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Sri Lanka has nothing to hide over rights

Rajapakse says ahead of C'Wealth summit

AFP, Colombo
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse yesterday hit back angrily' against allegations of war crimes which are set to overshadow this week's Co m m o nwea 11 h sum m i t, saying he had "nothing to hide" from his critics.
Rajapakse, who will chair the three-day summit in Colombo,
told reporters he was ready to confront the likes of Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron but would not be lectured to.
The summit has already been dogged by boycotts, with the leaders of Canada, India and Mauritius all staying away' over the bloody end in 2009 to one of Asia's deadliest civil wars.
Rajapakse has been under fire from rights groups and UN bodies for refusing to allow an independent investigation into the finale of the conflict, which pitted ethnic Tamils against the majority Sinhalese government.
"We are very' open, we have nothing to hide," die president, who is himself Sinhalese, told a press conference on the eve of the summit.
Rajapakse said he was ready to meet Cameron to discuss allegations that up to 40,000 civilians were killed by Sri Lankan forces in the closing stages of the 37-year conflict in the island's north.
Rajapakse, president of the former British colony since 2005, mounted a stout defence of his administration's handling of allegations of rights abuses.
The 67-year-old said his administration deserved credit for ending the conflict.
"People were getting killed for 30 years, at least after 2009 we have stopped it. There is no killing in Sri Lanka today."
At least 100,000 people lost their lives in the conflict.
Britain on Wednesday asked Sri Lanka to probe allegations that hundreds of men and
women had been sexually assaulted by government forces during and after the island's drawn-out ethnic war.
Kamalesh Sharma, the Commonwealth's Secretary-Ceneral, denied the organisation had turned a blind eye to allegations against the summit hosts.
Rights groups said the relevance of the organisation was now on the line.
A report by Brussels-based think tank, the International Crisis Croup, said Colombo's "attempts to mask its growing authoritarianism ... appear increasingly flimsy", accusing it of undermining judicial independence after the impeachment of the chief justice earlier this year.
Despite the allegations of abuses against Tamil civilians, who account for some 12 percent of the 20 million population, Rajapakse said he was determined to heal the island's pain.
"My policy' is to win over even die terrorists," lie said. We are ready to talk to them, but we will not allow anyone to divide this country'."