Sri Lanka, Sept. 28 -- Sri Lanka's long war, between Sri Lankan State Forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), officially ended in 2009. In those final phases, serious allegations have been made by human rights groups, the UN, and survivors' networks regarding extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture, sexual violence, shelling of civilians, and other war crimes and crimes against humanity by both sides.

The scale and gravity of these allegations have meant that accountability is not only a domestic grievance but also a question of international human rights and International Humanitarian Law (IHL).

Successive Governments (both under Mahinda Rajapaksa and post-Rajapaksa) repeatedly pledged reconciliation an...