IDPs - our spokesmen of future
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Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama in an
interview with Al-Jazeera TV on June 4, 2009 said that our future
spokesmen in terms of the reconciliation process would be Tamil
civilians who were held captive by the LTTE and now cared for by the
Government in welfare villages. Excerpts of the interview are given
below.
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Presenter: First of all on
the Navy seizing a ship laden with medicine, food and other supplies
they claim its carrying provisions for the defeated rebels, the mission
organisers say it is for Tamil civilians. Do you know anything about it?
Minister: Obviously any
ship coming into territorial waters of a country has to be cleared in
terms of its requirement for clearance. In an event any ship trying to
enter our waters, we have the right of arrest and we must inspect and
that is a procedure.
Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama |
In this regard whatever action we are taking is a legitimate purpose
towards establishing the intentions of the ones who are trying to bring
this ship in.
It can be threatening to our national security or at the same time it
can be a humanitarian exercise. But let us examine that and let us
respond accordingly.
Presenter: Ok we will talk
about national security in just a moment. First of all let us put that
first question from one of our voice spots outside parliament - the
young lad said “I just hope”. Can you promise that Tamils will be safe?
Minister: What about the
Tamils who are already there in the country? Aren’t they safe? 54% of
the Tamil community live outside the North and East provinces of Sri
Lanka and they are amongst other communities and how safe are they? They
have lived all this time, they have prospered and so much of investments
have taken place even in the heart of Colombo running into billions of
rupees and all that have been made by the Tamil community.
Haven’t they been safe all this time? What about their confidence in
the system? What about those who are coming into the country? One’s who
have fled the hold of the LTTE a few weeks ago are now part of community
very much and they are being cared for by the Govt of Sri Lanka.
What about the parents of Prabhakaran, they tyrant Prabhakaran, they
are being cared for by the Govt of Sri Lanka.
Why is this propaganda spin being given that Tamils are not safe in
Sri Lanka? They were not safe when the LTTE was holding them throughout
in the three provinces finally that fell into the hands of the Govt - in
Mannar, Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu, that is the record that the LTTE
brought about and we must put an end to this type of spin being given by
interested groups still batting for the LTTE.
This young lad you just mentioned, they are being misguided.
It is a sin to misguide the youth and the very young ones. That was
part of the LTTE strategy also. How many young people lost their youth
because of the LTTE, becoming child soldiers?
Presenter: You talk about
human cost. One figure I saw, the human cost - 6000 Sri Lankan soldiers
killed in the last 3 yrs of the war; many more Tiger rebels lost their
lives. How do you begin a reconciliation process which is the subject of
another one of questions? How do you begin that after what is it 21 yrs
of the war and after so many have died?
Minister: It is more than
21yrs - 27 yrs where the LTTE was trying to become a terrorist outfit in
Sri Lanka and played that into the highest degree in becoming the
world’s most brutal terrorist organisation.
That is now the history or is a matter of yesterday where Sri Lanka
is concerned.
We have completely eliminated the LTTE as a terrorist organisation
within Sri Lanka. But there can be certain concerns we still have in the
international community that is why we are trying to have a
comprehensive engagement with the outside world so that we could see
that the LTTE will not be able to manifest in various other forms in the
world.
We will be addressing that as a matter of priority. Now about the
reconciliation - right now we have got 300,000 our Sri Lankans coming
from the Tamil community who were held hitherto by the LTTE in the
no-fire zone as a human shield who escaped the LTTE hold and came into
the hands of the Govt and we are now taking care of them. They are the
ones that will become our spokesman in terms of the reconciliation
process for the future.
Presenter: You are looking
after those who were held as human shield. I want to move on to this
call for war crime investigators, the allegations of war crimes in Sri
Lanka. The UN shrugged off calls for an inquiry. Would you welcome an
inquiry to ‘clear the air’ if nothing else?
Minister: Let us
understand the definition of war crime, how the definition is being
given and within the framework of that definition where do you get Sri
Lanka coming in? A democracy, exercising the legitimate right against
terrorism and dealing with terrorism is the right that everyone has to
deal with. And if we fail to deal with terrorism during our period in
office, we will be held accountable by our people to have failed in
permitting terrorism to be there and we have done so.
Today I am happy to announce that we have eliminated terrorism
because we dealt with it. That won’t come within the definition of war
crimes that people are trying to once again try to hype this up
unnecessarily.
Presenter: Ok. You are
resisting calls for investigators to go in, I want to move on to the
displaced - the huge number of people who have left their homes, who
have fled the fighting at the beginning, many hundreds of thousands. How
or what action are you taking now to try and return those displaced to
their homes and are you allowing complete humanitarian access to the
camps?
Minister: This is already
allowed. There are over 52 agencies working within the camps, within the
villages which is termed as the welfare villages. The UN agencies are
already there, we have got around 16 INGOs, another 24 NGOs who are
backed by other international organisations the ICRC included. We are
looking forward to seeing that they return back to their places of
original habitat.
That is what is most important to us not to keep them in the welfare
villages but to see that they return to their own villages where we will
develop the infrastructure. We will provide water, electricity and
housing.
One may ask how we are going to do this. But we have done this
previously on two occasions - once when tsunami struck us in the North
and the East. We have cleared those areas and we have restored normalcy
to all parts of the Eastern and Southern parts of Sri Lanka.
We have done that once again in 2007 to 2008 in the eastern part of
Sri Lanka when we cleared the area from the LTTE hold. |