Fonseka’s credentials questioned

Lakshmi de Silva

The normal procedure for obtaining US citizenship after obtaining the Green Card is to live in the US for five years but it could be obtained by an applicant circumventing the residence rule, Immigration, Human and Fundamental Rights Lawyer Vijitha de Alwis said yesterday.

This is possible if the head of the US Central Intelligence Agency, Attorney General or Head of Immigration Naturalization advising that an applicant for citizenship could provide confidential information vital to their country.

“Therefore we have to ask NDF presidential candidate Sarath Fonseka whether he had given State secrets to the US seeking citizenship in that country”, he said.

Addressing a press conference at the Mahaveli Centre Colombo, de Alwis said a condition for US citizenship is that an applicant should swear that he/she does not owe allegiance to any other country. Therefore any member of the public had a right to ask Fonseka whether he had obtained US citizenship by resorting to giving confidential defence information to the US authorities.

As Fonseka was also the Chief of Defence Staff as well as the Army Commander he was privy to defence and other official secrets. He may have divulged them to the US authorities to make his case for US citizenship strong.

The public have a right to know it and if a similar person was contesting a high office in another country that person would have been behind bars, de Alwis said. On the other hand, Fonseka is saying he won the war but that was only part of the truth. We respect him for having led the Army on the ground to victory over the LTTE terrorists but the Navy and Air Force made their own contribution to the victory.

The leadership of President Mahinda Rajapaksa who did not bow before international pressure was the main factor that led to the defeat of terrorism. For instance when David Miliband came to pressurize us to stop the war, President Rajapaksa said Miliband was serving his people and President Rajapaksa was serving the people of Sri Lanka.

He did not bow before international pressure to stop the war, Alwis said.

Police Inspector Bastiampillai who was one of the first victims of the terrorists had told him that terrorism would not be finished during our lifetime but we have to thank President Rajapaksa for defeating terrorists during our lifetime itself he also said.