Sunday 25 November 2012

Why on earth was TNA not banned after the elimination of terrorists ?


    Sri Lanka Armed Forces recruited 100 Tamil Girls in to the Lanka Army Volonteer Force

Immediately after the elimination of the terrorists the political climate was conducive to the abolition of the TNA and the removal of the 13Amendment.  It was the  terrorists who  manipulated voting to have the candidates of the  TNA elected as MPs to be the voice of the terrorists in the Parliament.  After the elimination of the terrorists the TNA had no raison d’etre.

However, having lost that opportunity we are burdened with a set of MPs who have no sense of belonging to Sri Lanka as their Island home.  They are still seeking to realise the objective of their master the  terrorist Prabhakaran to setup  a Tamil Homeland.   An MP who takes an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of Sri Lanka has no right to  spread divisive political rhetoric and seek the help of foreign countries to intervene in the affairs of Sri Lanka to enable them to realise the separatist politics.  Normally that should be considered treasonable activity to confiscate their right to represent the people as Members of the Sri Lanka Parliament.

But for some reason the President and the Government seem to tolerate the recalcitrant attitude of the TNA MPs despite their continued refusal to  integrate into the political fabric as normal members of Parliament to cooperate with the government to ameliorate the condition of living of the people they represent and participate in the numerous development projects.  They remain outsiders with the only objective of somehow set up an Eelam State in the North.

But the numerous Missions to denigrate  the Government of Sri Lanka as  anti- Tamil government that denies the rights of the minorities succeeded only in getting the South African Tamil Navi Pillai the UN Human Rights Commissioner to move the UNHuman Rights Council against Sri Lanka with USA taking a prominent part in denouncing Sri Lanka and even in passing a resolution against it. 

Stephen Harper the Canadian Prime Minister  had also been roped in by the TNA to  be a vociferous anti Sri Lanka activist demanding the Commonwealth Countries to boycott the commonwealth Summit to be held in Sri Lanka in 2013.  TNA’s success in their numerous visits abroad was only to become a means for  the foreign governments to interfere with internal affairs of or country   accuse our Armed Forces and make incessant demands for  accountability for an internal military operation against a group of terrorists which is past history.

Stephen Harper had stated; “  I intend to make clear to my fellow leaders of the commonwealth that if we do not see progress in Sri Lanka in human rights I will not as Prime Minister be attending that Commonwealth summit. And I hope others will take a similar position." 

But it is unlikely that the other Commonwealth leaders will follow an undiplomatic Stephen Harper who has developed  traumatic syndromes because of   alleged war crimes supposed to have been committed by the Sri Lankan Armed Forces in the final phase of the war  which raged for 27 years with the Tamil Tiger.
And  Manmohan Singh too did his  part to pacify directly the “political idiots of Tamil Nadu” Karuna  nidhi and Jayalalitha  by voting against Sri Lanka along with its mentor the USA. 

As an excuse  in an interview  with Salma Yusuf, Rahpal Malhotra  the Executive Vice-Chairman of the Centre for Research in Rural and Industrial Development (CRRID) in Chandigarh, had said, “….If the Prime Minister did not make the decision that he did, the current ruling government would have collapsed. It is in such a context that the decision to vote in favour of the United Nations Human Rights resolution in March 2012 must be viewed by Sri Lankans.
 
Domestic pressure and what you rightly described as ‘coalition compulsions’ were what led to the vote by India in favour of the United Nations Human Rights Council resolution on Sri Lanka, but it must be made clear that this in no way means that the government of India is against Sri Lanka.”  

It reminds of Caesar’s last words to his friend Brutus when he stabbed him last-et tu Bruté ?
All that must have in some way consoled  the TNA  considering them as the results of their anti Sri Lanka efforts undertaken in hectic travel to different corners of the world with the pathetic story of the unpitying harassment of the Sri Lanka Tamils  by the Majority Sinhala Government of Sri Lanka have not however helped the TNA to realise their primary objective of a separate Eelam.

TNA even went to China seeking China’s  assistance to launch their pet idea of a Tamil Eelam.  In Ceylon Today P.K.Balachandra reports that the Propaganda Secretary of ITAK    Nadesan  Pillai Vithiatharan  who led a delegation and stayed  there for ten days  at the invitation of the Chinese Government, came back to Sri Lanka disappointed. 

Vithiatharan had said that, “China will not help the Tamils secure justice and political autonomy. The Chinese believe that the solution for the problem of religious or ethnic minorities lies in economic development and the grant of economic opportunities, rather than political autonomy.  The overall view was that the Tamil problem in Sri Lanka had been solved because guns had been silenced. There was no realization that the basic political issues over which the Tamils had struggled in various ways, still remained unsolved, and crying for attention,”

The China has thought rightly so,  as  the cry for “basic political issues” does not come from the ordinary Tamil people the TNA represents, but it is  the demand of the   handful of ambitious Tamil racist politicians of the TNA manipulated like puppets by the  pro terrorist Tamil Diaspora.  It is this TNA MPs  who have created an artificial ethnic problem for  the realization of the “ basic  political  issues“.

Do the TNA MPs at least now realise that they have been tolerated by some of the countries of the International Community as an instrument to intervene into the Affairs of  Sri Lanka , but other than that no one has taken them seriously enough to demand Sri Lanka to  create a separate state for the Tamils in Sri Lanka ?

The Government  of Sri Lanka which even in the eyes of the most vehement critics of Sri Lanka   cannot but appreciate the work it has carried outs since the elimination of the terrorists for the settlement of the IDPs after removal of  thousands of personal  mines, infrastructure development and providing facilities  such as hospitals, schools , electricity and fresh water for the welfare of the Tamil people and the development of  the North and East.

TNA MPs blinded by their foolish demand for a separate Eelam, when the ordinary Tamils seem to be happy in a  North and East developing  as it had never been before,  are groping in the dark trying  to hold each others hands to keep themselves afloat  without sinking into their own “cess pit”.

Even their  mentor India to whom they ran every now and then to get their advice  and requesting to help them set up the Eeelam State seems to have turned its back on them.
The TNA Jaffna district Parliamentarian E. Saravanabavan, speaking during the  debate on the Budget 2013, had  said that  India should either support or stay away from the matters of Tamils, so that they could earn their (Tamils) rights, instead of playing double games.  He had said,  "Thousands of Tamils in the North and East shed blood to achieve their rights but India let them down and because of the recent behaviour of the Indian Central Government, there is a serious and reasonable doubt among the Tamil people whether India has a genuine feeling of forcing the Sri Lankan government to resolve the matters,"

In the mean time M.A.Sumanthiran who often does not know what he is talking, after having heard about the UNO “leaked” document  has said, "Now that the UN has come with this report we want action, There should be an international inquiry. The government as the main accused party cannot be involved in the investigation."

Then in another mood  M.A. Sumanthiran admits that, . “The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution is something that we had rejected right through as being meaningless,”
TNA is unfortunately divided one does not know what the other says. Speaking in Parliament on the Budget  TNA Leader R.Sampanthan  has said, “any attempt by anyone to modify or nullify the 13th Amendment, to make it ineffective and worthless could cause irreparable damage to the future of the country. The 13th Amendment was the only provision that recognized the diversity of the country to a certain extent,”   

What is happening to the TNA MPs  are they suffering from brain damage ?

In the mean time the Sri Lanka Armed Forces  in a highly commendable effort to reconcile the Communities and  make the Tamil people accept the Defence Forces as belonging to  every citizen of Sri Lanka  and to make them  understand that it is not just a mechanism of protection of the Government , had recruited 100 Tamil girls  from Kilinochchi to the Lanka Army Volunteer Force.  There had been 200 applicants and after three rounds of interviews the Army had recruited the best 100.


TNA MP Suresh Premachandra did not appreciate it as a genuine attempt in reconciling the Communities.  According to a report in the Udayan News Paper Premachandran had condemned it calling it a  forced recruitment of Tamils to the army in Jaffna.

In an interview with Rohan Abeywardhana  the Sri Lanka Freedom Party organiser for the Batticaloa District Arun Tambimuttu has said that , “the 13th Amendment and the provincial councils need to go as the time has come to evolve a more practical system of devolution and administration in their place.”
 
All that makes it absolutely clear that TNA  has no intention of working together with the Government for the  reconciliation of the  Communities and the development of Sri Lanka.  If they continue on that path  they become a burden to Sri Lanka paying them  salaries  merely to disrupt  progress and development, and separate the Communities, when every thing is being done by the government for the wellbeing of the Tamil people in the North and East. 

Finally, what have the TNA MPs done for  the wellbeing  and the  improvement  of the living conditions of the Tamil people who voted to elected them  as their representatives to the Parliament other than going round visiting foreign countries crying about the pathetic situation of the Tamil people and  asking their help to force Sri Lanka to devolve political power.  Is that what the ordinary Tamil people want ?

Therefore,  it is time  that either the TNA  give up their separatist politics and join hands with the government,  or be abolished as a political party as they serve no purpose as Members of the Parliament of Sri Lanka.

Friday 23 November 2012

An Impeachment Motion is a part of Democratic Procedure, but it is strange, the lining up to bash Sri Lanka.




There is the Constitution of the  Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka prepared by a UNP President in 1978. He was very authoritarian and used his executive powers to the full. He believed America was his friend  until he became aware of the hypocrisy of America when he was dropped like a hot brick  when he needed America most.

However the Constitution of Sri Lanka is now a legal document containing  XXIV Chapters and 172 Articles. It defines the Executive , the legislature and the Judiciary.  Article 107 is on  Appointment and removal of Judges of the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal”

The procedure set out in Article 107 of the Constitution is as follows:

“(2) Every such judge shall hold office during good behaviour, and shall not be removed except by an order of the President made after an address of Parliament supported by a majority of the total number of Members of Parliament (including those not present) has been presented to the President for such removal on the ground of proved misbehavior or incapacity: Provided that no resolution for the presentation of such an address shall be entertained by the Speaker or placed on the Order Paper of Parliament, unless notice of such resolution is signed by not less than one-third of the total number of Members of Parliament and sets out full particulars of the alleged misbehaviour or incapacity.”

Hence Impeachment Motion presented to the speaker of the Parliament is according to the Constitution and is not arbitrary or totalitarian.  It is a democratic procedure according to the Constitution of Sri Lanka. A PSC has been appointed to  inquire into the charges and it is therefore up to the PSC to decide on the matter.   Hence any body making statements against the Impeachment motion against CJ is ill informed and  only making an issue of it to discredit the Government.

Though the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary are separate institutions, and the Judiciary stands independent of the rest does not mean that  the Judiciary could act to limit the power of the Executive or the Legislature.  Judiciary has to take independent decisions but such decisions should not be a barrier for the  legislature or the executive to take decisions for the development of the country or the  welfare of its people and the country.  Judiciary as an Independent Institution within the Constitution of Sri Lanka, cannot stop a Parliamentary bill but it interprets and point out its defects and advises a revision.

A former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor had said: “The concept of the framers of our Constitution in creating three branches of government, when they came to the judiciary, they wanted it independent of the other two branches, so that it could do its job to fairly and freely interpret the laws [of the] Constitution …”

But it has also been argued that “…. in addition to independence, the Framers believed in another virtue as well – the virtue of accountability. As James Madison wrote in Federalist 39, the “persons administering” our government must “be appointed, either directly or indirectly, by the people….Even the judges [under the Constitution] be the choice, though a remote choice, of the people themselves.”  This is why Justice O’Connor was appointed by a president who was elected directly by the people and confirmed by senators also directly accountable to the people.
“Independence does not mean a lack of oversight and accountability; judges can be disciplined for serious misconduct on or off the bench. All states have some sort of commission to investigate complaints about judicial behavior. The commissions can recommend removal from office, public or private reprimand, censure and suspension, as well as involuntary retirement. State judges may also face impeachment or recall (where judges are elected.) Federal judges are also impeachable. It is important that people know what judges do.” (lwvnoc.org)

However the Judiciary cannot be a law unto itself.  It has to be independent but it has to help the government carry on with its political manifesto with which it has come to power.   It can therefore interpret the law within  the accepted rule of law for the betterment of the people.

Sri Lanka after three decades of terrorism has an uphill task of  reconciling the Communities and create an environment of peace and trust to set right  a dislocated society to  take it forward to progress and development. The Government, and the Armed Forces  with its redefined role  as a partner in development have done a wonderful job of work that no other government  any where in the world has done coordinating with its Armed Forces.  The Armed Forces of Sri Lanka  are not synonymous with destruction  but  with construction.  They destroyed evil to bring back peace and goodwill.

In USA the Soldiers who  retuned from Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan  were psychologically wounded.
“….. a very large number of veterans haven’t made it all the way home from the war in Southeast Asia. By conservative estimates, at least half a million Vietnam veterans still lead lives plagued by serious, war-related readjustment problems. Such problems crop up in a number of ways, varying from veteran to veteran. Flashbacks to combat… feelings of alienation or anger… depression, loneliness and an inability to get close to others… sometimes drug or alcohol problems… perhaps even suicidal feelings.” (suicidewall.com)

Those returning  from Iraq, and  Afghanistan came with invisible  wounds of war such as post traumatic syndrome. “Most of those troops also came home with  traumatic brain  injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder, which in many cases were not recognized for months.”  (The New York Times)

Thanks to the Sri Lanka Defence Secretary  Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapakse our soldiers were able to psychologically redress themselves and adopt to the progressive  climate of development.

This deviation from the topic  is to point out the necessity for every one, every institution, agencies , including the Judiciary have to adopt themselves to the situation we find ourselves after the thirty years of suffering under terrorism.

Therefore the Legislature, Executive, the Judiciary, the University  Professors, the Sri Lanka Media,  the Opposition, the Marxists, the conservatives and the members of the respective communities  etc have also a duty  to adopt themselves to the need of the day for the  development of the country , bringing the Communities together to put right the wrongs of the past.

The Impeachment Motion against the CJ, is just an impeachment Motion  and nothing else and we have to let the procedure continue without making unnecessary criticism. The Judiciary is independent but the Legislature  is supreme.  Judiciary cannot instruct the legislature how to function, though it may interpret the laws and advise the legislature on   the correct  procedure.  But the legislature may accept it and make amendments or not accept it.

Because certain parities are against the government  they cannot say that the democratic process put in motion by the Government  is   a, "…. misuse of disciplinary proceedings as a reprisals mechanism against independent judges …..."  because  an Impeachment Motion in terms of the  Constitution has been prepared and present to the Speaker of the Parliament.  There is now a PSC in place inquiring into the Impeachment Motion, and it is up to that Committee to take a decision.

Amal Jayasinghe of the AFP reported, “Rights groups have said the impeachment is the latest sign of efforts by President Mahinda Rajapakse to tighten his grip on power after crushing the Tamil Tiger separatist rebels in 2009 at the end of a decades-long war.”

This is just twisted reporting to fit into an Agenda.  It was reported today by BBC that the Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has taken over the Judiciary putting himself above the Law.  President Mahinda Rajapajkse would be the last to do that, as he did not taint his Office, as President JR Jayawardhana of the UNP,  by using his executive powers. President Mahinda Rajapakse is also a Lawyer who had practiced law and he knows the importance of the Independence of the Judiciary. 

He would not do that to avoid criticism of the International Community, but because he is more sincere and democratic.  He has demonstrated so on  many occasion and had not precipitated into action  without evaluating a situation, when all around may have wanted him to react.  One instance is the TNA “jokers” who leaving aside their Parliamentary responsibilities go round  visiting other countries requesting their intervention on the ethnic problem they  continue to perpetuate with vehemence.

In the mean time the Bar Association of Sri Lanka which should normally be well informed of  the legal mechanisms has requested the speaker to reconsider the Impeachment Motion knowing very well it is now out of the Speaker’s hand.

Former President Chandrika Kumaratunga too has spoken out,  as it is a must for her to oppose what ever decisions taken by  the President Mahinda Rajapaksa.  She forgets that Sri Lanka is far away from what it had been during her term office.  Even she has to be more cautious about criticising  the government which has been doing things far better than  the government under her leadership.
Chandrika Kumaratunga writing to the Colombo Telegraph says, “A Member of Parliament who submitted the motion to the Speaker has publicly stated that the reason for the impeachment motion is the Supreme Court’s determination on the Divineguma Bill .  As that Bill seeks to make severe inroads into the areas of competence of Provincial Councils while concentrating power in the hands of a single Cabinet Minister, such a determination was only to be expected.  But, in the intolerant political environment that pertains today, judicial decision unpalatable to the Government are not tolerated.”

If the Impeachment Motion has something to do with the Divineguma Bill, there is reason to believe that CJ was trying to usurp the Parliamentary Procedure, and resort to a delaying tactic for whatever reason with out taking a positive or a negative decision.  This judicial lethargy would only delay the implementation of the Bill, which is damaging to the country as progressive Bills should take priority without leaving room for critics and interferes to intervene to hamper the progressive development of the country. But this is not directly or indirectly raised  in the Impeachment Motion, therefore it is only  to divert the attention from the actual  Charges  under investigation. 

However, Ground View in an article adds as an Editors Note, “The Supreme Court ruling on the Divineguma Bill presented to Parliament just before this article was published noted that the Bill has to be passed with 2/3rd majority in Parliament and that Clause 8 has to be approved at a referendum.”
It seems there are unknown hands to stop the Divineguma Bill taking effect, if not at  all at least for some time.

The Daily Mirror in an article To thine own self be true, writes ,” The Government is resorting to the impeachment of the Chief Justice, whose appointment was signed and approved by the head of the same regime. To facilitate this process, the Government had sought and collected 117 signatures from the members of Parliament, for this motion to be handed to the Speaker, so that the death knell could be expedited against the last bastion that protects democracy and the fundamental rights of the people.

Can one understand  how an Impeachment Motion could be the death knell of Democracy ?
The UNP Media Spokesman Gayantha Jayatilleke, MP had said, “The whole world knew what the real reason for presenting an impeachment motion against the Chief Justice was. She was being targeted due to her constitutionally correct order that the Divineguma Bill had to be approved by all the Provincial Councils before the Supreme Court could rule on its validity, the MP said.” 
Doesn’t he exaggerate when he says that the whole world knew the real reason  for presenting the Impeachment Motion ? The Divineguma Bill may have been the cause but the result is the availability of evidence  to  bring 14 charges for an Impeachment Motion. The Motion does not site the Supreme court decision as a Charge.

In an article  in the Financial Times of  London reproduced in the  Indian Express by Venket Narayan states , “  …………, many observers say Mr Rajapaksa is moving in the other direction, with fresh threats to judicial independence and recent moves to centralise yet more power in the hands of his family, notably his brothers Gotabhaya and Basil, who control the army and economic development, respectively. The highly-regarded newspaper quoted one unidentified western fund manager as saying: "Sri Lanka has lots of potential, but only if the megalomaniac tendencies of the President and his brothers can be brought under control;”

We see which way the diabolic Western Media goes.  They have not hesitated to bring in the President and his family into the fore as at a drop of a coin-rallying around the Impeachment Motion to bash Sri Lanka.

The reason of undue concern  of the West about what ever is taking place in Sri Lanka  boils down to the following extracts taken from the same article  referred to above: “According to the newspaper, concerns in western capitals have focused on Sri Lanka’s new ports, which some defence analysts think could form part of a series of military bases and other Chinese-backed projects around the Indian Ocean known as the "string of pearls."

The daily wrote: "Such developments worry India too, which frets about any Chinese presence close to its borders and about domestic political pressure from its 61 million Tamil citizens seeking action to help their fellow Tamils to the south."

They have nothing to do with the Impeachment Motion  except to make it an occasion to bash Sri Lanka, but their main concern is China’s influence in Sri Lanka.
In addition the USA not wanting to be left out in the imbroglio has issued a Statement, through its State department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, “..in a statement referring to the impending impeachment of Sri Lanka's Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake on Friday, was in fact expressing its concern that this South Asian nation's administration is on its way of making the nation's judiciary a captive branch.

In saying "We urge the Government of Sri Lanka to avoid any action that would impede the efficacy and independence of Sri Lanka’s judiciary", the State Department is concerned that the measures taken by the Sri Lanka government erodes or removes the effectiveness of the nation's judiciary. “ 
This is from a country which even impeached its own President.

She adds: "The United States, along with our partners in the international community, continues to urge Sri Lanka to address outstanding issues of the rule of law, democratic governance, accountability and reconciliation."

At the moment America is in a bit of a “hell hole” , with the economy not redressing, poverty line increasing,  people affected by natural disasters still not attended to, and continued war in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan  not seeing a quick end with more and more civilians being killed, Syrian war likely to turn into another Libya, continuing embargoes in Cuba etc.  But yet they are poking their nose into the affairs of Sri Lanka   where in reality they have nothing to do.

These multiple attacks on the government of Sri Lanka  goes on inside Sri Lanka with the Opposition political parties, and outside with the International Community and their stooges.

But all the fuss about an Impeachment Motion against the CJ is not necessary as the Motion has been placed before a PSC for investigation.  If the charges against the CJ are not proved the Impeachment Motion will be declared void, if proved her services will be terminated.  Therefore there is nothing for any one to worry about and make uncalled for allegations against the President or the Government of Sri Lanka for  a simple democratic procedure by the elected representatives of the people in the Parliament.




Sunday 18 November 2012

A Reply to Frances Harrison of the Huffington Post.



This woman Frances Harrison weeps for the terrorists and not for the poor soldiers who  had to give their lives to save the suffering of the innocent people under terrorists.

In an article  to  the Huffington Post of the 16 November,2012 Frances Harrison asks, “ What if the UN Had Spoken Out on Sri Lanka ?”  The article is to blame UN for suppressing the information it is supposed to have had  about 50,000 casualties in a war off limit to journalists and asks  if today the United Nations had informed  the receipt of such unconfirmed reports    ” wouldn’t the world take notice of it ?”

What would have happened ?  We know what happened in Libya . We have seen in Libya  what happened when the  “world  took notice  and tried to stop the killings.”  That taking notice ended up in what the NATO said  the “ most successful operation  in NATO History.”
“Writing back in September, Thomas C. Mountain, an independent journalist currently living in Africa who was a member of the 1st US Peace Delegation to Libya in 1987, estimated that NATO had dropped over 30,000 bombs on Libya, with an average of "two civilians killed in each attack.”  

Thus, Mountain has estimated that some 60,000 Libyan civilians had been killed by NATO air strikes alone by the end of August.  Shortly thereafter, when rebel forces began the siege of Sirte, Moussa Ibrahim, a spokesman for the now-deceased Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, told Reuters via telephone on September 19 that "in the last 17 days, more than 2,000 residents of the city of Sirte were killed in NATO air strikes."  As of today, some 26,000 NATO sorties and 9,600 strike missions have been conducted by NATO, with an average of four bombs used per attack.   “Though it may never be known just how many died in “the most successful operation in NATO history,” the alliance has shown little interest in rebuilding a nation that has in many ways been wrecked by its seven-month military campaign.  “

According to Palestinian human rights activist Shawan Jabarin, “The military operation damaged everything in Libya, not just Gaddafi and his regime, but the society [as well].”
(http://rt.com/news/nato-libya-operation-success-999/)
After some 8,000 bombing raids, with estimates of 4 bombs used per attack NATO has already dropped over 30,000 bombs on Libya. That’s almost 200 bombs per day for 6 months, some tens of thousands of tons of high explosives. With an estimated 2 Libyans killed per bomb and without a single NATO casualty the Western regimes have massacred over 60,000 Libyans in the past half year with the rebels themselves having said there have been 50,000 Libyan deaths. One hell of a humanitarian intervention isn’t it? (http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/09/02/30000-bombs-over-libya/)

Frances Harrison that is how the “ world took notice” in Libya when a group of Libyans  in Benghazi manifested against the Colonel Gaddafi .  It was not really the world but it was the “leaders of the powerful nations” that took notice of it and went all out to not only assassinate Colonel Gaddafi but also kill large numbers of civilians including women and children.  After that NATO’s most successful bombardments in its history what remained of Libyan cities and villagers were rubble of buildings, and houses where once people lived.

It would have been exactly what would have happened to Sri Lanka “if the world took notice  and tried to stop the killings.” The UN Secretary General having had experience of knowing how the West reacts to such notification may have deliberately suppressed the information without allowing the Western Nations to send its NATO Forces to turn Sri Lanka into rubble with civilian deaths put off as  collateral damage.

There would not have been the Human Rights watch , the Amnesty international, International Crisis Group and the UNHRC that would have got involved to intervene  but just the  NATO bombardments.  Frances Harrison aught to be naïf , not to understand that eventuality.

Frances Harrison ,  today UNO is just a label, there are other Organisations and  Agencies that have usurped  the original UNO.  What remains is an empty shell just bearing its name.  After the  Swedish Secretary General of  UNO Dag Hammarskjold, the next European who held the position was  Austrian Kurt Waldheim, and after him no Western man has  headed the UNO.

Since then the Western countries were disrespectful to the UNO, and gradually it lost its importance as an International Organisation to keep war at bay, making it a forum for the dissenting nations to meet and settle their disputes in dialogue rather than resorting to war.  George Bush just walked over the UNO and declared war against Iraq waving  tampered documents claiming Iraq has stock piles of  weapons of mass destruction.  In like fashion France, USA, UK and their allies gave false assertion of surveying the airspace over Libya and got the NATO Forces to Bomb Libya.

Frances Harrison has not written anything about Syria.  Syrian war continues because the western countries arm the rebels against the Armies of Al Asad like they did in Libya. Fortunately Sri Lanka escaped such a dire end. The West including people like Frances Harrison  regret that lost opportunity to get the NATO to bombard Sri Lanka and arm the “rebels under Prabhakaran” against the Government.

For Frances Harrison it is the question of  a leaked document which had been suppressed by the Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. One wonders how many such leaked documents there would be in future.   It is really another farce that is  being enacted by the West.  There had been no leaked documents, but these are  reports and information brought out from time to  time to discredit a Sovereign State –Sri Lanka which is doing far  better than the  expectation of the West.

At the moment West is  facing a serious political and economic  crisis.  There greatest fear is the Asian countries  piercing through difficult technological and financial barriers to take over the control of the world economy.   USA has its part of  the unsurmountable difficulties, yet the newly elected President Barrack Obama makes a voyage to Burma of all places.  Why not to France which has changed its conservative regime to a Socialist Regime ?

President Obama chooses Burma to spread American influence in an area of the world where China is becoming a super power.  America by its hopeful influence in Burma is trying to avert China’s influence in North Korea, which America continues to threaten along with Iran for their  nuclear intentions.

Therefore it is understandable that Frances Harrison is  made a mere pawn in the hands of the Western big powers to stop Sri Lanka getting further involved with China, allowing China to make use of its politically strategic position. The west is involved in a power game discrediting Sri Lanka and help any dissenting groups like the TNA and  anti Sri Lanka pro-terrorist Tamil Diaspora to Balkanize  Sri Lanka.  Having had lost the opportunity they had to break up Sri Lanka at the last phase of its  military operations against the terrorists, the countries Frances Harrison represent now come out with “leaked” documents and numbers killed by the armed forces at the crucial phase of its war against terrorists  gradually increased from 7000 to 40 or 50000.

Frances Harrison is getting depressive haunted by the thoughts of  what may have happened at the end phase of Sri Lanka war against  terrorists. Harrison says, “The document cites the UN's role in Rwanda, saying some lessons there were not learned and proved relevant to Sri Lanka. Let's hope they're learned for Syria, but as the author of a book of survivors' stories from that war in Sri Lanka I am haunted by the thought of what might have been there.”

Frances Harrison refers to Charles Petrie’s document and  very sadly remarks, “Petrie's report meticulously documents how senior UN officials continuously tried to blame the Tamil Tiger rebels - a proscribed terrorist group - for the killings even while their own international staff told them the Sri Lankan government was responsible for the majority of deaths. It was a bias that has slanted all coverage of the conflict since because it came from such an influential and reliable source - the UN no less. ”

Whatever Charlesd Petrie had said  UN is making constant errors without having an agenda of its own but serving the agenda of those powerful Western Countries.  There are no reliable reports about Sri Lanka   from whatever western agencies, journalists or foreign  political analysts , not to speak of  the squeaking of the  BBC,  the UK Channel 4 and the likes. 

I cannot understand Frances Harrison who is supposed to have written a book of survivors' stories from that war in Sri Lanka,( apparently there are  many who profit from the situation in Sri Lanka to make money writing books for gullible western readers) has not read the report of the  Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission on its  records of the breaches of the CFA by the terrorists and the Government, an excerpt from  which reads:   In total 13,026 complaints were filed, most of them in Batticaloa (3815, 29%) and Jaffna (3219, 25%). The vast majority (92%) of the violations were committed by the LTTE ….”

The Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission was  a European Group, and they reported from what they had verified and monitored that the majority of the violations against the CFA were committed by the terrorists.   How can then those  who had no access to the ground situation   say, even if they were senior UN Officials that , “the Sri Lankan government was responsible for the majority of deaths.” 

In the final stages of the military operations against the terrorists no body could have been counting deaths though Frances Harrison faults the UN officials . There was an exodus of Tamil Civilians held as  human shields by the terrorists    seeking  the safety amoung the Government Military Forces. 

Can Frances Harrison understand the dimension of the situation that existed in that no fire zone ?  Why cannot  Harrison give a modicum  of  his thoughts to the extreme human kindness of the Armed Forces taking 300000 Tamil Civilians to safety  risking their own lives ? Would the  soldiers  who helped the escapees from the terrorists seeking their protection turn round to shoot at them ?

Frances Harrison any human being has two mental aspects one that appreciates, and  the other that condemns.  What one observes in these Western do gooders is  their weeping for the  unknown dead, without turning to understand the living. They readily condemn, but are  slow to give credit.    If one can look at the problem without getting personally involved then one  will realise that there are the inevitable that may  happen in war  for which the one that fights to  destroy the evil cannot be blamed .  For terrorism was the evil that, massacred, killed, and maimed a nation’s cherished people, men and women of valour.

Frances Harrison there are many who try to put the Sri Lanka terrorists and the Government Forces on the same footing. This is a  most disgusting way of evaluating  perpetrators of crime, and those who try to stop its perpetration.

 Would you put Al Qaeda who blew up the twin towers killing more than 3000 Americans and the American  Navy Seals who killed the unarmed Osma Bin Laden on the same footing ? 

 Of course you would not… so why do you write accusingly of  Ban Ki Moon’s Chef of the cabinet Mr. Vijay Nambiar an intelligent  man imploring Navy Pillai to tone down and dilute her statement  ? You say “He even complained that her statement put the Tamil Tiger rebels and the government on the same footing.”

Frances Harrison,  many are the people who have come forward to accuse Sri Lanka  after the elimination of the cancer of terrorism that ate into the fabric of the Sri Lankan Society for three decades .  They never came forward before either to sympathise with the government and the people of Sri Lanka, nor to give a hand in its attempt to rid itself of terrorism. 

Why do you now after three years come round to look for numbers dead, while the living are seeking  to get over the shock of going that long period of suffering to settle down to reconcile with the communities and march together towards progressive development of Sri Lanka ?

Perhaps Frances Harrison  does not know  how many innocent civilians have been killed by the very nations he represent through out the period of colonisation from Peru to Africa, Vietnam to India, Latin America to Middle East ?  What are the numbers  the Western countries you represent killed in Vietnam, in Japan , in China, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Libya ?

 Frances Harrison you do not represent a saintly crowd of Western countries ?  They are and they have been more devilish, ruthless killers, murderers, and assassins ?

The war against terrorists in Sri Lanka was a rightful war against a group of terrorists sprung from amoung the people, and fought within the boundaries of Sri Lanka. It was a clean war .  It is the West represented  by you who are used to unclean wars , who try to make our war against our terrorist  seem unclean.

If there were to be terrorism again in Sri Lanka we will eliminate them the same way we eliminated the LTTE terrorists, and will not allow any one of the countries you represent to interfere asking us to set up monitoring offices.

Frances Harrison, you have worked for the BBC, Amnesty International , but these institutions have no love, they have no sense of justice and fair play. They get reporters to write what they are paid to report .  They are reporters without feelings without  hearts.  Each country has its own  cultural values that makes one  nation different from another.  It is only one who knows and understands another’s  culture, that can evaluate the reasons of its actions.  The rest are mere spectators trying to understand others from one’s own cultural make up, which is different from that of the other.

Thursday 15 November 2012

JVP’s Political bankruptcy and that of the UNP



JVP Parliamentarian Anura Dissanayake  says “The institutions they themselves wanted us to believe as ‘supreme’ are being demolished by Rajapaksa regime. They are being belittled and slandered. The impeachment process is not carried out for truth, justice or fair play. If you can read between the lines you would be able to see what the real intention is.  This is the real nature of Rajapaksa. All institutions they want to be cowed down are being insulted, slandered, threatened and attacked,” 

The JVP are following the tactics of the  Western Governments, UN Officials, Human Rights Activists , the pro-terrorist Tamil Diaspora, and the TNA. 

JVP wants to discredit the Government and see the fall of Rajapaksa Presidency.   They of the JVP were the very people who helped  the election of  Mahinda Rajapaksa, but they were not satisfied playing  the second fiddle to the President Mahinda Rajapakse.  JVP wants to be the Maestro.  But ever since they left the UPFA their popularity among the masses has fallen to zero. 

The people wanted to pardon them for their massacres during the period leading to their uprising in 1971  and there after.  The JVP was  then feared by the people to such an extent they would not even pronounce  their name loud .  JVP spies were every where nobody knew where.  The people were living with fear of death  in the most savage form.  They were even frightened of the shadows by the road sides.  JVP  insurrection failed it is said  because they did not have the backing of the masses, it was a proletarian revolution.  What ever it  had been  JVP still hasn’t  the support of the masses for even a successful election victory, let alone a revolution.

In 1982  Rohana Wijeweera the leader of the JVP contested the Presidential elections, but got far lees votes than he expected.  In the meantime they incessantly killed innumerable number of people who were opposed to their “Doctrine”.  Now the vociferous JVP Leadership  led by Somawansa Amarasinghe,  Anura Dissanayake,  Tilvin Silva , Lal Kantha and the rest have their annual memorial rallies  for their dead leader, but up to now JVP have  not demanded  the pardon of the people for their most savage assassinations that will remain the blood mark of JVP.  I myself had a cousin  who was taken away from his home, had his head cut off  stuck on a pole and displayed in front of his house.   There were stories of how flesh of their killed enemies were sent to their homes  telling that it was sent by the “victim” who will come later for  “dinner”………!!!

After the death or assassination (which is still a mystery)  of their leader the JVP still hopes  for  a successful proletarian revolution like the TNA  and the terrorist rump abroad are  hoping to set up a Tamil Eelam. It is that which keeps JVP from joining hands with the President Mahinda Rajapakse  but keeps on discrediting  him and  his government hoping that will pave the way for  an eventual JVP Government. The JVP is working for it  unreservedly criticising every action of the President and his government, increasing trade union activities organised by Lal Kantha with strikes and  manifestation, roping in the University Students –the IUSF and the FUTA.

They still go by Marxist theories propounded by their leader Rohana Wijeweera : “We Marxists are proletarian revolutionaries. We do not conceal this fact from anyone. We hope for a complete revolutionary change of the existing social system and act with that goal in view. Ours is not the role of sitting on the fence with folded arms waiting for the day when this capitalist system is taken for burial on the shoulders of others; this capitalist system has bequeathed suffering and oppression to the working class of this country, which is over three million strong. It has made poverty and want the sole inheritance of the middle and lower peasants who comprise more than half the population of this country, it has become the fount and source of each and every contemporary social problem that the bulk of the nation suffers. The socialist revolution in a country can be hastened or delayed depending on the degree to which objective conditions are ripe and subjective conditions, i.e. consciousness, organization and leadership, have developed.”

They want poverty to continue to exist for the success of their hopeful revolution , and Anura Dissanayaka perhaps sees end of poverty in the Divineguma Bill and wants to precipitate their “revolution”, as end of poverty will eliminate their Marxist revolutionary hope.  His critical stance on the Impeachment of the CJ is to bring about JVP’s desired foreign intervention against the Impeachment and thus against the Government of the President Rajapakse.  Otherwise with their own representative Vijitha Herath  nominated to the PSC, there is no need for  Anura Dissanayake to make a statement at a Media Meeting held at the JVP Office in Pelwatte on the Impeachment.

The UN human rights expert ( in the UN System every one is an expert) Gabriela Knaul has stated “ The irremovability of judges is one of the  main pillars of guaranteeing the independence of the judiciary.”  We do not know where she got it from, but that is apparently what she had said. 

Then in UK Commons Foreign Affairs Committee demands David Cameron the Prime Minister   to boycott the Commonwealth Summit to be held in Sri Lanka  next year due to continuing evidence of serious human rights abuses in Sri Lanka. 

And in Australia Gordon Weiss has opened his mouth  as is his  habit to compare which is  incomparable saying:  There is little doubt that in 2009 the government of Sri Lanka pulled off one of the nastiest episodes of mass killing since the Rwandan genocide - and got away with it. Tens of thousands of civilians were massacred, with barely a trickle of Syria-like imagery emerging from the battle zone.” (what has Rwanda Genocide and Syria-like imagery emerging from the battle zone, got to do with Sri Lanka).

These three news items may have titillated the unpatriotic  minds of the politically   bankrupt JVP parliamentarians to renew their attack on the President Rajapaksa and his government.

JVP is not alone in the idea of binding hands and legs of Sri Lanka and sell it off to  the foreign champions of “regime change” to do what they like with it and when finished with   hand it back to them. Ranil Wickramasinghe and the UNP are also participating in the deal.

UNP  also has still not asked the pardon of the people of Sri Lanka for the killing spree with torture chambers where thousands of Sinhala Buddhist youth were killed and tortured by the UNP under President  Premadasa  in the  attempt to  put an end to the savagery of the JVP.  Sajith  Premadasa-the Vice President of UNP has a duty by the people to say sorry for  his father‘s part in those killings, for arming the terrorists, and for what ever hand he had in the assassination of the late Lieutenant General Denzil Kobbekaduwa.

But they JVP and the UNP are  today the champions of democracy , human rights and  good governance. 

It is reported that the leader  of the UNP Ranil Wickremesinghe has  asked the government to clearly state its stance on the 13th Amendment……..and whether the Government was rejecting the May 26, 2009 joint statement with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the May 17, 2011 joint statement with the Indian Government where the Sri Lankan Government underlines its commitment to the implementation of the 13th Amendment. Mr. Wickremesinghe  has added that a different tone was being heard today despite the assurances given to the United Nations and to India that power devolution under the 13th Amendment would be systematized and strengthened.”

What is Ranil Wickramasinghe fishing for in the troubled waters of Sri Lanka when it  needs the unity of every one to  face the attacks  coming from the West to subjugate and bar the development and progress of our country after  the elimination of the terrorists, for which none of these Western Countries came forward  to help.

Democratic process has been set up for the impeachment of the Chief Justice of Sri Lanka. It is purely an internal problem which the country has to proceed with according to its Constitution.  It is neither the business of the UN nor  of any other foreign country.

Saturday 10 November 2012

What a fool is this UNHCHR Navi Pillai ?


 

Navi Pillai is the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, therefore   it is incorrect that I  call her a “ fool  “, but circumstances are such that I cannot do otherwise.  

 Navi Pillai goes to attend a summit in Bali  which was also attended by the Australian Prime Minister  Julia Gillard.  Navi Pillai had told National Times, “''I am highly concerned that detention in regional offshore processing centres such as in Nauru could result in indefinite detention and other human rights violations''  

When she was informed that the Australian Immigration Department has sent home dozens of Sri Lankans - from Christmas and Cocos islands - deemed not to have a refugee claim, Navi Pillai has said  Sri Lanka was still volatile, despite the end of the civil war in 2009. She has added,''Now that was a conflict area, matters have not stabilised as yet.''All the reports reaching me are that people are concerned over controls being imposed over them,….So I can understand if they'd be leaving out of fear or for their personal security, and it really cries out for all the refugee protections, asylum seeker protections to be made particularly applicable to them.''

This is what shows that she is a “ fool “ with  a warped mind, which prohibits her from looking at a problem with an open mind.  She has a psychological problem being the offspring of South African apartheid, racism, and living in poverty in the slums of South Africa’s segregated  residential areas.  She has not been able to rid  of that childhood  hatred, distrust and fear of those who maltreated  her, as a child of a segregated  ethnic group.

Hence looking at Sri Lanka with that psychologically wounded mind of hers she forgets that she is a jurist.  A jurist does not accept any thing on face value. A Jurist seeks proof without  even a reasonable doubt. 

But what  are the evidence on which  Navi Pillai  relies to state “Sri Lanka is  still volatile, despite the end of the civil war in 2009.” ? 

She relies on UK Channel 4,  anti Sri Lanka pro-terrorist Tamil Diaspora, pseudo human rights activists- the Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International , and  International Crisis Group.  But to what extent can she rely on information coming from them as reliable evidence acceptable in law?  To accuse Sri Lanka  on these “ evidence” most of them on cooked up stories without  eye witnesses or even the semblance of  circumstantial evidence.

Has she the “sacrosanct” UN High  Commissioner for Human Rights,  set foot on Sri Lanka  to  find out “where on earth” it is  and make a fact finding Mission ?  No, She relies on  nondescript persons and organisations which have  only collected hearsay evidence from the anti Sri Lanka pro-terrorist Tamil diaspora- most of them not having even visited Sri Lanka during or after terrorism..

We expect a United Nations Commissioner of Human Rights  to be open minded  without bias and prejudices able to evaluate evidence from those accusing  Sri Lanka,  as well as from  the 

Government and those people who know exactly what happened in  Sri Lanka, before she comes to a lopsided conclusion  that  Sri Lanka is  still volatile, despite the end of the civil war in 2009.”
The so called asylum seekers  who leave Sri Lanka to Australia on ramshackle boats  hired by criminals dealing in human traffic  some of them   now cornered in  Nauru are economic refugees, and not people running away from Sri Lanka for fear of likely Sri Lankan atrocities committed against them. 

The  frightful  voyage they had  undertaken to escape  from the   Frankenstein Monster  back in Sri Lanka,  was in the hope that they will be  accepted as asylum seekers,  is nothing more than a story they had invented to  recounted to any gullible Australian  Immigration Officers. Unfortunately for the so called “ asylum seekers” ,the Australian  International Organisation for Migration has seen through their  “concocted  story”.

To a question asked by the  reporter Stephanie March of  ABC Radio Australia why the  number of Sri Lankans trying to reach Australia by boat has increased dramatically over the past 12 months, against  211 so-called irregular maritime arrivals from Sri Lanka last year, to  more than 5300 so far in 2012 ?

Richard Danziger, Chief of mission, International Organisation for Migration in Sri Lanka, had said that, “   many of those who have chosen to return to Sri Lanka rather than wait to be processed on Nauru or Australia originally left their homeland in search of work. You know that is often what we hear, people tell us they were just seeking better lives, jobs, money and so forth…..The asylum seekers who do chose to go home often return to tough financial times, with debts owing to the people smugglers who helped them get to Australia.”

But Pillai the UNHCHR does not want to accept that fact but she stands by what she had heard from some one or some video footage of doubtful origin put together to make a film by the UKChannel 4
Ms Pillay visited Australia last year, meeting with Ms Gillard, and visiting detention centres in the country, and said,  ''They were all [in] very good condition, but not the detainees. These are, after all, not people who are criminals and so they were handling the detention badly; many attempts at self-harm, and I'm still receiving reports of self-harm, suicide attempts and protests at the off-shore processing facilities. And these are all highly worrying - and unfortunately it was a predictable outcome.''

That is what she said,  but she did not think it is necessary to verify about the fears in Sri Lanka that made them take a precarious voyage  at high financial cost  and still higher risks to their lives. 
Pillai if she is  not “foolish” as I claim should have also gone to Sri Lanka to see for herself whether there is so much of hatred amoung the Sinhala Comlmunbity, against the Tamil Community and how the Government is treating the Tamils in the North and East of Sri Lanka.  If she makes the voyage to see for herself  the ground situation in Sri Lanka I am sure she will be surprised.


Sri Lanka is far from the apartheid South Africa in which Navi Pillai spent her childhood.  Sri Lanka is different,  quite opposed to the stories she had heard about the Sinhala majority committing atrocities against the Tamils in Sri Lanka, the Tamils and Sinhala have lived together for generations. 

The Tamils, Sinhala and Muslims have attended the same schools and enjoyed each others  cultural values, for instance  the Hindu-Sinhala New Year.   The Tamils even enjoyed their religious worship along side that of the Sinhala who shared the belief in the Hindu Gods despite their Buddhist philosophical engagements.

All communal problems started after India took to  expansionist politics and trained a group of disgruntled  Tamil youth in terrorism and let them loos in Sri Lanka in 1983. That was the beginning of three decades of terrorisms.

Now Navi Pillai believes, and trusts the White West,  who did not  help the poor Natives and the Tamil labour class in apartheid South Africa to find a way out of their suffering under apartheid.  Except for Olof Palme of Sweden, it is said that the  other Western Countries “ adopted a more ambivalent position”.

It was only after Mohandas Karamachand Gandhi who appeared in the scene of South African apartheid that the world  began to look at the danger of apartheid.  Therefore Navi Pillai should begin to think differently of the West and its Human Rights activists accusing  a developing country like Sri Lanka attempting put the Communities against each other  to continue their leadership over the world,  denying the developing countries to rise above their  under development and rob them of their independence.

Be it America and the rest of the West or the anti Sri Lanka Tamil Diaspora  they are all working for their own Agenda, and their accusation of developing countries is not well founded.  We know how America, France,  Germany, Italy and Canada among others  accused the Libyan Leader Gaddafi and ended up bombarding the whole of Libya just to eliminate Colonel Gaddafi and leave the country in complete disarray. The Libyan rebels are  now killing each other  no one intervening to settle matters and develop the country to bring it back to what it was under Colonel Gaddafi.

Do you see Navi Pillai how the Western political system works ? Is it not time you take time to think over whether the accusations being levelled against Sri Lanka are justified, and that at least now there should not be a change of attitude ?

It had recently been reported that it is likely that Navi Pillai may visit Sri Lanka to see for herself how Sri Lanka attends to the question of Human Rights.   If she comes to Sri Lanka she should come open minded leaving behind her bias and prejudice  against  Sri Lanka and forgetting all what others have said about the country , and see for her self and come to conclusion after an intelligent perception of the situation.