Clinton’s irresponsible statement on Security Forces :

Lankan military victory irks US Forces

Wijitha NAKKAWITA

The recent utterance by the former US First Lady and present Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the UN Security Council that the Sri Lanka Armed Forces used rape as a tool of war to defeat the LTTE is a case of audacity coupled with irresponsibility of a person who holds a very high office in her country.

If one goes by the past records of the USA, as well as its current record overseas, it is common knowledge that the US has the worst human rights record in the past and the present. To begin with its three century old history one could not forget that whole tribes of indigenous peoples were annihilated by first white settlers who were given the misnomer pilgrim fathers and their armies with classic cases of killers like Custer who spent his lifetime killing the indigenous people of their country now called the US.

There was one incident I would like to recall from 1984. At that time a certain US Under Secretary Murphy came to Colombo and he summoned all the US Ambassadors of the South Asian region to Colombo for a meeting at the US Embassy. The picture of Murphy with the ambassadors came to be published in the newspapers the next day. I saw that picture with a friend of mine Nandasiri de Alwis who was the Deputy Editor of the Lankadeepa.

Nande, I am sure that a leader in one of the countries of South Asia would be assassinated soon but I don’t know who it could be, I told my friend.

When he asked me why I told him that the US had its own ways of getting rid of leaders whom they considered as impeding the US international or regional agendas. I also told him that it will not be the Sri Lanka President but it would be some other Asian leader. For our President at the time was J. R. Jayewardene who was also known as Yankee Dicky as he was known to be a great admirer of the US.

A few days later I was in Ampara and on that day I heard Indian Premier Indira Gandhi was shot by her Sikh bodyguards. I phoned Nandasiri at Lankadeepa to enquire about the incident.

He said, “You were right. It was Indira and her condition is bad. She may not live.”

Hillary Clinton and others in the US who concern themselves about human rights of other countries become voiceless when rogue States among their axis like Israel commit blatant violation of human rights, killing infants like the terrorist group the now defeated LTTE did. Since our Army had not only defeated the terrorist group with the least harm to the civilians of the North, Hilary Clinton’s absurd claim should be treated with the contempt it deserves.

It is no secret that the LTTE terrorist group and its International propaganda arm had been working overtime in most Western countries raising funds and worming their way into influential people including certain politicians.

It is well known that most US citizens are not aware about what happens in our country and still less about the Armed Forces. It had been said that the US civilization has been called with good reasons a civilization in recline and the longest trip on foot the citizen makes is between the fridge and the armchair or divan opposite the TV. So that these people are not concerned about our countries.

Though the LTTE terrorists were defeated by our Armed Forces by no stretch of imagination could one assume that sympathizers and even members of the terrorist group are not still living overseas and are not trying to do whatever they could to discredit the Sri Lanka Armed Forces whenever they could do it. Hillary Clinton and her department may not be sacrosanct or foolproof for such elements to have influence with some elements in it.

Most US administrations except those of Abe Lincoln or Woodrow Wilson and just a few others cannot be taken as those safeguarding human rights as they had continued to condone violations by some countries friendly to them and have gone or record as killing civilians during military attacks on Iraq or Afghanistan.

But perhaps the US did not believe we could defeat the most terrible terrorist group the LTTE and have good reason to be disappointed even after many years of the 9/11 tragedy failing to defeat the terrorist group responsible. Therefore, when a small country like ours defeats the most terrible terrorist group it may be irking the US administration. We should sympathize with them as we are aware how terrible terrorism was.