Sacrifices not in vain - Dr. Kohona

Manjula Fernando

Sri Lanka has after 26 year of struggle defeated one of the most brutal terrorist organisations in the world. It was not an easy task and many thousands of lives had to be sacrificed to achieve this, Foreign Secretary Dr. Palitha Kohona told the Daily News yesterday.

"Today we have enormous challenges before us to ensure that these sacrifices were not in vain. We must grab this opportunity to rebuild our country, to restore confidence and re-integrate all members of our community," he said. "This will include rehabilitating and re-integrating combatants who for various reasons participated in pro-LTTE activities. Forgiveness must be a key word in our approach consistent with the most valued traditions of our culture," Dr. Kohona said.

"The Government is totally committed to ensuring that a sustainable peace is achieved. We hope that the international community and international organisations will contribute pro-actively to realising our dream. At this point, we hope that the international community would appreciate the enormity of our achievement which was substantially our own.

I also take this opportunity to express our gratitude to our friends who stood by us faithfully during this dark period of our history."