Two-day workshop on APRC reports

COLOMBO: A two-day workshop on APRC reports with special reference to the proposals on the Indian origin Tamils was held on the March 17 and 18 at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute.

The workshop held under auspices of FCT with the support of Berghof Foundation for Conflict Studies.

The first session was a discussion on overview of the reports that came from the experts panel and also report of APRC Chairman Dr. Tissa Witharana.

R.C. Karunakaran Attorney-at-Law and former Secretary to the Human Rights Commission presented a paper titled “Fundamental issues of recognition and identity (revisiting the Kodakkanpillai case)”.

Karunakaran pointed out that the Privy Council judgement though cannot be accepted, laid down the fact that IOT were a separate community.

Vijayasandiran presented a paper “Do the APRC proposals offer a spring of hope for IOT”. A special lecture by Rohan Edirisinghe followed.

" A paper was presented by Prof. Sandirasekeran titled “Constitutional and institutional reforms for education advancement of IOT”.