Keep away from internal politics

Federation of Buddhist Organisations tells British HC:

Chamikara Weerasinghe

COLOMBO: The Federation of Buddhist Organisations has asked the British High Commission in Sri Lanka to act responsibly and refrain from making statements which according to it, constitute an interference in the country’s internal politics.

Federation reprsentatives met Second Secretary of the British Head of Mission, John Culley on Monday, over certain statements made by the British High Commissioner.

The Secretary of the Federation of Buddhist Organisations, Gallage Punyawardena said they had been requesting a meeting with the British High Commissioner for the last two weeks to discuss several sensitive statements the Commissioner had made, which directly interfere in the country’s politics.

Punyawardena said the British Mission had once stated at a Humanitarian Forum in Colombo that “ it would be a serious miscalculation to believe that the country’s problems could be solved militarily and strongly advocating cessation of military action and for starting dialogue.”

Punyawardena said that they had met the Mission’s Second Secretary Culley who said the British High Commissioner was unable to meet them then (on Monday).

However, Culley had promised to arrange a meeting with the High Commissioner on a later occasion, he said.

He said, the reason for their growing concern was that the British High Commissioner was making these statements at a time the Government was taking meaningful steps to curb LTTE terrorism.

“Besides there have been continuous requests and interferences to the Sri Lankan Government by the British Government, to stop offensive operations against the LTTE and continuously highlighting the need for a negotiated settlement especially when the LTTE terrorists were suffering setbacks,” he pointed out.

British MPs appeared to have made severe interferences into administrative politics of Sri Lanka when they made statements in the British House of Commons,

They were unneccessarily overstepping into areas outside their power violating all conventions, he added.