The British Government keeping a close watch on Sri Lanka’s human rights situation.
The UK says it is following developments in Sri Lanka closely and is aware of the concern felt by many about the potential impact on human rights defenders.
Minister of State for human rights, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon issued an interim statement on the human rights situation in 2018 in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s (FCO) 30 human rights priority countries.
In July, FCO published its annual Human Rights and Democracy Report. The report offered a snapshot of the global human rights situation over the previous year, and gave details of the UK Government’s work to advance universal human rights around the world.
“While this work is truly global, the report focussed in particular on the 30 countries in which we believe human rights issues are of greatest concern, and where we consider that the UK can make a real difference,” Lord Ahmad said.
In his update he also noted that in Sri Lanka the proportion of elected female officials has significantly increased.
He said that with a new 25 per cent quota in place for local elections in February, a total of 1,919 women were elected, compared with just 91 between 2008 and 2011.
Courtesy: Colombo Gazette
