A Sri Lankan probe into rights abuses blamed on both security forces and Tamil Tiger rebels fails to meet international standards, foreign observers say. Experts appointed by the international community to observe the presidential commission’s investigation charge the most serious abuses saw “hardly any noticeable progress.” Topping the list is the massacre of 17 local staff of Action Contre La Faim (Action Against Hunger) in August 2006, called the worst attack on aid workers since the 2003 suicide bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad. In the days after the killings, Nordic truce monitors were prevented by security forces from reaching the site in the northeastern town of Muttur. They now say charge that security forces were behind the killings, which the government strenuously denies. The bodies have been exhumed and examined by forensic experts, but no arrests have been made. (Reuters, June 11)
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