US Congressmen, Senate now favourable to Lanka - Envoy

Ravi LADDUWAHETTY

Congressmen and the Senate in the United States have now turned favourable to Sri Lanka with the unflagging efforts of the Sri Lankan embassy in Washington successfully reversing the opinion they had over the years on Sri Lanka.

"The Sri Lankan embassy and I have personally met a majority of the Congressmen and the Senators and we have painted a true picture of Sri Lanka which had hitherto been adverse, thanks to the LTTE propaganda which went on for years,

Sri Lanka's envoy to Washington Jaliya Wickremasuriya told the Daily News yesterday.

There are 435 members of the US Congress and over 100 members of the Senate and I have met a majority of them on a one- on- one basis since I took over and I have explained the true image on Sri Lanka and they are favourably disposed towards that, he said.

"I do not know whether there has been a single instance in the past 60 years where a Sri Lankan diplomat has met the members of the US Congress or the Senate on an individual basis explaining the rue picture of Sri Lanka, but it is also sad that some members of the pro- LTTE diaspora have gone from room to room saying things to the contrary. But the US Congressmen and the Senators have now been apprised of the true situation in Sri Lanka, he explained," he said.

He also asserted that the Sri Lankan diaspora in the US was very active and favourable and well disposed towards the country who in turn have advised the Congressmen in their own states.

These congressmen also listen to the Sri Lankan diaspora attentively as they are dependent on their votes as well. Efforts have been made to correct the opinion they had all this time of Sri Lanka, the envoy remarked. "Some of the Sri Lankan diaspora members who have been favourably disposed towards Sri Lanka, had told the Congressmen that Sri Lanka had dramatically changed in the last two years, where anyone could freely travel the length and breath of the country without succumbing to bombs and landmines and that all of safe and moreso, that the country was ready to leapfrog in terms of economic development," Wickremasuriya said.

"It has also been stressed to the US Congress and Senators that the lives of thousands of child soldiers and 11,000 LTTE combatants have been rehabilitated and that they also could get about their lives like any other Sri Lankan citizens and that the human rights were maintained countrywide across of the length and breath of the country," he said.