Response to outrageous allegation

BY KUMAR Rupesinghe

I HAD assumed that the debate regarding the role of NGOs and INGO were to be over with my second response to Susantha Goonatilake.

To the readers who have been following this debate the debate was started by an article by Susantha Goonatilake which appeared in the Daily News, January, 9. I then responded to that article in the Daily News on January 11.

Subsequently Susantha Goonatilake was given the opportunity to respond to my article (January 20 and January 21) and I assumed that the debate would be closed with my rejoinder on the January 27.

I now find that Susantha Goonatilake has been given an opportunity in the Daily News, Friday, 27, with another article called, Janavegaya, International Alert and the Coup in Sierra Leone. Given the serious and false allegations which was printed, I am compelled to respond to these allegations.

It is absolutely false and untrue that I was ever a supporter of the Pol Pot regime. On the contrary I condemned the genocide in Kampuchea in the Janavegaya and elsewhere. Susantha Goonatilake has to substantiate his charges.

Another canard that he puts forward is that I was a guest of Brezhnev and Kim Il Sung. It is true that I was a guest of both these leaders but I never praised either of them.

In fact I refused to make any comments on them in their state media. These were not the only visits which were made but other visits to Egypt, Lebonan, Iraq, Syriya which were at the invitation of the Arab League.

The visit to North Korea was as a representative of the Government visits to other countries such as India we made on the invitation of these governments.

I now wish to correct the impression on Sierra Leone which has been used by Goonatilake ad infinitum to defame and malign my work at International Alert.

As I repeated in my opening article International Alerts was founded by Martin Ennals, the renown Secretary General of Amnesty International, and who received the Nobel Prize on behalf of Amnesty International.

The Board composed of Archbishop Tutu, another Nobel Prize winner, Theo Van Bowen, the Special Rapporteur for Religious Intolerance for the United Nations, Asbjorn Eide, the Special Rapporteur for Minorities, Lord Judd, former director of Oxfam and former Minister for Defence and subsequently the Minister for Development of two labour governments, Bill Spencer, advisor to President Carter, Andrew Young, the Mayor of Los Angeles, and Foreign Secretary under President Carter, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the former Under Secretary General and others.

The Chair of the Board during my term of office was Lord Frank Judd. The Board in all cases acted with great diligence and the highest form of professionalism.

The war in Sierra Leone was a very brutal one which had caused immense hardship and loss to that country.

The United Nations, the Commonwealth Secretariat and the Organization of African States had been attempting to mediate with the rebel leader of the Revolutionary United Front, Fodey Sankor and had failed to get in touch with him for almost two years.

It was under these circumstances that the President of Nigeria, General Abacha and the President of Liberia made a request to IA to assist in mediating the conflict by getting in touch with the rebel movement.

Subsequently, President Strasser of Sierra Leone, the United Nations, the Commonwealth Secretariat and especially the Secretary General of the Organization of African States (OAU) requested us to help in gaining contact with the rebel leader.

With the full approval of the board IA embarked on a very risky but challenging task and the Special Envoy of IA, Addai Sebo who had interviewed the rebel leader earlier was request to gain contact with the rebel leader which he eventually did.

The IA Special Envoy took three weeks to reach the headquarters of the rebel leader amidst great risk to his life. We were aware at the time that the RUF had 16 hostages most of whom were foreigners, including six nuns.

As soon as our Special Envoy reached the headquarters he was able to secure the release of the six nuns and eventually the release of all the hostages. IA was then commended by the Vatican, the Swiss and British Governments for securing the release of the foreign hostages.

IA had not only successfully gained contact with the rebel group but had obtained their consent to take part in peace talks with the Sierra Leone Government.

The Government of the Ivory Coast was facilitating the talks between the two parties and Foreign Minister Amara Essy was the Chairman of the negotiations. IA was publicly commended at the opening of the talks by all the parties who were present at the talks.

International Alert's involvement ended after the peace agreement was signed. The ceasefire agreement lasted for almost two years.

But unfortunately the Ceasefire Agreement did not hold and hostilities started to unfold. It was then that Kofi Annan requested IA to re-enter the situation and try to intervene.

We were naturally very reluctant and agreed to a limited intervention. A series of events unfolded itself and IA found it impossible to make any contribution and decided to withdraw from the situation.

The Board was fully apprised of the facts. Finally President Kabbah was disposed by an internal coup in Sierra Leone. He had written a letter to the Secretary General of the UN at that time, Kofi Annan, accusing IA of diamond smuggling and gun running for the rebels.

Since this was a serious allegation, I visited New York with Lord Judd, the Chair of the IA. Board and complained about the statement of the President of Sierra Leone. We were assured by the Secretary General that he was aware of the facts and thanked IA for its contribution.

Subsequently, given the seriousness of the charges the IA board decided to hold an outside audit and investigation at my request. Such an investigation was carried out by a high ranking criminal lawyer from the USA.

The inquiry took three weeks and all financial records were examined and minutes and reports of IA underwent thorough scrutiny. I would like to quote from results of this inquiry.

There is absolutely no evidence to support the rumours and accounts relating to diamond or gold smuggling, gun running or money laundering acts. It is reasonable to assume that rumours associated with the IA Special Envoys conduct originated with unknown external sources desiring to embarrass IA.

There being no direct or circumstantial evidence necessary to support allegations of wrong doing, it is the finding of this inquiry that no violation of criminal, charity or international law was committed by IA, its officers, employees, or agents in the conduct of its affairs relating to Sierra Leone program. (August 1997)

I will be quite happy to share the report with anybody who is interested. It is amazing that a Board of high standing would have condoned any such action, which violates the mandate and principles of humanitarian intervention.

Susantha Goonatilake also refers to an evaluation which was done by the Christian Micelsens Institution, Norway. This evaluation was a mid term evaluation which was done as a matter of course to evaluate the overall performance of IA.

In that evaluation IA was given a sound and critical evaluation with regards the management structure, financial routines, and our programs in several countries. We were given a very positive evaluation on our work in Burundi, and a few critical remarks on our work on Sri Lanka.

With regards Sierra Leone, there were critical remarks as to the perceptions that had been created in this controversial issue and also to be aware of the complexities in working within deeply divided civil wars.

The evaluation was discussed openly by the board, staff and donors. Today IA remains a strong and highly respected organisation working in many regions of conflict.

I am glad at the opportunity that I have had to settle this matter once and for all. With regards Susantha Goonatilake, readers should note that a similar witch hunt is now carried out against the Norwegian facilitator.

His outrageous statements against the Norwegian Special Envoy, and attempts to malign and defame are also well known to educated readers. It is natural in deeply divided conflicts that misperceptions and controversy surround any involvement by third parties.

Open discussion and debate is healthy but it should not be a license for those who use this platform to malign and defame the integrity of individuals. I thank the editor of the Daily News for kindly consenting to put the record straight.