i wish this man (FM ) can go to a mother who`s son is abducted. and tell them this.
i wonder if this man have a son or daughter and let me pray to god that someone must abduct them. then if he can lie by his teeth.
if justice to pravail some do gooders must make these people feel the pain.
it is our own mistake that we did not share our sufferings with sinhalese , we suffered alone at all time.
now only tamils are abducted , they simply say , oops no abduction here its they gone on holiday without telling their parents,wife and childrens,
they can be explained by poor record-keeping rather than sinister activities, the country`s foreign minister said on Friday.
Rohitha Bogollagama also told Reuters that the tropical island needed no external help to investigate cases of civilians who have disappeared amid renewed civil war between the state and separatist Tamil Tiger rebels.
Some officials have said many of those reported missing had gone on holiday abroad or eloped with lovers.
Colombo is under international pressure to investigate accusations of abuse by the military as it fights the separatist Tigers in a conflict that has killed about 70,000 people since
1983.
Rights groups say hundreds of people, many of them minority ethnic Tamils, have been reported abducted or disappeared this year and 1,000 more in 2006. Rebels, paramilitaries, members of the security forces and underworld gangs have all been blamed.
---
Relatives of Sri Lanka `disappeared` demand answers
[ Reuters ][ Aug 01 18:11 GMT ]
The Civil Monitoring Commission rights group, trying to solve 133 cases of disappearances of mainly ethnic Tamils, has called on the government to prove its claim that many of the reported missing have simply gone abroad or eloped with lovers. `We are asking the government: What has happened to these people?` said commission head Mano Ganeshan. `The government has appointed several commissions to enquire about this, but nothing came of it. Still they are missing.`
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/08/01/asia/AS-GEN-Sri-Lanka-The-Disappeared.php
Hundreds of relatives demand justice for missing people in Sri Lanka
The Associated Press
Published: August 1, 2007
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COLOMBO, Sri Lanka: Hundreds of Sri Lankans, many carrying photos of their abducted relatives, tearfully demanded Wednesday that the government investigate the fates of scores of minority Tamils who have `disappeared` across the country in recent months.
Civil rights groups say more than 100 ethnic Tamils have been kidnapped amid the new wave of fighting between Tamil Tiger rebels and the government, which is controlled by the majority Sinhalese community. The fighting has plunged parts of the country into chaos and displaced tens of thousands of people.
Shaking with emotion, Thevani Yogarajan, 50, said her husband, a Pentecostal minister, and two sons, both in their 20s, have not been heard from since they went to the capital, Colombo, in March to get passports so they could travel to
India and escape the fighting.
`Give me my innocent children. They haven`t harmed anyone. Please give them back,` she wailed to the crowd at the rally in Colombo organized by the Civil Monitoring Commission, a group that campaigns against abductions.
`How can I live when three members of my family have gone missing?` she asked before fainting.
Sirithunga Jayasuriya, chairman of the group, blamed the government for the abductions. He said most of those taken attended Tamil Tiger rallies, and the kidnappings were the government`s retribution.
Other rights groups have accused the government of summarily executing those suspected of links to the Tamil separatists.
Several spokesmen for the government and police declined to comment on the allegations when asked by The Associated Press. Government officials have repeatedly denied such accusations in the past.
A total of 155 people have been kidnapped in the Colombo area since last year, Jayasuriya said. Of those, 16 were released after their families paid a ransom, he said. Only five of those kidnapped were Sinhalese, he said.
Many of those abducted were snatched when they fled to the capital from war-torn areas, their relatives said. Others were from Colombo. Some of their abductors demanded a ransom, while others were silent.
`The government must take speedy action to investigate the abductions, otherwise we will have reasonable doubt about the government`s complicity in them,` said
Ranil Wickremesinghe, the opposition leader in Parliament.
More than 300 people packed a hall in Colombo on Wednesday to discuss what to do about their missing relatives. Some carried photographs of the missing. Many were weeping, while others shouted in anger, demanding the government find their loved ones.
The families said many of the victims were abducted by masked men in white vans, reminiscent of abductions that occurred earlier in the country`s more than two-decade war and were also blamed on security forces.
Badra Ruhunage, 37, said men in a white van snatched her husband, Vairamuttu Varadarasan, 40, in January and she has heard nothing about his fate.
`It ruined our lives,` she said. `I have five children and how can I feed them?`
Violence has soared between government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels since December 2005, killing more than 5,000 people in clashes, assassinations and air attacks, despite a Norway-brokered 2002 cease-fire.
Mahinda `lying` on disappearances
BBC
President is accused of lying to the relatives of those disappeared
Human rights activists in Sri Lanka have accused President Rajapaksa of trying to introduce peace meal solutions to rights violations.
Chairman of the Civil Monitoring Committee (CMC), Siritunga Jayasuriya said the President has learnt a new tactic to solve burning problems in the country.
`When an issue is raised, he call the affected and comfort them and send them back,` Jayasuriya told a press gathering in Colombo.
Haiti and Somalia
`It is therefore, I think it is time for us to come to the streets`.
The main opposition meanwhile accused the government of bringing the human rights situation similar to that of countries like Haiti and Somalia.
When an issue is raised, he (President) call the affected and comfort them and send them back
Siritunga Jayasuriya
Opposition and United National Party (
UNP) leader Ranil Wickramasinghe said people are entitled to seek help from foreign countries as human rights situation deteriorate.
`We can seek help from anybody to protect our sovereignty,` he told journalists.
The CMC has convened a meeting of the relatives of those disappeared to the capital on Monday.
1000 relatives gathered
Over one thousand relatives who gathered to the capital accused President Rajapaksa`s government of lying on what happened to their relatives.
President asked us not to sling mud on the government
A relative of a disappeared
Subramanium Logendrarajah, from Borella, said his daughter, Komathie, disappeared on 22 August 2006.
When the relatives of the disappeared met President Rajapaksa, they were told that nearly 90 per cent of who were reported as missing have either come back home or gone abroad.
`Slinging mud` on government
`President asked us not to sling mud on the government,` he said.
CMC convenor parliamentarian Mano Ganeshan questioned President Rajapaksa: `Whom are you lying this?`
DA Hariet Nona, form Maradankadawala, said that she heard no news of her son and his wife since they disappeared a year ago.
The CMC has already recorded 133 incidents of disappearances.
