsored a UNHRC resolu-
tion, HRC 46/1 (2021), led by the United Kingdom, 
which recognizes the lack of accountability for past viola-
tions of human rights and international humanitarian law 
in Sri Lanka and directs the Office of the High Commis-
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•HRES 427 IH 
sioner for Human Rights to collect, analyze, and preserve 
information and evidence for future accountability proc-
esses for gross violations of human rights; 
Whereas the United States cosponsored UNHRC resolution, 
HRC 51/1 (2022), which— 
(1) underscores the importance of addressing deep-
ening militarization, lack of accountability in governance, 
and impunity for serious human rights violations and 
abuses; 
(2) recognizes the importance of peaceful protests to 
the effectiveness of democratic systems and democratic 
processes, including elections and referendums; and 
(3) calls upon the Government of Sri Lanka to fulfill 
its commitments on the devolution of political authority 
and to ensure that all provincial councils, including the 
northern and eastern provincial councils, are able to oper-
ate effectively; 
Whereas no effort has been made to bring to justice those 
who are alleged to have committed war crimes and crimes 
against humanity, no investigations have begun even on 
emblematic cases, evidence gathering is hindered through 
arbitrary arrests and threats by the state, and impunity 
prevails in the country with the outdated and the exces-
sively harsh Prevention of Terrorism Act, which does not 
comply with international standards and has still not 
been repealed despite repeated promises by the govern-
ment; 
Whereas the former United Nations High Commissioner for 
Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, stated in January 
2021, ‘‘Given the demonstrated inability and unwilling-
ness of the Government to advance accountability at the 
national level, it is time for international action to ensure 
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•HRES 427 IH 
justice for international crimes. States should also pursue 
investigations and prosecution in their national courts— 
under accepted principles of extraterritorial or universal 
jurisdiction—of international crimes committed by all 
parties in Sri Lanka.’’; 
Whereas Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe has 
continued the damaging policies of the Rajapaksas, in-
cluding state-sponsored land appropriation, occupation 
and destruction of Tamil religious and cultural sites, sub-
jugation of and violence against largely peaceful protests, 
imprisonment of activists, and disregard for calls for jus-
tice for past violations; 
Whereas families of individuals who disappeared during and 
following the armed conflict still have no information re-
garding the whereabouts of their loved ones, and no lists 
of persons who surrendered to the government after the 
end of the armed conflict have been published; and 
Whereas progress on domestic and international investiga-
tions into reports of war crimes and human rights during 
the conflict and the promotion of reconciliation would fa-
cilitate United States engagement and investment in Sri 
Lanka and demonstrate support for the international rule 
of law: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 
(1) acknowledges the 14th anniversary of the 
end of the war in Sri Lanka and offers its deepest 
condolences to all those affected by the conflict; 
(2) honors the memory of those who died and 
reaffirms its solidarity with the people of all commu-
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•HRES 427 IH 
nities in Sri Lanka in their search for reconciliation, 
reconstruction, reparation, and reform; 
(3) commends the United Nations Human 
Rights Council for prioritizing the collection and 
preservation of evidence related to human rights vio-
lations, a process that must not be interfered with 
by the Government of Sri Lanka; 
(4) recognizes the bravery and commitment of 
advocates for justice across all communities in Sri 
Lanka, including the Tamil families of the dis-
appeared, whose protests and demands for answers 
have at times been met with threats, intimidation, 
and harassment by government security forces; 
(5) urges the international community to advo-
cate for and protect the political rights and rep-
resentation of the historically oppressed northeastern 
region of Sri Lanka and work towards a permanent 
political solution to address the underlying issues 
that led to ethnic conflict and ensure nonrecurrence 
of violence; 
(6) encourages the promotion of universally ac-
cepted democratic principles and systems on the is-
land of Sri Lanka, including through the use of the 
referendum process to ensure that peoples of all 
ethnicities, including the Eelam Tamil people, are 
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•HRES 427 IH 
democratically and equitably represented on the is-
land; 
(7) recommends the United States explore in-
vestigations and prosecutions pursuant to the rec-
ommendations of the United Nations High Commis-
sioner for Human Rights; 
(8) urges the United States to work with the 
United Nations General Assembly, the United Na-
tions Security Council, and the United Nations 
Human Rights Council to establish a credible and 
effective international mechanism for accountability 
for the grave crimes committed during the war in 
Sri Lanka; and 
(9) encourages the Secretary of State to lever-
age the United States position on the United Na-
tions Security Council to pursue a referral of Sri 
Lanka to the International Criminal Court, as out-
lined in the February 2021 report on Sri Lanka 
from the United Nations High Commissioner for 
Human Rights, which describes ‘‘the referral of the 
situation in Sri Lanka to the International Criminal 
Court’’ as one option to ‘‘advance criminal account-
ability and provide measures of redress for victims’’. 
Æ 
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