Of course the LTTE never was about Justice, and so on. That was all just words without intention, and they were, in essence, a brutal dictatorship. As I said, my one trip into Tigerland amply illustrated this to me. A (Colombo) Tamil member of the group even said “THIS is Tamil Eelam? No thanks!”

Our government, however, says it is a democracy with democratic principals. That puts us to a higher standard than a megalomaniac generalissimo or his remaining overseas minions. Or are we no better than the LTTE, all words but no substance? I don’t believe this: we are better than they were.

Just because people like Matinthiran have co-opted these concepts for their own use doesn’t mean the concepts are now invalid. Nor does it mean that those of us who believe in them are secret Tiger agents.

My feelings, ideas, whatever you want to call them, come from an extremely patriotic view of Sri Lanka. I believe deeply in the people and country of Sri Lanka. This doesn’t change because I think that right now our government is headed in the wrong direction. Nor does this mean I have to accept what I’m told on blind faith.

Look, a lot of the issues we’re talking about on Groundviews are the same types of issues that were used by the LTTE to justify the war. My worry is that if we repeat the same actions as the past we will end up with another war. It seems like a no-brainer; we need to do things differently this time around. Then, perhaps, we’ll get different results.

There is no guarantee of success; there are no guarantees in life for anything except birth, death, and taxes. However, isn’t the vision of a prosperous, free, harmonious Sri Lanka worth the gamble?

In my opinion, just because someone else is a hypocrite is not justification for us to be hypocritical. We are better than that.

Generally speaking, countries with strongman leaders who control the security forces end up as dictatorships, and if things continue the way they seem to be, such things as Justice etc. will FOR SURE go down the toilet, as you put it. Strongman dictatorships do not preserve these ideals; they destroy them.

This is our window of opportunity, as a country, to live up to the high ideals written down in our constitution and laws. Let’s embrace these ideals. Let’s cast aside fear and go for it.

Perhaps it’s a matter of perspective. I just don’t understand how, for example, equality is a threat to the nation. Please explain. I’m being serious not sarcastic; I don’t understand your perspective, and maybe if I did then we might even find agreement on some things.

Damn, I’m late for work. Gotta go. Thanks for reading this, Ossie. I hope we can have a useful dialog.

“Strong” is an imprecisely defined condition. What SL desperately needs is a *different* kind of leadership. A leadership that does not utilize force and intimidation to achieve its own ends. In which case, there is no longer any need for an “efficient Army.” SL is beginning to resemble Burma; a military junta imposing martial law over a poverty-stricken rural population.

I was able to get into Tigerland once. I can guarantee that these concepts were NOT part of the way the LTTE did things; frequently is was the opposite.

So please do not call me sinister or tricky or even smelly because I want peace, justice, prosperity, etc. for Sri Lankans – ALL Sri Lankans.

It is over a fortnight since I posted the following two responses to your article.

Hope you will spare your valuable time to oblige with a response soon in order to bring out the multifaceted nature of the problem.

An overly simplistic view would not do justice to such a complex issue.

Sincerely
Off the Cuff

September 28, 2009 @ 1:34 pm
http://www.groundviews.org/2009/09/28/doing-the-right-thing-freedom-for-vanni-idps/#comment-9399

October 1, 2009 @ 1:09 am
http://www.groundviews.org/2009/09/28/doing-the-right-thing-freedom-for-vanni-idps/#comment-9468

The only way to reverse the degradation of our economy and polity is to acknowledge that the war is over and take the appropriate measures: release all the Vanni IDPs immediately, slash military spending, dismantle the paramilitaries, redeploy demobilised soldiers to civilian reconstruction tasks, replace military and ex-military administrators with civilian ones, dismantle the HSZs, resettle all displaced civilians including those displaced by HSZs, repeal the PTA and Emergency Regulations, restore democratic rights, especially to freedom of expression, and release J.S. Tissainayagam and others incarcerated for exercising this right. The best way to ensure that Sri Lanka retains its EU GSP+ facility is to do the right thing, failing which, the government must take full responsibility for the lost jobs and revenue. Unquote.

I would say DAM SMART Tiger tails are showing.

Sri Lanka was a homeland for all peace and harmony loving people until a small percentage of the Tamils began to terrorise the whole country with their Eelam terror fantasy during the past 30 odd years. The track record they left behind is well known.
The war is over does not mean that those Tamil Terrorists have given up the idea of using Sri Lanka as their Urinal. They continue to pose a serious threat to the national security and interest of the country. What they now try to do is to creep back into the civil society under some disguise and start all over again to make a Tamil Urinal out of Sri Lanka.
We shall never allow that to happen again.
The Security forces are the Backbone of Sri Lanka and everything will be done to keep them exactly where they are as long as we need them. The solution for Sri Lanka is a strong leadership with strong and disciplined security forces. If these leaders and security forces were good enough to crush down the terrorists and liberate the country from becoming a Tamil Urinal, they will be good enough to rule the country for the next 100 years. Those who made a mockery out of Parliamentary democracy will not fool us again.
Prabhakaran imported thousands of Tamils from TN and settled them in the North and North East to fill in the space left by the Singhalese and Tamil families that were killed or chased out. Those who are in IDP camps cannot be released until they are screened. The IDPs are no business of any outsiders.

(a) “The best proof that the LTTE is no longer a threat in Sri Lanka is the release of top LTTE cadres Daya Master and George Master”.
I agree with you Rohini but I do also speculate whether the truth is more complex than just that. I had assumed that the Masters might have just agreed to co-operate and agreed to tell whatever lies our authorities want them to say. For that reason I have been waiting to hear that yet another honest activist or media personnel or lawyer or such, has been charged with terrorism based on information supposedly received from the Masters. Or perhaps some opposition politician who is a threat to the present government. Anyone whose integrity is a threat to our present ruling coalition. I speculate if such would the real reason for such wonderful treatment meted out to the Masters.

(b) I observe now, two weeks later, that there is hardly any news about any more IDP releases. It would be amusing, if it was not so serious a matter, to compare Rohini’s valid suggestion “slash military spending”, to the contrasting and mind boggling increase in military spending few days ago.

(c) “redeploy demobilised soldiers to civilian reconstruction tasks”. I agree. Yet, look at where these soldiers are. Look at Colombbo streets, day after day. We let our country use up armed forces manpower in pointless exhibitions at the BMICH, which only serve to win votes and public brainwashing. Those soldiers could all be helping in the demining to help the IDP people to go home soon.

Where are we going, I worry very much. We Sri Lankans need our hearts to be educated, and stop being brainwashed. I say it again: “Oh, what is the use.”

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to expose the Times story in detail

These are the stories in question

1. Times photographs expose Sri Lanka’s lie on civilian deaths at beach
By Catherine Philp and Michael Evans datelined May 29, 2009
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6383477.ece

2. The hidden massacre: Sri Lanka’s final offensive against Tamil Tigers
By Catherine Philp in Colombo, date lined May 29, 2009
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6383449.ece

3. Slaughter in Sri Lanka
Evidence gathered by The Times has revealed that at least 20,000 Tamils were killed on the beach by shelling as the army closed in on the Tigers
Date lined May 29, 2009
No byline but the video carries a commentary by the Foreign Editor Richard Beeston
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/leading_article/article6382706.ece

The first thing that one notices is that there are THREE stories on the SAME DATE with different headlines, using the same data

Three pictures are used in their video presentation
1. a part of the NFZ
2. Picture of an LTTE grave yard (not from the NFZ)
3. another part of NFZ showing earth mounds (possibly graves)

This is a transcript of Foreign Editor Richard Beeston’s commentary

“In the first photograph you can see the remains of what was a refugee camp for some 100,000 Tamil civilians. In the center you can see the destroyed dwellings these wretched people were trying to live in. To the South out of the shot is the sea. Between them and the sea are Tamil Tiger gun emplacements you can see them they are mortar pits circular, bottom center, bottom right you can see what we believe is a command center, ammunition trucks, so effectively you had a population, the size of a large football stadium packed with civilians trapped here for weeks upon weeks under the merciless bombardment of the govt offensive”

Note – the mortar pits, command center and ammunition trucks are highlighted by graying out the background but they fail to highlight any ground impact bomb crater or any “Burnt Out Tree Stumps” that they claim were “one of the sights seen frequently in The Times photographs.” Very strangely this allegedly frequent sight, is no where to be seen in ANY of the three photos used by them (see story 1 para 19). In fact you can see that ALL vegetation is intact and still standing

Transcript continues…
“In the second picture we can see what looks like a strange crop in the center of the photograph these are in fact we believe Tamil tiger graves, hundreds of them neatly laid in the fields buried presumably near where they fell.

Note – This picture is not of a LTTE grave yard WITHIN the NFZ. It is an LTTE graveyard far removed from the NFZ. Observe the COMPLETE absence of any war damage. There are no bomb craters. Even the vegetation is intact, not a single bush, let alone a tree, shows signs of ANY damage. This UNRELATED photograph has been surreptitiously introduced to hoodwink the reader

Transcript continues…
(focus moves now to the third photo)
“In contrast to the Tamil Tiger dead, in this photograph is what we believe are the civilian mass graves down to the right these will be men women and children killed in the fighting and hurriedly buried by their relatives in between lulls in the onslaught”
End of transcript

Note the use of the words “In contrast to the Tamil Tiger dead” Mr Beeston is DELIBERATELY misleading the reader into believing that the LTTE buries their dead in “Lines and Columns” even during “weeks upon weeks under the merciless bombardment of the govt offensive” which forces civilians to bury their dead “in between lulls in the onslaught” haphazardly but allows the LTTE to bury their dead at leisure, in ordered rows and columns, completely unaffected by the same bombardment of the same area!!!!

The Times states
“It looks more likely that the firing position has been located by the Sri Lankan Army and it has then been targeted with air-burst and ground-impact mortars,” said Charles Heyman, editor of the magazine Armed Forces of the UK” (see story 2 para 7)

“Air-burst and ground-impact mortars can cause wide destruction and reduce trees to burnt stumps — one of the sights seen frequently in The Times photographs.” (see story 1 para 19)

This statement means that this type of intense bombardment creates an intense HEAT capable of burning down LIVE trees to Burnt Stumps

Strangely, such an intense heat had failed to burn down the FLIMSY TENTS. The story teller wants you the reader to believe that Plastic and Cloth tents cannot be burnt even by an inferno that can burn “Live trees to Stumps”

These Times stories contradicts itself big time. Someone some where has been on the uptake big time. LTTE millions at work.

These fabrications add insult to injury as these people were flown over the NFZ by the SL Govt in Air Force copters. Not something a govt would do IF it wants to hide the NFZ from sight.

Blatant and damaging fabrications such as this and Channel 4 is sufficient reason for the Govt to shut out such media institutions. Media freedom or freedom to slander?

Note –
Mawatha Silva has a special relationship with Times and is one of its most prolific comment writers; he is a Tamil posing as a Sinhalese and projects the trash he writes as views of a Sinhalese to foreigners but has no success in fooling Sri Lankans. Why he is so ashamed of his Tamil ancestry is a mystery

Times on line moderators blocks dissenting views and very few get published. It could be due to either of two things.
1. The moderators are mainly Tiger sympathizers or
2. They are in the pockets of the LTTE

This writer wrote to Times on line challenging their reports on Sri Lanka. An automatic reply was received but nothing got published. They were afraid of the truth.

Sorry, correction:

“but one crime that the LTTE has NOT been pinned down is that of rape”

Sometimes I do pity you. The newsmedia in SL is living in fear of the next murder and all you get these days are loads and loads of govt cpntrolled news. Read this news:

“Vanni IDPs sheltered in transit centres in Cheddiku’lam cannot expect justice under the Sri Lanka’s law. Law of the country does not show any interest on these IDPs. I openly say this. The authorities can penalize me for telling this,”

said Sri Lanka’s Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva when he addressed a public meeting which followed the ceremonial opening of a court complex at Marawila in Negombo district Tuesday. These transit centres are described as internment camps by human rights activists.

Sarath N. Silva further said:

I visited ‘relief villages’ where Vanni IDP families are sheltered. I cannot explain their suffering and grief in words. It is an utter lie if we continue to say that there is only one race and no majority or minority in the country. I visited Cheddiku’lam camps where IDP families live. I cannot explain the pathetic situation they undergo. I was unable to console them. They survive amid immense suffering and distress.

We construct massive building on our side. But these IDPs live in tent-shelters. Ten IDPs live in one tent-shelter. They could stand straight only in the centre of the tent shelter. Their neck will break down if they move to aside of the tent-shelter.

IDPs are seen waiting in queues, extending from 50 to 100 yards to take their turn to answer a call of nature. This is the life of Vanni IDPs in Cheddiku’lam camp

I attempted to smile at these IDPs. But it was without success. I failed to express my feeling towards them. I was unable to tell them that we also were crying with them for their suffering. I was unable to tell them that I would supply new clothes to them.

They should be provided with enough relief. We would be blamed if we fail to supply them with enough relief.

They cannot expect justice from the law of the country. Their plight and suffering are not brought to the court of law in our country. I openly say this. I will be penalized for telling this”,

Of course, no mainstream news would ever dare to publish this and in the same way UN Pascoe’s statement was twisted, am I surprised you, too, just try your luck in spinning.

I also wonder why is the SL regime being so selective in allowing those from EROS & EDF and not from other parties who had wanted to visit these camps. After all, they too have legitimate rights, don’ they or is this selective process in place to weed out any adverse reports?

Yes, we all know the atrocities of the LTTE and there is no love towards them for their bloody atrocities but how come you are so lopsided that you never bother to mention of the heinous crimes and atrocities by the SL regime? Call me what you want, but one crime that the LTTE has been pinned down is that of rape which the SL regime can hardly claim innocence. For all the waffling on being a disciplined army, there is certainly a trust deficit.

Murders and torture has sort of become a SL way of life. Terrorism was added on to that list. It is the duty of the country’s leadership to protect the people as they would and should have in the case of murder of Lasantha and others in the South. As the govt now acknowledges, the terrorist threat would be existent for some time to come and for that you do not lock up 300,000 innocent people in internment camps. Would it be easier to lock up the Southern population in gated and fenced camps so that giving protection to them would be easier? What is good for geese should be good for the gander, too, don’t you think so?

quote

Everyone knows and has accepted the possible existence of ex-LTTE combatants in the internment camps. Show me anyone or any group, UN, India, US that has disputed this. It is not that you wave a magic wand and hurrah you have revealed a mystery or secret that the world does not know and acknowledge but why keeping the children, the aged, women, etc. It flies flat on your face.

unquote

i agree with you. It’s becoming a farce to hold so many people in concentration camps.

You just can’t detain 300 000 innocent civilians for so many months because Sri Lanka Government thinks there may be some criminals amongst them.

There may be many killers, pedophiles, thieves, robbers, pimps, etc., in Colombo– do you put a fence around it and let no one move until all the unsavory characters have been “weeded out” ?

It is the most insane and preposterous attempt at so-called security measures the whole world has ever seen.

If I happened to be in the vicinity and was imprisoned in a concentration camp for many, many long un-ending months because I was in the wrong part of the island, because it was my bad luck to be there, with no constitutional rights of free movement, unable to see my dear and near, living in the flimsy tents, queuing for days and days under scorching sun for food, water and other basic necessities and sharing a toilet with 1000 other victims – I would be extremely shocked!!!!!

Thamil’s rights have been removed, and they live as animals in the Sri Lanka concentration camps.

All of this is forced upon them by the Government of Sri Lanka and the Sri Lankan Army while the Sinhalese majority lives a civilized life.

300,000 people forced behind barbed wire fences, living in a squalor, appalling, unsanitary conditions, starving, disease ridden, emotionally and physically abused- this is not shelter provided by a “caring” Sri Lankan Government , rather a mass prison to innocent Thamil men, women and children.

The IDPs are not war criminals, but war victims!!

Also –OFF the Cuff-asked you about -“INTENSE HEAT” capable of “BURNING LIVE TREES TO STUMPS” was generated by Air burst and Ground burst mortar attacks allegedly carried out by the Sri Lanka (SLA).

OFF the Cuff’s quote

Remember Quote

Now about the Times of London story….

Remember that story where “INTENSE HEAT” capable of “BURNING LIVE TREES TO STUMPS” was generated by Air burst and Ground burst mortar attacks allegedly carried out by the SLA. The heat produced could not even burn cloth and plastic tents, let alone Live Trees, as pictures published in that story by the Times proves

Unquote

The above is my ANALYSIS it’s neither my words nor my pictures.
This is what they wrote

Air-burst and ground-impact mortars can cause wide destruction and reduce trees to burnt stumps — one of the sights seen frequently in The Times photographs.

This is the voice of their Foreign Editor explaining the pictures
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6383477.ece
Let alone Burnt trees you can’t even find a Burnt tent

It is a PRIME example of an LTTE sponsored shameless FABRICATION
In spite of your pretentious comment “Disproving” takes more than just innuendo and denial or altering history.

Going by the way you fabricate statements as you go along you don’t have what it takes

What, no comment on the equitable issue?

OFF the Cuff’s unquote

Well, I can comment on his assertions and they are WRONG!!!

I check the timesonline link he kindly provided in his post. I also, found a horrific image of a scorched earth, metal buses were burned thru and vegetation obliterated by fire due to indiscriminate shelling by Sri Lankan military of the rebel-held zone, resulting in soaring civilian casualties.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ij1_uLxfg2vfQJPXWGIih40JlLjQ

Further, in the timesonline article I’ve read that figure is based on the growth in the intensity of shelling in May, resulting in an average of 1,000 civilian deaths every day. Below some extracts from timesonline article

The Times has acquired a full set of the documents showing the previously unreleased breakdown of the weaponry that caused each death and revealing the scale of carnage from shelling which defence experts said could have come only from the (Sri Lankan) army’s side.

The UN figures until the end of April, which are based on death records, show that 2 per cent of deaths in January, the beginning of the final offensive, were caused by gunfire and more than 80 per cent by (Sri Lankan Armed Forces’) shelling.

Three independent defence analysts who examined photographs of (Sri Lankan) army and rebel firing positions taken over the no-fire zone (NFZ) confirmed that the range of the rebel weaponry and the narrowness of the zone make it unlikely that rebel munitions caused significant civilian casualties.

Charles Heyman, a former army officer and editor of the magazine Armed Forces of the UK, said. “It looks more likely that the firing position has been located by the Sri Lankan Army and it has then been targeted with air-burst and ground impact mortars.”

Mortars are an indiscriminate weapon employed usually to take out groups of fighters on an open battlefield. Use of imprecise weapons of this kind in densely populated civilian areas is a war crime under Common Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Convention — to which Sri Lanka is a signatory.

Mortars — the Sri Lankan Army has 81mm, 82mm and 120mm rockets — can detonate on the ground where the impact would be absorbed partially, or between 100ft and 200ft above the ground, causing a mass of shell fragments.

According to a former Sri Lankan army officer, the Tamil Tigers did not possess air-burst mortars. Their heavy weaponry had a range of 7 to 27km, meaning that most of their fire would have fallen outside the zone.

The actual report that speared in the Times group was as follows

No truth in allegations of abuse and rape in camps: CJ
By Ranjith Ananda Jayasinghe

Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva has said there is no truth in the allegations that displaced people in welfare centres in Vavuniya, were being abused by the armed forces and that women were being raped.
The comments followed a visit by the Chief Justice on Thursday, to centres where displaced people were being housed temporarily and where suspected terrorists were being held.

He said the government has provided these people with the best possible facilities. Mr. Silva said, according to international law, it was wrong to call them Internally Displaced People (IDP) adding they had land and property and could go back and re-establish themselves in their villages.

He said elderly women, pregnant women and children should be sent back as soon as possible from the camps adding that except for the LTTE suspects no one was being held against their will.

The Chief Justice said he got the opportunity to speak to the suspects without the presence of the armed forces and they had told him they were forcibly recruited by the LTTE and that they would not fight again.

Post # 2

As observed in my first post addressed to you, corruption that allegedly exists in screening the IDP’s cannot be used as a rationale for generalized condemnation and as proof that the screening process is of no use, that would indeed be naive in view of KP’s statements and the identification of over 10,000 suspected cadres from within the camps.

The alleged corruption should be investigated and totally stamped out unequivocally. The perpetrators must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law and maximum punishment meted out.

Screening is another matter altogether and is done to safeguard the 20 million inhabitants of this country who lived within the shadow of terrorism for nearly three decades from any further terrorist attacks. The proof that screening has worked is the very large number of suspected terrorists that were identified.

This is what Dr. P Jeganathan wrote on May 28, 2009

Most camps, including the massive (second largest IDP camp in the world) Manik farm (zone 1, 2, 3 & 4 which was/is under construction) were/are accessible to some 52 agencies, which include, Sri Lanka NGOs, INGOS and UN agencies. As of about two weeks ago, restrictions on the entry of agency vehicles carrying personal, but not supplies was imposed. Because allegedly, there were people being taken out, in these vehicles.

Unquote

This shows that certain IDP’s were being taken out of the camps surreptitiously by NGO’s INGO’s and UN agencies. Were they paid for it by the relatives or the Tiger Diaspora? Were they involved in the Flesh Trade as you call it? We will never know for sure will we?

Elaborating on the above he further states

Before this, these vehicles had access also. The deal offered was that relief supply trucks, with uniformed, unarmed, GoSL trooper escort, in the truck, would be allowed. Additionally now, other agency vehicles, if parked inside the camps, can be used to transport agency personal within the camps. Personal have to move out of these vehicles when they leave the camps, and use the vehicles they arrived in for road travel. I think this is a functioning deal, especially the first part. The second part of the deal is in progress. But it has not been so reported, I don’t think, internationally. Relief supplies have never been restricted, as far as I know.

Unquote

This is what Mr. Nesan Shankar Raji, Senior Leader & spokesperson, EROS & EDF who personally visits the camps had to say

It may be that our people have to be temporarily housed in IDP camps until the areas where they are from are de-mined & cleared of weapons …. used by the LTTE. Civilians in these camps also need to be screened & their identities verified & cross-checked for national security purposes. This is the duty of any responsible Government in power as there are many ex-LTTE Intel agents … including former cadres who need to be rehabilitated before being re-introduced back in to ordinary civilian life. These camps constructed by the SL Govt are a far cry from Concentration Camps as they are being labeled by … LTTE supporters in the West …

Unquote

Large scale displacement of people occurred before, in the East, where 211,850 IDP’s existed. The difference between the East and the North was that the LTTE cadres moved North to rejoin the main body rather than disperse into the Eastern IDP population, making the task of resettlement easier.

Strangely the intensity of pressure from the Tiger Diaspora (distinct from the Tamil Diaspora) was of a lower key then, than now.

Is it an indication that the real reason for the intensified pressure in the case of the Northern IDP’s (about 40,000 more than in the East) is to get the LTTE cadres enlarged?

This is what UNHCR has to say about resettlement of the Eastern IDP’s

However, there was a measure of stability in the east of the country, where the Government organized a large-scale return operation in 2007. Provincial elections were held in the first half of 2008, and UNHCR assisted IDP returnees to the area with their reintegration. Between August 2006 and the end of July 2008, some 180,610 individuals had returned to Batticaloa and Trincomalee districts.

Unquote

Emotional questions are raised why children and women cannot be released. Let’s look at the past for answers

February 4, 2009: A 13-year-old LTTE suicide bomber blew herself up after reaching the troops in a location north of Chalai injuring one soldier

November 22, 1990: LTTE’s child soldiers saw their first recorded major action. In this attack on the Mankulam army camp, nearly a third of the Sri Lankan troops were killed

December 4, 1997: gunning down of 200 elite government troops in Kanakarankulam, Wanni by the Leopard Brigade or Siruthai Puli which consists exclusively of children

26 LTTE child soldiers, including four girls who surrendered to SL forces at Mankulam, in early October 1998, disclosed that the LTTE kidnapped and recruited them into its fighting forces. Some of them were picked up from their homes while others were hustled into a waiting vehicle

Women pose a bigger security problem than men as a higher proportion of women were Suicide Terrorists

The carnage from the following two incidents did not discriminate between, Tamil, Muslim or Sinhalese. Children, Women, Men, the old and the infirm

January 31, 1996: A suicide bomber attacks the Central bank and kills 91 people and wounded 1,400 others

April 21st 1987: Central Bus Stand in Colombo was bombed. Kills 110 civilians, Injures 298 and permanently disables 40. LTTE Cadres killed zero

These two incidents out of the many, are mentioned to show what a hidden terrorist or a suicide cadre can do.

The need to screen is justified even with the small sample of terror attacks stated above when weighed against the temporary loss of liberty of 260,000 (this figure may now be 220,000 if the announced release of 40,000 had actually taken place) against the possible carnage among 20,000,000

Emotively this is inhuman but rationally sound.

What is required is to do everything within the Govts power to provide all possible comforts to the IDP’s. Everyone who has genuine concern for the innocent people within the IDP camps and the 20,000,000 living outside it, should help the govt to do so as it did in the East without diverting its energies elsewhere

Sri lanka will keep getting GSP irrespective of all the reports by AI, HRW, ICJ, ICG, IBA, …. because there are multilateral ompanies that want fat profits and rich consumers that want cheap prices and western politicians can sometimes be pushed around the thumbs of businessmen and not under the criteria of ‘human rights for all.’

Those who keep oppressing Tamils for sixty one and a half years call the westerners ‘white tigers’ one moment when they talk about human rights and then the next moment ask for GSP(and or employ PR companies to go backdoors).

This ‘interconnected’ world favours the oppressors and the oppressed will have to decay and disappear. The world won’t have to wait for long to see that.