A new Commonwealth

Today Patricia Scotland, Baroness Scotland of Asthal QC, a Dominican and British lawyer and former Attorney General for England, Wales and Northern Ireland takes over as Secretary General of the Commonwealth. Her job will be to rebuild an institution which her...

Cameron in the dock for failing to prevent torture reprisals

  Two years on and the legacy of David Cameron’s visit to the 2013 Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting remains a topic of debate. His historic visit to the North of Sri Lanka, though regarded by some as a powerful gesture of solidarity with members of the...

How the Foreign Office makes decisions

Britain’s Foreign Office has had a puzzling policy towards Sri Lanka in recent years. At times it has been downright terrible: selling arms to Sri Lanka and denying the clear evidence of torture by Sri Lankan security forces. At other times it has been a deal...

Reprisals start in Mannar

Following on from last week’s Commonwealth Summit we were concerned that there might be reprisals against those who had been brave enough to speak out. We have now seen worrying signs that this might be happening. We received this report from Mannar today, the...

The Commonwealth Summit: the aftermath

The Commonwealth Summit has now ended. It was broadly seen as a complete disaster for both the Commonwealth and Sri Lanka.Only 27 of the 53 invited Heads of Government attended. 23 nations sent lesser representation (Antigua, Sierra Leone, Botswana, Canada, Mauritius,...