Mr. Bernard Wijeyasingha Says;

It is high time for Sri Lanka to push the issue of human rights violations committed by the Indian Peace Keeping Force to the Council in Geneva. This is not a “tit for tat” issue but given that the UNHRC is so “concerned” about human rights violations supposedly commited by the Sri Lankan military which ended the war then it is equally imperative that the human rights violations commited against Sri Lankans by the Indian Peace Keeping Force be addressed simultaneously.

This would be a litmus test of the objectivity of the UNHRC and a test on the UK and the US for their true purpose to single out only one aspect of a 30 year long war while avoiding other blatant human rights violations commited during the war. Colombo has to take a relentless stand on this issue till the UNHRC gives a proper reply as to why the human right violations commited by the Indian Peace Keeping Force has been ignored.

Since the war in Sri Lanka is a war against Tamil terrorism and not a civil war then it is equally imperative that Colombo demands that those who trained supported, gave logistics and funds to the LITE during the war be equally charged of human rights violations. This would not be a unique act as the US war against Islamic terrorism also targeted nations who supported the Al-Qaeda. Recently the Caribbean nations are demanding compensation from their former European Colonial rulers for the act of slavery. The Jews in the past have done the same and in the US the Japanese community were compensated for being treated as enemies of the US state during world war 2 and placed in concentration camps in the US.

In this vein Sri Lanka must demand that those who funded the LITE be they in India or in the UK to Canada pay reparations for hosting terrorist cells who funded the LITE during the war. Finally Colombo should demand that LITE terrorists cells and organizations who support LITE and their cause for Eelam be dismantled as they go against international law of harboring such entities. India cannot harbor TESO (Tamil Eelam Supporters Organization) and TELO (Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization) while taking a stand on the human rights resolution against the Sri Lankan military.

Finally Colombo has to question the motives of the Tamil National Alliance for their stead fast support of the human rights resolution including why they seek the advice of a foreign government as in India instead of working with Colombo to resolve any disputes. The Tamil National Alliance is the most powerful internal force in Sri Lanka that still voices the demands made by the now defeated LITE. I end with a quote from the Roman Senator Marcus Tullius Cicero:

“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.”

 Sincerely

Mr. Bernard Wijeyasingha