Ananda w. P. Guruge

BUDDHISM TODAY AND AESTHETIC CREATIVITY – A MISCELLANY OF RECENT ARTICLES, ESSAYS AND SPEECHES covers many areas of my personal interests in the field of Buddhist studies and action. I have shared these views, opinions, observations and concerns with many audiences in all parts of the world over the last decade. The decision to compile them into a single volume is in response to many requests I receive for copies.

These articles, essays and speeches portray a range of subjects on which most Buddhists and friends of Buddhism seek information, clarification, explanation and solution. I have done my best to share my knowledge and understanding. The treatment of each subject was determined by the nature of the invitation, the kind of targeted audience or readership or the requirements of the organizer or publisher. As such they are not exhaustive or complete. Time and space had necessitated brevity and precision. Some of the subjects dealt with here would require individual treatises if they are to be treated in adequate detail. In many instances, I have indicated where further research is required.

I have been fortunate that a large group of international friends, colleagues and acquaintances have circulated my writings through periodicals, felicitation volumes and Internet forums and that enabled me to limit what I needed to include in this volume. For example I have left out the articles contributed to Venerable Hammalawa Saddhatissa, Venerable Dhammavihari, Venerable Kakkapalliye Anuruddha, Saddhamangala Karunaratne and N. H. Samtani Felicitation Volumes and the Jagajjyoti Centennial Volume.

During the decade under review my output had been many times more despite intermittent health problems. It is my intention to bring out a compilation of Sinhala writings separately. I have also not included what is available through other media such as YouTube and www.closertotruth.com . This website is due to make available several hours of intense interviews I have had with Dr. Robert L. Kuhn on many philosophical and metaphysical issues from the Buddhist point of view.

The motivation for this publication came from a letter to the editor of Island Newspaper of Sri Lanka in response to an appreciation which Dr. Laksiri Jaysuriya of Perth, Australia and I from Los Angeles, USA wrote jointly on late Mr. Padmal de Silva of the University of London. We made reference to the vast array of articles which Padmal had published through Western periodicals on Buddhist approach to psychotherapy and ranked him as an outstanding contributor to the advancement of knowledge in this field. The writer complained that these articles were not accessible to readers in Sri Lanka and mentioned also that a similar situation existed with regard to my writings as well as the erudite contributions on a variety of subjects by Professor Laksiri Jayasuriya. As a remedial measure, I have agreed to a generous proposal of Mr. Sirisumana Godage of the Godage International Publishers of Maradana, Colombo to bring out in a series my complete works in Sinhala and English, commencing with articles published from the age of seventeen as a school boy of Dharmaraja College, Kandy.

My major works are in Sri Lankan editions. ASOKA THE RIGHTEOUS: A DEFINITIVE BIOGRAPHY has been translated into Sinhala by Jinasoma Weerasooriya and published by Sirisumana Godage following an initiative taken by His Excellency Mahinda Rajapakse as Prime Minister. Professor Tissa Kariyawasam translated my MAHAVAMSA into Sinhala and once again it was published by Godage International Publishers who also issued a second edition of the original in English.

Already Sri Lankan editions have been published of my novels SERENDITPITY OF ANDREW GEORGE and PEACE AT LAST IN PARADISE. It is proposed to bring out a Sri Lankan Edition of the first volume of this Trilogy FREE AT LAST IN PARADISE so that my complete Sri Lankan Trilogy on Freedom to Peace will be available to Sri Lankan readers at a reasonable price. In addition, I have donated all my archival material to the National Archives Department of Sri Lanka, where the Director Dr. Saroja Wettasinghe has already put them on display for the use of researchers.

Teaching, speaking and writing on various aspects of Buddhism have occupied a fair amount of my time and energy from my younger days as when the first ever Buddhist journal of the University of Ceylon was edited and produced by me as PATIPADA in 1948 at the age of nineteen years. Traveling to all corners of the world to meet diverse audiences to deliver speeches or moderate seminars or organize conferences has been a visible reward. But the real reward of sheer joy comes from meeting persons who recall what they have heard or read and tell how much the sharing of my views had contributed to their pursuit of the study of Buddhism. I expect no less from this volume.

Neither the intellectual preparation and the actual writing nor the travel around the world to deliver these speeches would have been possible without the generous support and encouragement of my family to whom I can never be too grateful. Once again, I express my indebtedness to my wife Darshanika, the children Anura, Mardhavi Sakuntala and Nisala Abhimana and my grandchildren Danielle, Matthew, Devanee and Tieschan. It is with justifiable pride that I include as a frontispiece a poem written by my grandson Matthew, age 17, who no doubt is inspired to carry on to the third generation the family tradition of a father and a grandfather who have many books and articles to their credit.

Sabbe satta bhavantu sukhittatta:
May all beings be happy and well.

Ananda w. P. Guruge,
8351 Snowbird Drive,
Huntington Beach, CA 92646

By James Jayalath from Melbourne

http://cjpcbrisbane.wordpress.com

Dear Mr. Arndt,

I have read your article published in Catholic Justice and Peace Commission website on 02/03/10 and the Catholic Leader on 07/03/10.

As a Catholic I am ashamed to read articles like this because you attract an audience on the Internet to read utter rubbish, and you want people to believe you and take against our Government. Looks like your wish to see our country fail miserably in economic front but I can tell you one thing, people like you are absolute disgrace to the Catholic community because you are trying to create divisions in our society not only in Sri Lanka but in Australia too, and I am not sure how you go to Church and worship the Lord every week.

According you article you have asked the federal government to take strong actions against human right violations in Sri Lanka. Mr. Arndt where were you when LTTE thugs were ruining our country and killing unarmed civilians for the past 30 years. Were you in a Coma? Do not try to promote hatred using religion when you know whole heartedly how some citizens treat Aboriginal people in Australia. Some Western Governments violate human rights in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq. Why don’t you have guts to write any articles about those issues? Our Sri Lankan President took firm action to destroy terrorism and that was an action against ruthless Tiger movement not against Tamil people. People who migrated to Western countries as refugees (especially LTTE sympathisers) did not want this war to end, but fortunately due to a strong leadership and our war hero’s, they were able to crushed our enemies(LTTE thugs). Some Western Governments tried their best to stop the war at any cost, but sadly they failed and still try to intervene with baseless allegations. Our country needs support to develop not harassment from individuals like you.

 Mr. Arndt if you have nothing to do during your leisure time I have a small suggestion for you. Buy an Air ticket and fly to Sri Lanka and enjoy our Sri Lankan hospitality, and visit a place called Galle Face where you can fly kites (A light framework covered with cloth, plastic, or paper, designed to be flown in the wind at the end of a long string) for leisure. Please keep your hands off from our beautiful country and let people who suffered for 30 years enjoy the freedom with support from our Government and other parts of the world to develop the Nation for every race to live in peace and harmony.

Yours sincerely,

James Jayalath

By Dr.Levins T.C.Rajaratnam

The Philosophy of Politics and the Philosophy of Law (jurisprudence) are often studied separately, but they both come back to the same thing: the study of force. Politics is the study of political force in the general community and jurisprudence is the study of how laws can and should be used to achieve political and social goals. Many religious theists believe that both law and politics should be based on a religious foundation, and in particular on the commands of some alleged god. Without that foundation, they argue, both law and politics will be illegitimate uses of force.

 Why Should Atheists Care About Political and Legal Philosophy?:

Most atheists recognize that the separation of church and state are important to their ability to be free of having religion imposed upon them. Not all realize that separation is based upon a more fundamental political and legal philosophy which theocrats on the Christian Right don’t accept. Debates over church/state separation are thus debates over political and legal philosophy and one reason why such debates often don’t go anywhere is because, in not realizing all this, people fail to address the more fundamental disagreements that are really at issue — like the legitimate authority of government, for example.

 What is Political Philosophy?:

Political Philosophy is primarily constrained to the workings of governments and nations — how they developed, why they developed, which systems are better than others, what the purpose of government should be, etc. All of this is closely related to Ethics, because so much is dependent upon what actions are right; but there is the added element of what actions can and should be constrained by outside human forces. There is much debate in America over how much separation there can or should be between politics and people’s religious beliefs. Can people, for example, base public policy on private religious revelation?

 What is Legal Philosophy or the Philosophy of Law?:

Legal Philosophy focuses on laws and legal systems: how laws came to be, what laws are better than others, what the purpose of law should be, whether or not laws should be obeyed, etc. Because political systems are dependent upon the law, legal philosophy is at the heart of political philosophy. Legal Philosophy is often studied in an effort to elucidate the way in which human nature and social nature need to be expressed and controlled through the law. There is significant effort from some Christians, especially Christian Reconstructionists, to re-make American law along the lines of Old Testament religious law.

 Exploitation of principles of Philosophy & Law

What is Law ? Law is the command of the sovereign state. It can be a just law or an unjust law. Law is exploited to the extent it could be allowed when the Judiciary turns a blind eye.

Reflections by comrade Fidel

It is not an ideological issue related to the definitive hope that a better world is, and should be, possible.

It is a known fact that the homo sapiens has existed for about 200 thousand years, which is no more than a tiny span of the time passed since the emergence of the first basic forms of life on our planet approximately three billion years ago.

The answers to the unfathomable mysteries of life and nature have fundamentally been religious. It would be senseless to pretend otherwise and I am convinced that it will forever be this way. The deeper science delves into the explanation of universe, space, time, matter and energy; the infinite galaxies and the theories of the origin of the constellations and the stars; the atoms and the fractions of them that made possible life and its briefness; the more questions man will have in search of ever more complex and difficult rationalizations.

The more involved human beings are in the quest for answers to such deep and complex endeavors related to reason, the more significant the efforts will be to release them from their enormous ignorance on the true possibilities of what our intelligent species has created and can still create. Living and ignoring it is tantamount to a complete denial of our human condition.

However, something is absolutely certain: very few even imagine how close we might be to the extinction of our species. Nearly twenty years back, at a World Summit on the environment held in Rio de Janeiro, I brought up this danger before a selective audience of Heads of State and Government who listened with respect and interest albeit unconcerned for a risk they perceived to be centuries or perhaps millenniums away. They certainly felt that science and technology plus a basic sense of responsibility would suffice to tackle the problem. That important summit happily concluded with a great photo-op of distinguished characters, including the most powerful and influential. There was no danger whatsoever.

Hardly anyone talked about climate change then. George Bush senior and other dazzling leaders of the North Atlantic Alliance enjoyed victory over the European socialist camp. The Soviet Union was dismembered and in ruins. A huge amount of Russian money ended up in the Western banks, its economy broke up and their defensive shield vis-à-vis NATO military base was dismantled.

The former superpower that had contributed the lives of over 25 million of its people to World War II was left with only the nuclear power capability for a strategic response, something it had been forced to create after the United States secretly developed the nuclear bomb that it dropped on two Japanese cities when the adversary, already defeated by the irrepressible advance of the allied forces, was unable to fight.

Such was the beginning of the Cold War and the production of thousands of increasingly destructive and accurate thermonuclear weapons capable of annihilating the population of the planet several times over. Nevertheless, the nuclear confrontation continued while the weapons grew more accurate and destructive. Russia does not resign itself to the unipolar world that Washington intends to impose. Other nations such as China, India and Brazil are emerging with unexpected economic strength.

For the first time, in a globalized world full of contradictions the human species has created the capacity for self destruction. This in addition to unprecedented cruel arms such as chemical and bacteriological weapons: like napalm and white phosphorous used with total impunity against the civilian populations, the electromagnetic weapons and other forms of extermination.

No place on earth or in the sea, no matter how deep, is beyond reach of the current means of war.

It is known that tens of thousands of nuclear devices have been produced, even portable ones.

The greatest risk stems from the judgment of leaders with such decision-making power that mistakes or madness, so common in human nature, could lead to unspeakable catastrophes.

Almost 65 years have passed since the explosion of the first two nuclear artifacts due to the decision of a mediocre individual who was left in command of the rich and mighty American power after Roosevelt’s death.

Today, eight countries are in possession of such weapons

The military industry is the most prosperous of all and the United States of America the largest exporter of weapons.

If our species can escape the abovementioned risks, there is still a greater one or at least less unavoidable: climate change.

The population of the world today is seven billion, and soon, within 40 years, it will be nine billion. This figure is nine times what it was barely 200 years ago. I dare assume that in the days of ancient Greece the figure was about 40 times lower all over the planet.

What’s amazing in our times is the contradiction between the imperialist bourgeois ideology and the survival of the species. The need for justice among human beings is no longer the issue; this is not only possible but unwavering. The issue now is the right and the possibility of survival of the human species.

The farthest the horizon of knowledge expands to previously unknown limits, the closer humanity is brought to the abyss. All sufferings known so far are hardly a pale reflection of what could lie ahead of humanity.

Three events occurred in only 71 days that humanity cannot overlook.

On December 18, 2009, the international community sustained the most important setback in history as it tried to find a solution to the most serious problem threatening the world at the moment: the necessity to urgently put an end to the emission of greenhouse gases which are causing the gravest problem that mankind has faced until today.

All hopes had converged on the Copenhagen Summit after years of preparation following the Kyoto Protocol that the government of the United States, the most contaminating country in the world, had lightly decided to ignore. The rest of the world community, 192 countries, –this time even the United States included– had committed to promote a new agreement. The American attempt at imposing its hegemonic interest was so shameful that in violation of the most basic democratic principles it tried to force unacceptable conditions on the rest of the world anti-democratically resorting to bilateral arrangements with a group of the most influential United Nations member countries.

The States that make up the international organization were invited to sign a document that is no more than a travesty, a document that relates purely theoretical future contributions to curb climate change.

Barely three weeks had passed when at sunset on January 12, Haiti, the poorest nation in the hemisphere and the first to put an end to the horrible slavery system, was hit by the greatest natural catastrophe in the history of this part of the world: a 7.3 degrees in the Richter scale earthquake only 6.25 miles deep and very close to its coastline struck the capital of the country where most of the dead or missing people lived in fragile houses built with clay. A mountainous and soil-degraded country of 16, 875 square miles where wood is practically the only source of domestic fuel for nine million people.

If there is a place on Earth where a natural catastrophe has become an enormous tragedy that place is Haiti, a symbol of poverty and underdevelopment, where the descendants of Africans live who were brought by the colonialists to work as slaves for white masters.

The event came as a shock to the entire world; people in every corner of the planet were shaken by the filmed images that seemed almost incredible. The injured, bleeding and moribund, crawled among the dead asking for help while the lifeless bodies of their loved ones lay under the debris. According to official estimates, the number of lethal victims exceeded the figure of 200,000.

The country was already occupied by the MINUSTAH forces sent by the United Nations to restore the order subverted by Haitian mercenary forces that instigated by the Bush administration had undertaken actions against the government elected by the Haitian people. Several buildings that sheltered soldiers and commanders of the peacekeeping forces collapsed, too, adding to the painful toll in human lives.

The official reports estimate that, aside from the dead, about 400 thousand Haitian were wounded and several million, almost half the total population were affected. It was a real test for the world community that after the shameful Danish Summit had the duty to show that the rich and developed countries could be capable of tackling the threats of climate change to life on our planet. Haiti must be an example of what the wealthy nations should do for the Third World countries in light of climate change.

You can believe it or not, challenging the data

It is absolutely unthinkable that nine billion human beings who will inhabit the world by 2050 could survive such a catastrophe. There is still the hope that science may find a solution to the energy problem that today forces to consume in 100 more years the remaining gas, liquid and solid fuel that it took nature 400 million years to create. Perhaps science can find a solution to the energy required. The crux of the matter would be to know how long it would be, and how costly, before human beings can cope with the problem, which is not the only one since many other non-renewable minerals and grave problems demand a solution, too. There is one thing we can be sure of based on everything known until today: the closest star is four light-years away from our Sun, at a speed of 187,500 miles per second; maybe, a spaceship could cover that distance in thousands of years. The human beings have no other choice but to live on this planet.

It might seem unnecessary to deal with the subject if only 54 days after the disaster in Haiti, another incredible earthquake, 8.8 degrees in the Richter scale, with its epicenter 93.7 miles northwest of the city of Concepcion and

29.6 miles deep, had not caused another human catastrophe: this time in Chile. It was not the most severe in the history of that sister nation, for it is said that another one in the past reached 9 degrees, but this time is was not only a seismic event.

But, while in Haiti they waited for hours the occurrence of a tidal wave that never happened, the earthquake in Chile was followed by a huge tsunami, which showed up in its coasts almost thirty minutes or an hour later, depending on the distance and the data that are still not accurately known, one whose waves made it as far as Japan. If it had not been for the Chilean experience in facing earthquakes, its sounder constructions and larger resources, the natural phenomenon would have taken the lives of tens of thousands or perhaps hundreds of thousands of people. Yet, it did cause about one thousand fatal victims, according to official reports, thousand of wounded and maybe more than two million people sustained material damages.

Almost the entire population of 17, 094,275 people suffered terribly and still endure the consequences of the earthquake that lasted more than two minutes, its repeated aftershocks and the moving scenes and suffering left behind by the tsunami along its thousands of miles of coastline.

Our Homeland fully sympathizes with and morally supports the material effort that it is the international community’s duty to make in favor of Chile. The Cuban people would not hesitate to do for the fraternal Chilean people anything within the extent of its capabilities from the humane point of view.

I think it is the duty of the international community to objectively report the tragedy sustained by both peoples. It would be cruel, unfair and irresponsible to fail to educate the peoples of the world about the threatening dangers.

Let truth prevail above selfishness and the lies used by imperialism to deceive and confound the peoples!

Fidel Castro Ruz

March 7, 2010

By Malinda Seneviratne

Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu has advocated, alternatively, and how! This was in a piece published in a daily newspaper (‘Rajapaksa regime in grip of “missing enemy” syndrome’). He has for a long time operated like an authority of international relations, advocating an alarmist don’t-upset-the-West line (in June, 2009 he wrote: ‘Sri Lanka’s foreign policy: missing the wood for the trees’, in www.groundviews.org).

Punditry on foreign policy

Now the piece in the daily newspaper is basically an old script which goes like this: Sara and Co quote some dubious and unverified (deliberately) source and howl; the howl is echoed by the likes of Phillip Alston, Susan Rice, Navi Pillai, HRW and AI; then Sara and Co echo back, in solemn tone. If this is the ‘alternative’ policy to what we already have (with all its weaknesses), then there is only one thing to say, ‘thank you, no’. The point is that, Sara is not innocent. Sara is the quintessential agent provocateur; no following as such, compromised by his own contradictions, mischief-making and shady political games with equally shady characters, Sara is the ideal ‘local operator’ for any foreign meddler.

All this is known so I shall not repeat. What was fascinating about his Wednesday howl was his punditry on foreign policy which warrants full quotation:

‘Foreign policy cannot be conducted through allegation and counter allegation, shrill incoherence and what increasingly looks like incomprehension and incompetence. Most importantly governance cannot be served or sustained by conflict and conspiracy, fear, paranoia and insecurity.

If someone had sent this quotation to me sans the rest of the article and without mentioning the author I would have immediately thought, ‘damn, what a great piece on US foreign policy!’

So I thought I’d flesh it out for Sara. I mean ‘allegation’ and ‘counter-allegation’ isn’t that the preserve of Uncle Sam? Remember ‘weapons of mass destruction’ in Iraq, and how Iran is supposed to be making nuclear weapons? Remember how the situation in Grenada in 1983 was seen as a ‘threat to US national security’ and prompted that Reagan administration to send in the marines, taking the luster off the New Jewel Movement and the assassination of that country’s democratically elected Prime Minister, Maurice Bishop? A total of 10,000 US troops landed in that tiny island in the Caribbean Sea with a population of less than 100,000 people. It was called ‘Operation Urgent Fury’. Smiling now, Sara? How about you, Ms. Patricia Butenis?

How about ‘shrill incoherence’? How about comparing, Barack Obama’s ‘concerns’ about Tamil civilians and his relative nonchalance, the victims in Gaza? How about his administrations noises about IDPs in Sri Lanka but his determination to stick with a policy in Afghanistan that is designed to churn out hundreds of thousands of IDPs? How about concerns raised by his minions regarding a doctored tape mischievously aired by Channel 4 news while he sits on incriminating photographs depicting torture perpetrated by US troops? How about championing democracy in unfriendly regimes while being good buddies with military juntas, dictatorships, totalitarian regimes and monarchies? Coherence?

Is it ‘incomprehension’ and ‘incompetence’ on the part of Uncle Sam that hundreds of thousands of civilians are regularly killed or maimed or displaced year in and year out courtesy US foreign policy or a deliberate and coldly calculated strategy which devalues people who are not white or Christian in the rush to secure access to and monopoly of resources and markets?

‘Conflict and conspiracy’: aren’t these two words that stand out as the defining signature of US foreign policy (ref innumerable interventions in dozens of countries all over the world, orchestrating coups, assassinating heads of states etc)?

The fear

There are other ‘key words’ here: fear, paranoia and insecurity. Remember what happened to non-white people and especially those who had names such as Mohammed in the US in the immediate aftermath of 9/11? Remember what the USA did to Japanese American citizens during World War II? I can understand the fear, the paranoia and insecurity that drives US foreign policy because Uncle Sam has been quite the bully for over a century and bullies are the most insecure and paranoid people around. They know that the good times won’t last and spend their hours looking over their shoulders.

I urge Sara to read what the new US Ambassador told us was the US take on human rights: “Promoting human rights is one of our most important global concerns. No country, including the United States, has a perfect record in safeguarding human rights. We too have been criticized. We believe it to be our responsibility, however, to advocate for the rights and freedoms of people worldwide, even while we work to address our own shortcomings.”

Sara may very well believe that he is a champion of human rights in Sri Lanka. I think that’s a load of nonsense because that championing is compromised by crass and petty politicking on his part. Still, if he believes it, fine. He should not go the whole hog so that he can recover some morality in the business. He must show Sri Lanka that he is serious about these things and he has to start by calling out the US of A. We want a quick take; it won’t take much time, Sara. We want a series of articles on the subject (you have the vocabulary, this we know). And we want a treatise on the subject. This side of such an exercise you will not be able to brush off the ‘malice’ tag, trust me on this.

L Peiris

Sri Lanka does not care damn if India does or does not welcome the restrictions that had been imposed on the displaced Tamil civilians in Sri Lanka. Certain restrictions had to be imposed on Sri Lankans of Tamil origin as they were rescued from LTTE terrorist lairs and until circumstances are conducive to resettle them in their original places of habitation.

Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao is not a new kid on the block when it comes to Sri lanka. She can convey her sentiments to President Mahinda Rajapaksa however he should take it with a pinch of sugar as her ideas are always bitter. A historic opportunity to initiate a process of reconciliation where all communities can live in peace and harmony is available but what Nirupama Rao should understand, is that it is for the Tamils to decide if they are for integration or separatism. Sri lanka from North to South, East to West belongs to all Sri Lankans. Why not promote Indian consulates in Galle, Trinco, Batticaloa etc! [Create more Indian soils within Sri Lanka]  

External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna must tell the Rajya Sabha not about the war in Sri Lanka and the search for a political settlement but what he is doing to stop dozens of terrorist groups carrying out terrorist activities in his own back-yard and what political settlement he is going to give them. Our President and government can sort out the internal affairs of Sri Lanka. The biggest humanitarian act., S.M. Krishna can do is to grant citizenship to Tamils in their motherland Tamil Nadu in India, to Tamils who do not want to live and work in Sri Lanka  as Sri Lankans with allegiance to Sri Lanka. This will be the political settlement of the century.

Lanka peiris

India wants to set up a Consul-General’s office in Jaffna to create further mischief for the Sri  Lanbkan people and restore connectivity of separatist ideology and Indian Foreign Secretary, Nirupama Rao is not a babe in the woods in these activities.

Chennai, Mumbai and Kolkata are  the capitals of separate states and each of these states are  larger in area an population than Sri Lanka.  All the other countries have one Office in Sri Lanka and it should be the same for India.

 Why should there be a special objective to cater to the needs of the people of the Jaffna peninsula? Why should the Indian government strengthen the cultural links between the Northern Province in Sri Lanka and Tamil Nadu, the birth place of Tiger terrorists? If India wants they should develop their visa office in Colombo so that any Sri Lankan can obtain visas without standing in mile long ques.

They say once bitten twice shy but unfortunately Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama and others never learn. Agreeing to this  proposal they have given the Indians premises with diplomatic immunity to pry into the internal affairs of the area and the repercussions of this foolish gesture will come to roost in the years to come.

Nava Thakuria

The military ruled Burma (Myanmar) emerges as an important actor on the projected peace talks between the Union government of India and the banned militant group, United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA). An active and influential underground outfit of Northeast India, the ULFA is fighting New Delhi for its core demand of sovereignty for Assam (out of India). The three decades old armed outfit is understood to be responsible for the killing of thousands of people in the State.

The militant outfit reportedly runs few training camps inside the jungles of northern Burma. The cadres of ULFA are using those hideouts, mostly in Sagaing division and Kachin province of Burma, for many years. New Delhi is worried about the hideouts, which have been used by many Northeast militants, and pursuing the military government in Rangoon (now Nay Pie Taw) to take actions against those militants.

However the Burmese junta is yet to initiate for an affective approach to the problem, though they had not hesitated to play tricks with the Indian government for their selfish interest time to time.

New Delhi still believes that ULFA’s military chief Paresh Barua is hiding some where in Burma-China border. The notorious militant leader, as the Indian security agency claims, had recently left Bangladesh for hiding in Burma. Barua might had come to know about the change of Dhaka’s heart towards New Delhi that finally resulted in deporting some top ULFA leaders to India (from Bangladesh) recently.

Meanwhile, in response to the voices of local people, the Assam government is tying to create a peaceful ambience. Recently Dispur played an important role in the release of two top ULFA leaders.

Following the government’s submissions at the designated TADA court in Guwahati on February 16 that Dispur had no objection if ULFA vice-chairman Pradip Gogoi and publicity secretary Mithinga Daimary were given bail, both were granted the same on February 23 last. The court only directed them not to leave Guwahati without prior information and asked them to report to local police stations if they had to leave for their home towns.

Though received bails together, Pradip Gogoi could not complete few follow-up procedures that delayed his release. Of course, Mithinga Daimary came out from the Guwahati jail on February 25. Daimary, 43, served jail terms since he was arrested (and subsequently handed over to Indian authority) during the Bhutan operation in December 2003.

Talking to media persons in Guwahati soon after his release, Daimary, whose real name is Dipak Das expressed his gratitude to the government for his release. Commenting it was a ‘positive response from the governments’, Daimary however maintained that other senior ULFA leaders should also be released for the proposed talks.

Daimary, also a poet with the nick name of Megan Kachari, went to his residence in Barama of Nalbari district. The ULFA leader was emotional while saying that he was ‘returning with an empty hand to an empty home’. Mentionable that Daimary’s mother, elder brother, pregnant sister-in-law, younger sister were killed by unidentified gunmen a decade back.

Pradip Gogoi was finally released from the same jail on March 4. One of the founder-members of ULFA, Gogoi was arrested in 1992 from Kolkata and he had since been behind bars. Talking to media persons at his home in Baksu Mauthgaon of Sibsagar district, Gogoi demanded for the release of all jailed leaders to pursue the peace process.

He even claimed that ULFA’s commander-in-chief Paresh Barua would ‘come for talks if the government creates the right atmosphere for the exercise’. Elaborating about the right atmosphere, Gogoi argued that the government should initiate for the release of all jailed ULFA leaders and also lobby for bringing back ULFA’s general secretary Anup Chetia, who is serving jail term in the Bangladesh capital city Dhaka for many years.

Amazingly, the Guwahati Jail is now home to almost all top leaders except self-syled commander-in-chief Paresh Barua and general secretary Anup Chetia. Those in Guwahati jail include ULFA political adviser Bhimakanta Buragohain (recently shifted from Tezpur to Guwahati), chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa, foreign secretary Shasha Choudhury, finance secretary Chitraban Hazarika, cultural secretary Pranati Deka and deputy commander-in-chief Raju Barua.

During a recent media conversation, while on way to his routine health check up, the ULFA chief Rajkhowa acknowledged his interest for dialogue with the government. He reiterated that the ULFA was keen to solve the long standing conflict situation in Assam. Answering to queries of media persons, Rajkhowa also assured that the outfit would keep the people of Assam into confidence and let them know about any developments in the process.

The local media remains speculative but positive about the talks.

Similarly, various socio-political and advocacy groups of the State came out with their official statements that they want the peace as early as possible. They are unanimous that the common people can not afford the insurgency turned terrorism for decades. Rather they want development and prosperity in a peaceful ambience.

During his recent visit to Northeast, the Indian Union home secretary GK Pillai expressed hope that ULFA leaders would attend the talks. He even clarified that New Delhi would not insist on a formal letter from the outfit expressing its eagerness for discussion.

Mentionable that, the issue of a formal letter from the ULFA leaders remained a major hurdle for the talks between the government and the underground outfit. The Indian Union home minister P Chidambaram had earlier asked for such a letter and the Assam chief minister supported him.

Talking about Paresh Barua, the home secretary Pillai disclosed that he was plying somewhere along the Kachin-China border. He also confirmed that New Delhi had reiterated its request to the Burmese junta to flush out the Northeastern militants from their soil. He expected that Burma would soon launch the operation against the militants.

But the Indian government made it clear that it would go for talks with the militant outfit even without the presence of hard-liner Paresh Barua.

New Delhi maintains that it would continue its effort to bring all the left out ULFA leaders to the negotiation table, who want to talk to the government under the parameters of Indian constitution, in the coming days.

by DEMOS, Courtesy The Island 

Navaneetham Pillay, the UN Human Rights Commissioner, has started her all too familiar, ‘War Crimes Investigation’ refrain once again, to coincide this time, quite ‘accidentally’, with the upcoming parliamentary election. She has been going for Sri Lanka’s jagular ever since the Government crushed her fond band of LTTE terrorists.It has almost become a blood feud that can be satiated only by arraigning Sri Lanka before the UN for ‘war crimes’ aka the crushing of LTTE terrorism! She is of course egged on by notoriously pathological LTTE sympathizers like Miliband (religiously committed mouthpiece of the Tamil Diaspora) and the Vikings et al, in this relentless endeavour. Not that NP needs any encouragement by the West to pursue this vendetta as she apparently seems to have deep, impelling, Tamilian atavistic urges in her own right, to do so.Not at all happy with the round rebuff they received at the hands of the UN when they first yelled for blood,this vengeful cohort is back once again trying to intimidate and demoralize the government of Sri Lanka, on the eve of a crucial parliamentary election. To give the proposed investigation the appearance of a level playing field, NP ventures to name three countries Iran, Sri Lanka and somewhat ‘boldly’, the US (where some Guantanamo prison abuses are thrown in), in regard to alleged human rights violations and war crimes.Why is there complete silence,one may quite righteously and legitimately ask,on the unspeakable atrocities committed in Iraq and Afghanistan? Why such abhorrent selectivity on the basis of differentially applied multiple standards?

by Kath Noble , Courtesy The Island 

The Government invariably responds to such pressure by declaring that those applying it must have ulterior motives. If they are lucky, they are only accused of grubbing for votes. Or they are said to have sour grapes about some petty incident or other. Their advice wasn’t heeded, perhaps. The range of implausible explanations has become quite vast over time. Most are claimed to be actively working towards the resurrection of the LTTE. Fascinatingly complex reasons for this are then suggested.

It is sometimes true. But the actions of Ban Ki-moon should alert people to the fact that there is something more going on here. We need to understand why an official of his standing feels compelled to look into the situation in Sri Lanka, despite the country finally being at peace.

This is what prompted me to request an interview with Professor Francois Houtart, chair of the largely-ignored Dublin Tribunal. His team found the Government guilty of war crimes at a three day session held at Trinity College in January this year.

There are plenty of reasons to question their conclusions.

The report is almost completely lacking in details, and the supporting evidence that the authors say can be found on their website has not been uploaded yet, two months after proceedings closed. Professor Houtart explained that they could produce only a summary of their findings for publication because the documentation submitted was so vast and the organisation responsible for compiling it had limited resources and worked on a purely voluntary basis. The information was available in Rome for anybody to consult, he told me over the phone from his office in Belgium. This may be fair enough, but it makes assessing the validity of the document rather tricky.

Worse, there are some glaring errors.

The document opens with a particularly bad one. It says, ‘From the time the war began in July 2006 through April 2009, according to United Nations internal documents, air raids and the use of heavy weaponry resulted in the death of 116 people per day.’ This implies that about 120,000 people were killed under the watch of Mahinda Rajapaksa, not counting victims of the LTTE and those who succumbed to small arms, mines and due to sickness or the lack of proper food and water, which Professor Houtart acknowledged on questioning was ridiculous. It is more like the total number of dead in 30 years.

Everybody in Sri Lanka knows that the United Nations estimate refers to the final stages of the war and that an extrapolation of this was the basis for the claim made by The Times and then repeated by other media groups that 20,000 people died. That the authors didn’t spot this very obvious discrepancy in their complaint against the Government doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in their ability to carefully review information and reach sensible conclusions.

Nevertheless, there is no getting away from the fact that a group of eminent intellectuals have come to believe that the Government was responsible for war crimes.

Professor Houtart is totally convinced, and his opinion should be respected. He is an internationally recognised figure, having been involved in social work all his life. His links, particularly with progressive leaders in Latin America, are formidable. Last year, he won the UNESCO Prize for the Promotion of Tolerance and Non-Violence.

He is also no stranger to Sri Lanka. I met him in Colombo some five years ago, but he has been visiting at regular intervals from the 1960s. He did his PhD thesis on Buddhism here.

The Dublin Tribunal is one of many in which he has participated. His involvement in such work dates back several decades, to the effort organised by Bertrand Russell and Jean Paul Sartre to question American foreign policy and military intervention in Vietnam. Professor Houtart has chaired a number of sessions, including one on the Iraq War that condemned the United States in the harshest of terms.

He isn’t biased. Nor is he a fool.

Whether or not he is right about why the Ceasefire Agreement broke down and what was subsequently done to beat the LTTE can’t be cleared up in the space of this column. But in the course of discussing his interpretation of the facts, he made an important point.

The primary concern in Sri Lanka must now be reconciliation.

This is what motivated Professor Houtart to accept the invitation to chair the Dublin Tribunal. As he told me, experience shows that if the truth is not recognised, it is impossible for a country to move forward. The repercussions may not be felt at once, he said, but they will come. A genuine process of reconciliation will emerge only if people can reach a common understanding of what happened during the war.

It is blindingly obvious that there is no such consensus to date. The vast majority of Sinhalese believe something quite different to most Tamils.

The same is true in the diaspora, I might add, or actually to a far greater extent. How those who supported the LTTE are to be persuaded to give up their struggle for Eelam if no efforts are made to bring them into a serious dialogue, I am really not sure. They present the most imminent danger to the country as things stand, considering the funds and networks to which they have access.

My suggestion to Professor Houtart was that to insist on an approach that might lead to prosecutions was to close off all possibility of debate in Sri Lanka. The sense of relief and gratitude towards the Security Forces for finishing off such an old and all-consuming problem is just too widespread and strong for that to be allowed. The more people in Colombo and other parts of the country that were insulated from the full impact of the conflict feel they are being pushed towards legal action, the less willing they will be to consider whether the narrative they have come to accept regarding the final stages of the war is the whole truth. We then remain stuck in talk of a humanitarian rescue mission, surgical strikes and a zero casualty policy, phrases that can only anger those who lost relatives in the Vanni.

The Government clearly isn’t going to be forced into doing anything other than settling scores with Sarath Fonseka in any case.

Professor Houtart disagreed, saying that the law couldn’t be ignored. He said that to do so would jeopardise what he called the ‘whole social fabric’, adding that pardons could still be issued afterwards.

This is worth further consideration.

It seems to me to be the key to dealing with allegations of war crimes. Indeed, the interview as a whole reinforced my feeling that Sri Lanka must now look back at the last three decades and try to understand where mistakes were made and why, in order to ensure that they can never be repeated. Enough time has passed. The country is secure.

Mahinda Rajapaksa is about to consolidate his success in the presidential election with another poll victory. Once the UPFA returns him a majority in Parliament, he will have run out of excuses to act on reconciliation and all the other issues he has been avoiding in the past ten months.

Ban Ki-moon probably doesn’t want anything more than such a process of reflection, assuming it is sincerely undertaken. Getting started would therefore be an excellent way of shoring up relationships with the international community. We should remember that it was never only Western nations who were concerned about human rights violations and a political solution for minorities.

Nobody should mistake this as a call to bow down and capitulate to the demands of Navi Pillay or whoever else. It is just a happy coincidence that doing what is best for Sri Lanka will also help in dealing with institutions like the UN.

Asoka Weerasinghe Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario . K1J 6G1 . Canada

March 7, 2010

Mr. Ban Ki-Moon  
 Secretary General  of the United Nations
 New York, US

Dear Secretary General:

The word that has hit the print media the past 48 hours is that you had announced your intention to appoint a panel of experts to advice the UN chief (you) on accountability issues related to Sri Lanka.

Umm…….You know what Ban?  The pressures from the western nations to bring Sri Lanka, that puny little island stuck somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean that defied calls from the US, Britain, Norway, France and the European Union  to declare a “Ceasefire” at the latter stages of the Eelam war so that they could rescue the Tamil Tiger leader Prabhakaran and his Tamil Tiger leaders and whisk them to safety, is what has smacked them like their parents pulling their pants down and smacking their bare bums for playing stupid until their bottoms turn red.  That is what the problem is Ban, didn’t you figure that one out?  I am surprised. I thought you were smart!

It looks like your blood sugar count gets pretty low often with such Western nations pressures and that you need a shot of insulin to clear your mind so that you could think properly.   Having wiped out the Tamil Tiger terrorist menace after 30 years, President Rajapaksa doesn’t need to be taught a regressive Moon-walk by you that goes backwards.  He is pushing the island progressively forward without the help of the west and that is the direction that he will be walking.

Let’s get this one right Ban.  If the President is accountable to anyone, it is to his masses who had voted him in to office to look after their business and them, and not to a man who calls himself the Secretary General of the United Nations who is pulling puppet strings sitting in a air-conditioned office somewhere in a high rise tower  in New York.  And it was absolutely right for the President to tell you in a simple understandable language that such a stupid move by you were “totally uncalled for and unwarranted.”

Ban I was in stitches when I read that you want to “appoint a panel of experts to advice you”.  What experts Ban?  Did you know that there is a conspiracy within the UN to make you look a rooky on the job when you are advised to appoint certain questionable “experts” to deal with Sri Lanka?

Here is a couple from your galaxy of “experts”.  Navinathen Pillay, a South African Tamil, who is your United Nations  High Commissioner for Human Rights, has acted like a woman scorned by her lover.  She has refused to accept the decision by 29 nations of the UN Human Rights Council which represented 4 billion people against hauling the Sri Lankan Government in front of the International War Crimes Court for the alleged Human Rights violations during the last phase of the Tamil separatist war, while only 12 western nations representing 0.5 billion people voted for it.  She obviously acts like a “white man’s darling” still stalking Sri Lanka to bring her to the International War Crime Court.  Such arrogance is debilitating your command of the UN and showing you up as a weak CEO.  This is not good Ban.  Be ruthless and kick her out.

Then you got this strange Professor Philip Alston, the Australian who is the UN’s Rapporteur on extrajudicial killings.   He has performed like an absurd minded, and an illogical Professorial academic, who has difficulty to comprehend between good analytical research and bad analytical research when it came to dealing with the Channel  4  video clip.  He has embarrassed all of us.  Kick out this ‘expert’ Ban.  He is part of the conspiracy to make you look like a weak CEO.

The bottom line is you are locking horns with Sri Lanka to satisfy the western nations and Sri Lanka will take you on.  This is a proud nation with a proud and honest people, and what you do not want to do is interfere investigating her internal affairs, which will compel the President to tell you to go home and jump into River Nakdong.

These are the people, who when the world  was sympathetic to the Tamil Tiger terrorists, including your people were crying out  loud  last March, April and May saying that the Sri Lankan Government was committing “genocide” against the Tamils, the Sri Lankan Government was preparing one million meals a day to feed 300,0000 Tamils  thrice a day, whom they rescued from the clutches of the Tamil Tigers who held them as a human shield.  By then they had been herded  like cattle for almost two years bringing them from the west in Mannar to the East into Mullaitivu. That is a reality check for you Ban.  That is how caring these proud Sri Lankans are.  It didn’t matter to them that these rescued 300,000 were Tamils. They were all Sri Lankan brothers and sisters to the Sinhalese majority.  Feeding 300,000 Tamils three meals a day with a million meals was not easy, but they did it, when in places like Canada thousands of poor kids go to school with an empty stomach without breakfast.  That is a reality check for you Ban and stop trying to penalize this good and caring people for what comes naturally to them.

When Great Britain took almost 15 years to re-settle their people in repaired and new houses who went homeless after World War II which lasted six years, it was asinine for them and you to expect Sri Lanka that came through a devastating 27 year war to resettle 300,000 Tamils they rescued within two months. Yet, Sri Lanka has produced humanitarian miracles to resettle 220,000 Tamils within nine months in their own homes, having cleared the terrain of millions of landmines which was pocked like fields of mushrooms.    So stop being so uppity Ban trying to undermine this little island which is recovering well without the help from the west after a devastating separatist war with the most ruthless Tamil terrorists in the world.

So why all this silliness Ban?  Why this nonsense wanting to appoint a panel of “experts” to advice you on accountability related to Sri Lanka?  President Mahinda Rajapaksa, doesn’t have to be accountable to you Ban, and you know it.

Just a note of caution Ban.  Be careful not push your luck as President Mahinda Rajajapaksa might tell you to go and fly a kite from the window of your high towered office unless you  learn to respect the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of his sovereign country.  He is in no mood to entertain such arrogance from you or anyone else from the west – the Milibands, the Browns, the Clintons, the Blakes, the Kouchners, the Pillays, you name it.

Sincerely

Asoka Weerasinghe

Dilrook Kannangara

The UN spirit of the 1940s is long dead. UN was born out of respect for all member states, big or small. However, since then mighty nations have dominated the UN and even bypassed the UN. Smaller nations can only lament over gross unfairness and rampant hypocrisy. Today there is a dangerous tussle between the superpowers within and outside the UN. It is inevitable the UN’s relevance is diminishing by the year as a result. Exploiting this weakness, certain breakaway groups of banned terrorist groups, have assumed a pseudo UN presence which they could not achieve through violence. Remnants of the banned terrorist organisation – LTTE (Tamil Tigers) scattered around the West use the power of their hosts to destabilise India, Sri Lanka, China and other nations fighting terrorism.

UN’s Degeneration

It is important to understand the degree of degeneration the UN has suffered in order to prescribe a remedy. The UN is being exploited in a number of ways by its powerful members to cause havoc in other member states.

1. Selective recognition of states. At times showing ridiculous disregard of consistency.
2. Manipulating UN agencies to get one’s own private dirty jobs done.
3. Hypocrisy and unequal treatment of like situations.
4. Unwarranted interference in member states.
5. Using UN staff who are countrymen to obtain favours using their position.

Selectively recognising states has been around for a long time. Fuelled by this trend territories are turned to nations using military power knowing well that with time UN can be persuaded to recognise them. Kosovo, Abkhazia and South Ossetia are recent events. All these are forcibly severed territories from UN member states. Manipulating UN agencies to do the work of a powerful nation is another “use” of the UN for the mighty. Getting UN agencies to cast doubt on the presence of Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq is one example. Pressing Iran to declare its nuclear facilities after putting together a case against Iran alleging the development of a nuclear explosive is another example. Iraq is yet another example of buck-passing to the UN. Coalition troops safely escaped the mess they created in Iraq by handing over the mess to the UN and Iraqi troops. This relieves the invaders their manpower and finances. Ultimately it becomes UN’s problem.

There is widespread inequality in the UN. From nuclear proliferation to war crimes, inequality is obvious. While the UN was silent when millions were killed in Iraq for no reason, it shows extraordinary interest in alleged war crimes in Israel and Sri Lanka which are minute compared to Iraq and Afghanistan. Torture in Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere have different levels of significance.

UN staff has been blamed in a number of instances trying to meddle in national affairs. There were other instances where UN staff members claiming firsthand information about conflicts in UN member states and making exaggerated and unsubstantiated claims. These claims are in turn used by their governments to pressurise independent nations.

How to remedy it

Instigated by the US, UK and EU, the UN General Secretary stated that he is going to look into alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka even after the UN decided on the contrary. UN has no power whatsoever to look into these allegations without the consent of Sri Lanka and without the sanctioning of it by the UN or its five permanent members (and Germany).

In this context Sri Lanka, as a UN member, must insist that UN staff respects the sovereignty of member states. This must be put forward by way of a resolution. The resolution should disallow the UN and its agencies from interfering in member states in any way without consent from the state unless it is sanctioned by the UN or its five (plus Germany) permanent members. It should totally disallow any act to be taken without those formalities.

Given the overwhelming support in the UN for a non-interference approach, the majority of the 192 member states are likely to support it. Only about 30 nations would oppose it since it takes away extraordinary powers they enjoy now. Most Asian, African and Latin American countries will support such a resolution overwhelmingly. This will give protection to less powerful countries and put an end to misusing the UN by powerful countries to achieve own objectives. A number of totally unnecessary conflicts and millions of deaths could be avoided in the future by following such a non-interference approach. It will bring the UN back to its senses and stop its rapid degeneration.

UN should remain a collection of independent and sovereign member states, not states and their satellite states within a sham subservient organisation used by some states as a cat’s paw.

Gamini Godakanda

In the case of political representation in Sri Lanka, we cannot even refer to a ‘glass-ceiling’ – as women have been kept in the ‘basement’ of politics. This was one of the opinions stated by Leader of the Sri Lanka National Congress, Milinda Moragoda at a meeting held on Saturday in Maradana, which included grassroots women activists.  He added that while Sri Lanka has an excellent record on women’s health, education, and life expectancy, it is worst in the region when it comes to participation of women in politics.

Sarath W

Malin Abeyatunge

LTTE apologists and activists of the Tamil Diaspora have still not given up the Eelam Cry. The newest entity formed called “Global Tamil Forum” (GTF) branching off from now banned British Tamil Association(BTA) has now started their campaign for a “Provisional Trans-national Government of Tamil Eelam” (PTG of TE)’ by getting the LTTE apologist countries like UK, USA, Norway and some EU countries to lobby for their cause for Eelam. This in other words another  attempt and strategy for a separate Tamil State in Sri Lanka. Latest lobbying  in UK was the addressing of  GTF by none other than the British FM David Miliband (DM), Conservative Shadow FC William Hague and Liberal shadow FC Ed Livey.

Let these Tamil groups, the western politicians and British FM (DM) et al who ardently support the Tamil cause for a separate State  in Sri Lanka know that the present leadership under President Rajapaksa  cannot be pressurized or influenced by any means or by any western politicians. British FM (DM) and his French counterpart Kuchner  still unable to digest the humiliating response they got from President Rajapaksa when both were trying their utmost best to stop the last stages of the war operation in Mulaithivu to save Prabhakran and LTTE and advise him how to run the country.

 It is appalling to see that the Conservative  and Liberal Shadow Foreign Secretaries have joined the DM’s band wagon. It is obvious that being General Election is nearing and all these stooges are eyeing  300,000 strong Tamil votes for their survival.  

Whatever DM’s and other shadow ministers’ utterances at the GTF whether in support of it or against it is not the question. Having attended a meeting propagating ‘Separatism” whilst LTTE being a  banned terrorist outfit in UK alone is unacceptable and appalling and an attempt to give currency to a banned terrorist outfit on their soil. Even though David Miliband et al are willing to join hands with  the LTTE fronts like GTF, wine and dine with them and ready even to sleep with them, Sri Lanka will not bend down to satisfy the remnants of the blood thirsty group LTTE terrorists and its western political and media lobby. Let the GTF form a “Provisional  Trans-national Government for Tamil Eelam”  or any form of government in exile, SL will not bow down for any external pressures to undermine the sovereignty of the country. 

The Tamil Diaspora has been contributing to the LTTE war machine over the past twenty seven years but achieved nothing but a  humiliating defeat at the hands of our Sri Lankan forces. Now the GTF and other affiliated LTTE fronts world wide may be collecting funds for their next strategy to form a “Trans-National Tamil State”. Yet again, mind my words the Tamil Diaspora who will support this new strategy financially will be another disastrous investment except the custodians of such funds will have a carnival with those funds collected.

The leadership under President Rajapaksa has committed to bring sustainable peace by uniting all ethnic groups under Sri Lankan Label and it’s time that the moderate Tamil Diaspora re think and act pragmatically without getting trapped to this “PTG of TE “ like the Eelam. The pro-LTTE Tamil Diaspora and its supporters have misled the ordinary Tamils living in Sri Lanka for 27 years and they still want to mislead them  with this newest strategy PTGof TE for another couple of decades.

“The International Crisis Group (ICG), an independent non-governmental organization based in Brussels – with a branch in Colombo – in its latest report has strongly urged the Sri Lankan Tamil Diaspora to jettison once and for all the failed Tamil Eelam agenda of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and instead put their energies into the quest for a sustainable and just peace in a united Sri Lanka “(The Hindu reported). I hope the 29 page report of the ICS will open the eyes of the still misled Tamil Diaspora.

 It is believed that there are around one million Sri Lankan Tamils spread around world wide. In  family terms, there will be around 250,000 families (say a family of four) who live in affluent countries in luxury with their children being educated in best of schools. No qualms for that. But let them think of the poor Tamil children who needs help after going thro a miserable 27 years under the jackboots of LTTE without a proper education or basic living conditions.

The Tamil Diaspora should not forget that they are also totally responsible for the plight of the poor Tamils. Suffice to mention here that whatever the facilities, food and health provided by the successive governments have been robbed by LTTE to feed their own fighting carders leaving the poor Tamils in the once LTTE controlled areas starving. At least they are now enjoying three meals a day, education, health  and other basic facilities.  There are hundreds of Tamil children in Sri Lanka not only in the North & East but other areas as well who need extra support for their education. There are hundreds of children who needs sponsorship from the rich Tamils living overseas.

I am personally aware that Sinhala Diaspora world wide are sponsoring around three to four thousand children of the soldiers who lost their lives, crippled, disabled in the war. Achieving Eelam thro a so called Provisional Transnational Government” is a day dream. The Tamil Diaspora should stop this nonsense of financing the” Transnational Government” and utilize those donations and contributions  to sponsor deserving Tamil children; help them in their education and give them a dignity of life. Tamil Diaspora should follow the Sinhala Diaspora  to help these deserving poor Tamil children.

ALI SUKHANVER-The writer is a Pakistan based bilingual analyst on national and international strategic and defense affairs.

According to all dictionaries of English language, ‘raw ‘means crude and coarse, unprocessed and untreated ; these meanings  seem very much close to reality  when we look at the working of the world famous  intelligence agency RAW. The name coined for it very truly matches the accurate meanings of the word. Raw has very surprisingly succeeded in getting the record of the telephonic conversation between the ISI chief General Ahmed Shuja Pasha and President Karzai of Afghanistan. During this telephonic conversation, General Pasha tried to convince the Afghan president to curtail the Indian involvement in Afghanistan. General Pasha promised to smooth the way for negotiations between the Taliban and the Afghan government if Karzai co-operates in this context.

  RAW’s claim to trace the conversation between Karzai and General Pasha is the best example of RAW’s ‘unbelievable and astonishing’ working. However this ‘Breaking News’ could have been more credible and fascinating if it were supported by authentic proofs which are yet awaited. RAW high-ups must speed up the process of proof finding in this respect other wise this ‘research’ of Raw would be taken as much non-serious and childish as that of the Mumbai blasts. The question arises why did RAW spend a lot of its precious resources and valuable time on tracing the conversation details of the telephonic talks between General Pasha and president Karzai if it ever happened as reported by RAW.   Whatever General Pasha said to Mr. Karzai must not be a hidden reality. If there were any conversation of this type, he might have simply conveyed the policy and demand of the government of Pakistan.

 Every one knows that Pakistan has its own reservations regarding the increasing influence of India in Afghanistan. Since the very first day of the NATO forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan is of the opinion that the situation would never be bettered if India is given a free hand in Afghanistan because a long lasting peace in Afghanistan is not in favour of India. In the name of different development projects India is sending agents of its different intelligence agencies in Afghanistan. Even the staff of the Indian consulates in Afghanistan   constitutes of the Raw agents. With the help of these consulates India is providing monetary as well as military support to the terrorist groups working in the tribal areas of Pakistan. During the operations against the miscreants in Swat and other afflicted areas Pakistan army has recovered a lot of weapons with Indian mark on them. Same is the case with the diaries which were found in the possession of different arrested miscreants. The pages of these diaries indicated a very clear cut involvement of Raw Agents in worsening the law and order situation in these areas. These are the reasons for which Pakistan is always worried about the increasing involvement of India in Afghanistan. If General Pasha has ever talked to Mr. Karzai on this issue, he has committed no crime. Being the chief of ISI, what else one can expect of him. He heads a department whose sole responsibility is to take care of the interests of Pakistan on every front.

 As far as General Pasha’s proposal regarding the negotiations between the Afghan government and Taliban is concerned, it also indicates the peace-loving approach of Pakistan. Since very after its creation, Pakistan has always been a very staunch supporter and promoter of the world peace. Pakistan has always fully supported each and every effort done for the peace and prosperity everywhere in the world. The Taliban are no doubt the Muslims and they have a natural inclination towards all Islamic countries. They take this war against USA and other Allied forces not as a war but as Jihad. As a result of a planned conspiracy, different foreign elements have very successfully hijacked some groups of Taliban and defamed them as terrorists and extremists .However still there are so many groups which do not own terrorist activities going on in the name of Taliban. Such groups are in majority and they simply want the liberation of their motherland from the cruel clutches of the foreign invaders. The government of Pakistan knows very well that such Taliban groups can be very useful in the maintenance of peace in Afghanistan. If Pakistan has offered its services for the existence of peace in Afghanistan, again it is neither a sin nor a crime.

 Since after the revelation of Obama’s intention of leaving Afghanistan by 2011, India has been trying   its best to be the future care-taker of Afghanistan. It knows very well that the local Afghan people would never be ready to accept Indian hegemony in their motherland. They would have a natural leaning towards Pakistan after they succeed in getting rid of the USA and the Allied forces. That is the reason that India is trying to create misunderstandings between   Afghan Taliban and Pakistan. A picture is being portrayed as if Pakistan is manipulating the situation in Afghanistan by playing under hand game against Taliban whereas at the same time India is trying to introduce itself as a very passionate well-wisher and sympathizer of the Afghan people.

 On 5^th March,2010, National Security Adviser of India Shivshankar Menon arrived Kabul  on a two-day visit .He had a meeting with the  Afghan President Hamid Karzai and discussed the issue of security of about 4,000 Indians who, according to him , are untiringly engaged in working at different rehabilitation and reconstruction projects in Afghanistan. Menon also met his Afghan counterpart Rangin Dadfar Spanta. In both of these meetings he seemed very much worried about the investigations into the February 26 Kabul attacks that targeted guest houses frequently visited by Indians. These attacks took the lives of seven Indians, including three major-rank Indian Army officers. The National Security Adviser conveyed the apprehensions of the Indian government regarding the safety of its nationals in Afghanistan. He suggested some proposals including setting up of protected venues where the Indians working on projects could be housed. He also suggested deployment of more security personnel at places where Indians work. In short the basic purpose behind this visit was to pave a way for the deployment of more security personnel which would be surely coming from India. In the light of Menon’s visit and proposals, it can be very easily estimated that the Kabul Attacks were the artistic work of no one else but of RAW and the only motive behind was to push more RAW agents into the Afghan soil.

 It is very unfair and unjust to drag the hi-ups of the ISI into such nonsense type of affairs. ISI is a part of Pakistan army and its only objective is to safeguard the interest of Pakistan. The words spoken by the ISI chief represent the feelings and thoughts of the whole of Pakistani nation. There must be nothing secret if General Ahmed Shuja Pasha has ever talked to the Afghan president but even then RAW will have to provide proofs for its artistic and adventurous ‘research’.

 The writer is a Pakistan based bilingual analyst on national and international strategic and defense affairs.

Sri Lanka news

The Central Bank of Sri Lanka yesterday announced further relaxation of foreign exchange transactions with the following measures to be implemented with effect from March 11 in relation to foreign exchange transactions.

A Sri Lankan resident who is earning foreign exchange from investments abroad as approved by the Central Bank, engaged in providing international professional services in Sri Lanka or abroad, engaged in any occupation abroad or who have proceeded outside Sri Lanka for education and/or for medical treatment and exporters of goods will be permitted to open and maintain bank accounts abroad, the bank said.

The bank said that forward contracts in foreign currency to cover foreign exchange transactions related to trade in goods and services, remittances and approved foreign lending and borrowings, will also be permitted.

Under these measures the present 100 percent margin deposit requirement against advanced payments on the invoice value of selected items to be imported, will be removed.

The suspension on the pre-payment of import bills will be lifted.

Under this the existing different investment accounts, namely Share Investment External Rupee Accounts (SIERA), Treasury Bond Investment External Rupee Accounts (TIERA), Treasury Bill Investment External Rupee Accounts (TIERA-2), and Treasury Bill/Bond Investment External Rupee Accounts Deshabhimani (TIERA -D) maintained by non-residents in commercial banks will be permitted to be unified.

The unified account will be renamed as Securities Investment Account (SIA), the bank said.

The Central Bank states that the relaxation of these specific exchange controls would contribute to further improve investor confidence and stabilize the foreign exchange market, thereby paving the way to further integrate the Sri Lankan economy with the global economy.

Forex Capital Markets are foreign exchange markets where the currencies are been bought and sold continuously for profits. The capital markets of forex are present globally and transactions are non-stop in this forex cash market. Whether its Sydney or Tokyo, one would find aggressive forex dealers and brokers peering into their computer screens and on the telephone for minor changes that might affect this currency trade.

The forex trade is carried out for profits that can be gained by buying and selling of the currencies. Currencies are always bought and sold in pairs. Let us take an example to clarify the forex dealA trader trades in Euros/ Us Dollars. (All figures are samples only) He purchases 10,000 Euros on Jan 1 when the EUR/USD rate is .9600. Then he sells these Euros at the market rate of 1.1800. On August 1. Therefore he gets 11,800 USD. Thereby making a cool forex transaction profit of USD 2200.

Nadira Gunatilleke -Daily News Sri Lanka

The United Nations (UN) will not be able to cause any impact on Sri Lanka, Environment and Natural Resources Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka said.

No resolution will be passed against Sri Lanka in the Security Council or in the Human Rights Commission, he said.

“Only two or three Western and European countries and two or three foreign `politicians’ work against Sri Lanka. All other countries, especially newly empowered countries are with Sri Lanka,” Minister Ranawaka said.

Addressing the weekly UPFA press briefing at the Mahaweli Centre, Colombo yesterday, Minister Ranawaka said Sri Lanka is very proud to have President Mahinda Rajapaksa as the leader because he shows again and again that he is capable, strong and brave to face any type of challenge on behalf of the country.

The President showed the country that he is ready to make whatever sacrifice on behalf of the nation. “I am sure that any other leader would have welcomed the UN with a red carpet betraying the country, war heroes and the 30,000 who lost their lives,” he said.

According to Minister Ranawaka the UN Charter very clearly states that it cannot interfere in the internal affairs of countries.

Sri Lanka receive continuous support of all the other countries, especially newly economically empowered countries such as China, India, Russia and South Africa. “I request our people to respond to this latest conspiracy with a good reply on April 8 by giving a two-thirds majority to the Government led by President Rajapaksa,” he said.

When Sri Lanka is ready to elect a legal and democratic Government through the Parliamentary Election, the foreign representation of the LTTE is trying to declare a `dream state of Tamil Eelam’. Evil foreign elements follow two strategies, he said. They are forcing countries to act against Sri Lanka using their own internal laws and forcing the UN to act against Sri Lanka.

General Sarath Fonseka opened the door for them while the Opposition Leader, Leader of SLFP (M) and the JVP supported this move. Today a large number of people travel from and to the North and these evil forces are trying to stop this progress and the development of Sri Lanka aimed at economic independence, the Minister said.

The UN is not interested in the deaths of 650,000 innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq. There are two million permanently displaced persons in those countries. The world needs a new UN which is in tune with the new developments in the world and newly joined countries.

It was Asia which recorded the significant economic growth during world economic crisis and the growth rate of US and UK was minus. All these newly economically empowered Asian countries are with Sri Lanka, the Minister added.

Ajit Randeniya

The intensification of subterranean activities of the US embassy in Colombo and USAID in the north and east of Sri Lanka, especially following the defeat of their ‘trump card’, Sarath Fonseka, is such that the Sri Lankan government needs to declare it a spectator sport and collect some additional taxes!

 The latest news of a speech given by a woman by the name Valerie Fowler from the US embassy at the graduation day of the ‘College of Journalism’ is particularly revealing in terms of the extent to which they are engaging in undermining the stability and future prosperity of Sri Lanka.

 The US strategy in Sri Lanka is clearly based on systematically targeting the ‘weak spots’ of the fabric of Sri Lankan society, and on devising methods of brain washing the people involved to create chaos: the media sector has been targeted due to its obvious usefulness for spreading subversive propaganda, like they did before the presidential election, together with ‘making friends’ among the minorities with lingering dissatisfaction being the other am.

 Looking at the structure that has ‘given birth’ to this so-called School of Journalism, its financing and the close involvement of US agents who work in Colombo under diplomatic and aid worker cover reveals a disturbing level of intensification of US activities in Sri Lanka.

 The ‘College’ is part of a triumvirate they have created, together with a ‘parent’ body named the Sri Lanka ‘Press Institute’, touted as Sri Lanka’s premier institution for ‘supporting the media throughout the country’, and a ‘Press Complaints Commission’ purportedly designed for ‘effective and fair’ arbitration of disputes.

 The ‘College’ and the ‘Complaints Commission’ are the business end of the classic ‘Trojan horse’ approach the US is adopting in Sri Lanka; so much has been revealed by the US embassy when they announced that “The Sri Lanka College of Journalism endeavors to change the media from within”. Funding for it comes from the usual sources of the governments of Norway, Sweden and Denmark while curriculum a University in Sweden. The shady and corrupt “Free Media Movemen” of Sunanda Deshapriya and Frederica Jansz is also involved: had to be!

 The ‘College’ is touted as the body that is designed to provide journalists with the skills, ‘while imparting the values and ethics that are essential elements for responsible journalism’. The ‘complaints commission’ has been clearly devised, again, to bypass the country’s legal system. The conspirators are fully aware that the character assassinations likely to be carried out by the gullible, brain washed sections of the ‘journalists’ trained here will attract legal action ‘as night follows day’. They are planting a structure designed to give a ‘slap on the wrist’ to offending ‘journalists’, rather than subjecting them to multi billion rupee defamation claims.

But the key question here is as to what, and whose, values and ethics are they teaching at the’ College’? If they pass on the values and ethics of total dedication by Sri Lanka’s budding journalists to national development in the same manner Reuters, AP, AFP, BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera journalists are serving Zionism, Sri Lanka has nothing to worry about!

 However, they will only plant the seeds of social destruction by teaching young Sri Lankans to act against their own interests by ‘waging war’ against the government, without reasonable grounds as the charges during the presidential election campaign revealed.

 During her speech, Valerie Fowler, probably overexcited by the ‘excellent’ opportunity the media training offers, has clearly overstepped the boundary of appropriate diplomatic behaviour: in saying that SLPI is a beacon of light in an environment where ‘media unfortunately remains under great pressure and intimidation’, she has cast aspersions on the Sri Lankan people and their government. She deserves a call from the Department of Foreign Affairs for a reminder that she can ‘butt out’ of any local debate on media freedoms.

 Then we need to tear her cover off! Valerie Fowler is the archetypical American ‘career woman’ who will not hesitate to do ‘anything’ for the right money and ‘advancement’ within the bureaucracy; even if it involves working in ‘hellholes’ under constant threat to life. The ‘work’ people like Ms Fowler are engaged in all corners of the world is sold to the US tax payer as activities that bring great benefits to them, and they pay dearly for it, like they did on 11 September 2001.

 Prior to her current assignment in Colombo, Ms. Fowler was Counselor, Sub-National Governance Office at the US Embassy in Kabul from 2008-2009. Previous to that, from 2005-2008, she was the Public Affairs Counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Singapore. Obviously a trusted operator, she has also served in the Department of State’s ‘Operations Center’ as a Senior Watch Officer and as Director of ‘Crisis Management’ (2002-2004). If you need more convincing that Ms Fowler is a serious spy, she earned her spurs by proving her worth in China, in key centres such as Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai and Shenyang in the early nineties.

 But that is not all! They are ‘a family’ dedicated to this kind of work: Ms Fowler’s husband, Charles ‘Chip’ Fowler held the rank of Captain in the US Navy ‘Office of Naval Research’ –the body that collects technical information through contacts with scientists and naval officers of other countries- until he retired in January 2010.

 There is something intriguing about Captain Chip Fowler’s real work however: he takes a special interest in ‘mountain climbing’. There surely wouldn’t be much naval traffic up in the clouds!

 State Department sources inform that back in July 2009, Capt Fowler was in an ‘expedition’ of the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan, the ranges bordering Kabul and Parwan Provinces to be exact, around the time three American ‘hikers’ were arrested while secretly entering Iran through its border with Iraq.

 The three, Shane M. Bauer, 27, Joshua F. Fattal, 27 and Sarah E. Shourd (noted the surnames?) claimed they were ‘freelance journalists conducting research on sustainable-living’ trekking through the Kurdistan region of Iraq and simply ‘strayed’ in to Iranian territory. The Iranian authorities thought otherwise and charged the three with spying. The reader is free to draw own conclusions.

 But let us dwell for a few moments on the self-righteous sounding filth this woman has dumped on this young and impressionable group of Sri Lankans. Even before we pay attention to her preachings, it needs to be noted that an American establishment agent teaching a developing country journalist how to promote democracy is equivalent to a bank robber advising banks on security arrangements!

 Fowler has pontificated that it is their shared responsibility to be purveyors of the truth, watchdog of the public interest, and defenders of democratic rights and principles. She has also reminded the graduates that as journalists, they are duty bound to be defenders, a fourth branch of democratic rights and values: of the American type, of the nominally separated legislative, judicial, and executive arms of government.

 Fowler has clearly failed to mention that the so-called ‘separation of powers’ only exist theoretically in her own country, and all the branches of government she mentioned have been, since their very inception, under the control of the global Zionist movement.

 She has failed to mention that the two party ‘democracy’ in her country does not offer real alternatives to US citizens, and the presidential election process from the ‘unearthing’ of candidates to their progress through the so-called ‘primaries’ is a process corrupted to its core by Zionist money.

 Fowler has forgotten to mention that US citizens are kept in the dark by their political masters about the atrocious criminal activities they carry out overseas, all in their name, and the US and western corporate media owned by the same money bags who control their governments do precious little to expose such crimes: their control of the journalistic profession including recruitment, training, placements and promotions see to it that different opinions or interpretations are not presented or published.

 One can go on: what is crucial however is to inform our young minds that we in Sri Lanka don’t need foreign money or advice, especially from America, on how to nurture good journalists with commitment to national advancement and sensibility to public needs.

 Sri Lankan journalists of the calibre of Tarzi Vittachchi, D.B.Dhanapala, David Karunaratne, H.A. J. Hulugalle, Denzil Peiris, Mervyn de Silva and Ajith Samaranayake were not ‘trained’ by these thieves, though some of them fell in to their traps later in their careers. We alo acknowledge that we also have had exceptions to this tradition, such as Frederica Jansz and Lasantha Wickrematunga!

 But ,warts and all, we have a sound tradition of quality, fearless journalism that is continuing in Sri Lanka. That should not be compromised by the self-serving ‘advice’ of these thieves.

 Valerie Fowler, go home!

By Darmitha

On January 26^th 2010 gave President Mahinda Rajapakse another term of office as The Executive President of Sri Lanka. It is envisaged, that all economic and social ills which were sidelined during the previous term which had a major objective of eliminating the country of terrorism which he did, much to the consternation & dismay of worldwide pro-LTTE supporters but the military but humanitarian victory brought the much needed psychological relief to all those who live in the North and East (who suffered silently for 30 years for fear of death and torture) as well as the rest of the country. Today, citizens whether they like it or not, have to admit that the impossible has been achieved by sheer focus and determination.

 Having achieved this military victory over terrorism & also having won a resounding victory at the recent Presidential Elections held in January this year, our President has now promised to pave the way for a decent and righteous society during the forthcoming years of his extended tenure of office. With this very much harped on, the election trail for the forthcoming General Elections has taken off the ground after nominations closed on the 26^th of February 2010. Already, we can see walls, bill boards and even brand new unregistered vehicles all getting covered over layer over layer with the “faces” of candidates from all political parties who all promise and wish to project their image “to serve Sri Lanka!” In this process, publishing/printing establishments will either make money or go bankrupt due to their enthusiasm to make hay while the sun shines. Most often, election candidates or their supporters who place orders for cut-outs, stickers, posters and pamphlets end up slipping into oblivion once the election is over, leaving the print-shops with huge un-recovered bills! Let us say, that it is their own seeking because the choice is their.

 Voters in Sri Lanka today, are much wiser than those of yesteryear. We saw this quite well during the recently held Presidential Elections. No amount of promises given by the opposition alliance duped the voters who knew exactly who their President was going to be. However, we are not quite sure whether the General Elections will have such a clear path given the fact, that there is much accusation against the GOSL for bribery & corruption, thuggery, mismanagement, family bandysm, wastage- you name it, they have it all listed. Since 1977, all governments have been hurled with such accusations for valid reasons ofcourse. In the current context we must admit that even though our President has some vision for the country, not all his Ministers and MPs have been doing a glorious job with their duties and responsibilities in the social, economic, health & education sectors much to the dismay as well as disgust of the citizens of this country. They have by their own actions, proved that they fall far short of the high expectations that President had of them. These General Elections will show us whether the President is truly concerned about making amends even if he has to earn the wrath of some of those “time servers.”

 Simple things can prove whether our politicians are law abiding or not & election time is best to judge them. Our Elections Commissioner has been stressing time and time again, that cut-outs, posters and banners of candidates must be removed forthwith- how many humble politicians have obeyed the orders of the Election Commissioner? More posters keep coming up and decorating any and every wall with a few square metres of space. Some candidates and their supporters consider it heroic, to paste their posters over the faces of other candidates to shut them out wholesale from public view! Those with the worst negative public opinion are the ones whose posters give a message of their honesty, simplicity and service to the country! The normal practise for all forthcoming candidates is for them to declare their assets no sooner nominations are accepted by the Elections Commissioner- of the 7000 odd candidates around the country who are hoping to contest at the April General Elections- how many have already declared their assets? Only a handful isn’t it? The Election Commissioner has also declared how candidates should set out their political offices but who or which candidate respects the order? What does this expose to us, the public? That most politicians in this country do not care a damn for law and order! Once in power, the “sky is the limit” for such obnoxious & arrogant politicians while the poor voter is left to tolerate all their insolence and eat humble pie. Gone are the days when politicians gave of their wealth to serve the country- today, it is a case of getting rich at the expense of the public once they enter The August House of Parliament! It does not matter whether a politician is with the government or the opposition, what matters is how honest are they?

 The amount of money spent in lakhs and millions of Sri Lankan Rupees for posters, cut-outs, banners, organizing political meetings and the massive paid advertisements placed in the newspapers of all three languages just go to show how lucrative our political arena is. How many of these political candidates ever thought of foregoing all the publicity stunts to boost their own egos and instead, pool all that money which would count out to be a phenomenal amount by any standards & spend it to help the deserving citizens of this country no matter whether they be Ranavirus, the homeless or the jobless? Pro-government as well as opposition candidates could have truly proved their commitment to helping the citizens of this country-is it not so?

 Instead of the above, what we see are the politicians with the worst reputation, advertising themselves with “ Api Gena Hithane”, “ Wedak Karana”, “Mahinda Chinthana Jathika Punarjeewana Wedapiliwalate Ayoma Shakthiyak”, “Ayukthiyate Hisa Nonamane Obe Sevayate Kepawu”, “Gampaha Asiyawe Hondame Distrikkaya Bawate Pathkaranawa”, “Rate Dawena Prashnawalate Visadum Thiyenne Api Langai”, the Island newspaper(3^rd March 2010) carried on the front page “Muthuhettigama Wants Mental Patients Given Franchise and Sanity Test on All MPs” in which he states that he was the only politician who had been declared mentally sound by doctors…………” These are the statements and slogans that we see everyday while getting about our daily businesses. What we all know, is that once elected most of these politicians will only be serving themselves and their families; abusing government assets and land to suit their own fancies, furnish themselves with security staff who are their mafia to attack opponents; fly around blocking traffic and inconveniencing the public in their “Duty-Free” Monteros and other luxury vehicles at State Expense; abuse the usage of water, electricity and telephones+ accommodation costs to bring massive bill payments at government expense; organize Tamashas to boost their own egos; amassing commissions from government purchases; harassing investors who come to Sri Lanka to engage in constructive projects by interfering in project work and demanding that their men and their supplies must be accepted instead of giving the investor or contractor the prerogative to decide what is best for the work needed to be done; within the government services, it is well known that government servants known to be supporters of the Opposition being harassed and transferred from pillar to post; appointing their own spouses as their Coordinating Secretaries, Personal Secretaries; use government vehicles not only for their own personal use but that of their immediate as well as “extended families” etc- “Mahinda Chinthanaya” will fly out of the window in next to no time! The same will apply to Opposition politicians as well no matter what they say about “Rate Dawena Prashnawalate Visadum Thiyenne Api Langai-Ravi Karunanayake(Lakbima-28th Feb 2010) ” little understanding or realizing that the burning problems of the country were created by none other than their own Mentors the late JR Jayawardane with his horrendous Constitution of 1978 which introduced internal party bickerings and enmity due to preferential votes, furnishing personal fire-arms to politicians to eliminate their opponents and build up the underground mafia which destabilized the Police Stations and Officials who were conducting honest duties and the late R. Premadasa when they openly permitted looting, thuggery and misappropriations and uneducated politicians into entering politics!

 Let us think that “Mahinda Chinthanaya” may come out victorious at the forthcoming General Elections but, President Rajapakse has a gargantuan task ahead of him to streamline all the riff-raff within the government and bring proper discipline within the government ranks! The public has had enough of all the tomfoolery and promises. What the public needs is not film star or cricketing popularity or “punky” youth with their “Tharunyate Hetak” but seasoned, educated serious minded & above all, honest politicians to be in his Cabinet of Ministers who are committed to serve the country and the public in a constructive and beneficial manner. We have witnessed how the health sector has gone down the drain where neither the government hospitals or pharmacies lack essential drugs, the education system being destroyed by bungling the school admissions and the trade bunglings with rhetoric suitable for cheap entertainment but with cost of living rising by the day! It is also pertinent to state that the President needs to understand that it was the majority Sinhala Buddhist voter who brought him a second term & that he must show his gratitude by giving priority to their grievances without much delay- this is the least he can do to keep things in their proper perspective. Those whom he attempted to pamper and go overboard with his overtures did not vote for him and he must know and acknowledge it for the country to know the truth!

චන්ද්‍රසිරි විජයවික්‍රම

යූ.එන්.ඕ. මහලේකම් බෑන් ඔහුගේ තනි මොළයට කරගත නොහැකි නිසා ඊට තව මොළ කීපයක් ඈඳා

ගැනීමට ලංකාව ගැන උපදේශක මන්ඩලයක් පත් කර ගන්නට තිරණය කලාලු.  යුනෙස්කෝ, ලෝක සවුක්‍ය සංවිධානය,

ලෝක කම්කරු සංවිධානය වැනි කීපයකින් කල සේවාවට අමතරව මේ යූ.එන්.ඕ. කියන්නේ බටහිර රටවල් තවදුරටත්

පරන යටත් විජිත පාලනය කරගෙන් යෑමට අටවා ගත් උපක්‍රමයයි.

    මෙම ආයතනය කෙතරම් සවුත්තු තැනක් ද යත් එය ඈතුලේ සිට ටෙලිෆෝන් කෝල් එකක් වත් ගන්නේ

නැත. ඊට හේතුව එය බග් කර තිබීමය. මේ ආයාතනයේ මහ ලේකම් කියන්නේ ක්‍රිස්තියානි ආගම අදහන සුදු

ගැත්තෙකුට දෙන රක්‍ෂාවටය. තායිලන්තයෙන් යූ තාන්ට් හා ඊජිප්තුවෙන් බුට්‍රොස් බුට්‍රොස් ඝාලි ද මේ තනතුරට ආ

බව ඈත්තය. නමුත් අරාබි ජාතිකයා තනතුරින් එලවා ගැනීම තමාගේ හිසරදය බව යුදෙව් ජාතික ඈමෙරිකන් විදේශ

ලේකම් වූ මැඩලින් අල්බ්‍රයිට් නිතර නිතර කිව්වේය.

    නාසි යුද්ධ නිලයක් දැරූ අවුස්ත්‍රියාවෙන් ආ කර්ට් වෝල්ඩ් හෙයිම්ට ඒ ගැන බොරු කීම නිසා

තනතුරෙන් ඉල්ලා අස්වන්නට සිදු විය. ඩැග් හැමර් ෂල් ව මැරුවාද නැත්නම් ගුවන් අනතුරක් නිසා මිය ගියාද යන්න

තවමත් අභිරහසකි. ඔහූ හොඳ කරුනාවන්ත කොන්ගෝවේ ලුමුම්බා බේරා ගැනීමට ගිය  මිනිහෙක්ද නැත්නම් සී.අයි.ඒ.

ඒජන්ත කෙනෙක්ද කියා ප්‍රශ්න ඈත. ෆින්ලන්ත සුදු කාන්තාවක් කසාද බැන්ද ක්‍රිස්තියානි ජාතික කෝෆි අනන් ආවේ කෙන්

යා වෙනි. ඔහුගේ පුතා ගැනත්, සදාම් හුසේන් සමඟ එකතුව තෙල්-ආහාර හුවමාරුවේ දී යු.එන්. ඕ නිලධාරින් කල්

මුදල් වංචා ගැනත් කොමිසන් පවා පත් කරන ලදී. මේ අනුව ජගත් මහ ලේකම් තනතුර කියන්නේ බල්ලෝ බත් වත්

නොකන තරමේ තනතුරකි. රෝහිත බෝගොල්ලාගම ද ඔහුගේ පුතාට රක්‍ෂාවක් ගන්නට හදන්නේ මෙතැනය!

    බෑන් නමැති කොරියන් ක්‍රිස්තියානි මිනිහෙක් ලංකාව පස්සේ එලවමින් එන්නේ ඈයි? මීට හේතුව  මේ

ජගත් සංවිධානය කියන්නේ හොර සංවිධානයක් නිසාය. බෑන් ට රක්‍ෂාව බේරා ගැනීමේ උවමනාවක් ඈත. යුක්තිය,

සත්ත්‍යය බෑන් ට වැදගත් නැත. තම මුලු ජීවිත කාලයම ලෝක සාමය වෙනුවෙන් කැපකල නෝර්වීජියන් ජාතික

ජොහාන් ගල්ටන්ග් කියන්නේ මේ වෙනුවට වෙනත් සංවිධානයක් ලෝකයට අවශ්‍යව ඈති බවය.  මේ ආයාතනය

චීනයට තැනක් දුන්නේ චීනය ජලකර බෝම්බය ද නිපද වූ පසුය. දැනටත් මෙහි ස්ථිර සාමාජිකයින් පස් දෙනා ගෙන්

හතර දෙනෙක් පරන යටත් විජිත කාරයින් වේ. ඉන්දියාව ලෝකයේ බිලියන් 1 කට වඩා සිටින රටක් වුනත් තාමත්

තැනක් නැත. බ්‍රසීලයට ද එසේය. ජපානයට ද තැනක් නැත.
   
    මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ මේ වාරයේ බෑන්ට ලංකාවේ හීන් සැරය පෙන්වා දී ඈත. බෑන් මේ මෝඩ වැඩේ

කලොත් ඊට විරුද්ධව ක්‍රියා කරන බව මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ බෑන්ට දන්වා ඈත. එක්සත් ජාතීන්ගේ ප්‍රඥප්තියේ වත් නැති

දෙයක් බෑන් කරන්න හදන්නේ මේ සේරම නීති රීති බටහිර අධිරාජ්‍යවාදීන් තමන්ගේ වාසියට හදා ගත් ඒවා නිසාය.

ඔවුන් කන්න හිතුනහම කබර ගොයා තල ගොයා කර ගනී.

    1500 ගනන්වල පටන් ගත් ලෝකයේ අනිත් රටවල් අල්ල ගෙන ඒවා ශිෂ්ටාචාර කිරීමේ ව්‍යාපාරය

අනුව යටත් විජිතවල වැසියන්ගේ මනසට හීන මානයක් ක්‍රමයෙන් ඈතුලු කිරීම මූලිකම උපාය මාර්ගයක් විය.

අවුරුදු 500 කට පසුව මෙම හීන මාන පැලෑන ආපසු බටහිර සුදු අධිරාජ්‍යවාදීන්ට හරවා යැවීම සිදුවුනේ 2009

අප්‍රියෙල් මාසයේ දී ලංකාවේ දීය. යුදෙව් කොල්ලෙක් වන මිලිබෑන්ඩ් ටත්, ප්‍රංශ විදේශ ඈමතිටත්, ගෝඨාභය රාජපක්‍ෂ

කණේ පාරක් ගැසුවේ ඔවුන් ප්‍රභාකරන් හමුවීමට ඉල්ලා සිටි විටය. ප්‍රභාකරන්ගේ ප්‍රාන ඈපක්‍ර‌ැවන් වීමට වුනොත් එය

ප්‍රශ්නයක් නොවේ යැයි මේ දෙන්නා මහ උජාරුවෙන් කිව්වේය. ගෝඨාභය කිව්වේ, “ප්‍රභාකරන් ඔබලාට මොනවා කලත්

මට ප්‍රශ්නයක් නැත, මගේ ප්‍රශ්නය එතකොට මට යුද්ධය අවසාන කිරීම ප්‍රමාද කිර්රිමට වෙන එක ගැනය” කියාය. මින්

මුහුනු පිලිටු කර ගත් මේ දෙන්නා වෙඩි කෑ ඌරන් මෙන් කෙලින්ම ගියේ නිවෙ යෝර්ක් නුවර යූ.එන්.ඕ.  එක ඉස්සරහ

පිට පදික වේදිකාවටය

    මෙසේ බෑන්, චූන් වීමේ  රහස කුමක්ද? ලංකාව දෙකඩ කිරීම බටහිර සුදු පාලකයින්ගේ ආශාවය. ඊට

හේතුව ඉන්දියන් සාගරය පාලනය කිරීමට ලංකාව සාමකාමි නොවන රටක් වුනොත් හොඳ නිසාය. එසේ නැත්නම් අඩු

තරමින් උතුර නැඟෙනහිර 13-ඒ ක්‍රමයක් වත් තිබෙනවා නම් තිරිකුණාමළේ වරාය අල්ලා ගැනීමට ලංකාවේ දෙමළ

පලාත් මහ ඈමතිට ලොකු පගාවක් දී ඉන්දියාවේ ටැමිල් නාඩ් වල ත්‍රස්තවාදී ඉන්දියාව කැඩීමේ ව්‍යාපාරයක් දියත්

කරවිය හැකිය.  මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ තිරිකුනාමලේ වරාය ගැන ජේ.ආර් ඉන්දියාව සමඟ කරගත් ගිවිසුම නිසා

හම්බන්තොට වරාය චීනයේ ආධාර සමග ආරම්භ කලේය.

    මෙය ඉතාමත් වටිනා දෙයක් වුවත් ඈමෙරිකාවත්, බටහිර පාලකයෝත් මේ ගැන ඉතාමත් කේන්තියෙන්

පසුවෙයි. චීනය ඉන්දියන් සාගරය පුරාම වරායවල් හදා දෙමින් සිටී. පකිස්තානය, බුරුමය හා  අයිරානයේද මෙසේ

වරායවල් ඉදිවෙමින් පවතී. ලංකාවේ හම්බන්තොට මේ අතරින් වටිනාම වරාය වේ. මානසික රෝගියෙකු විය හැකි

සරත් ෆොන්සේකා රවටා කුමන්ත්‍රණයක් කලේ ද මේ ගැන මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ ගැන ඔවුන්ගේ ඈති ඊර්ෂ්‍යාව හා ක්‍රෝධය

නිසාය.

    උතුරේ හා නැගෙනහිර දෙමළ ජනයා තවදුරටත් වංචාකාර, බොරුකාර දෙමළ බෙදුම් වාදී

දේශපාලකයින්ට නොරැවටෙන බව ලංකාවේ ඈති සී.අයි.ඒ. ඔත්තුකාරයින් දනී. මේ නිසා ඔවුන්ට අවශ්‍ය දෙමළ

ජනතාවට වෙනම රටක් ලබා ගැනීමේ සිහිනය අත හරින්නට නොදී ගෙන්‍යාමට මොකක් හෝ ඈමක් දීමය. මෙසේ

ඈමක් දුන් විට කර්නල් කරුනාට හෝ ඩග්ලස් දේවානන්දට හෝ දෙමළ නිජ භූමි මිත්ථ්‍යාව ට පටහැනිව දෙමළ

ජනයා ඉදිරියට යාම අපහසු වේ. මිනිස් ගතිය නම් තමන්ට වෙනම රටක් ලබා ගත හැකි නම් එය ලබා ගැනීමය. එය

සාධාරනද, එය දිගටම පවතීද (පකිස්තානයෙන් බංන්ග්ලා දේශය කැඩීයාම වැනි) යන් කාරණා ගැන මිනිසුන්

නොසිතයි.

    සරත් ෆොන්සේකා රවටා ගෙන, රනිල් හා සම්භන්ධන් කලේ මෙසේ යම් සිහිනයක් දෙමළ ජනතාවට

දීමය. මෙය බටහිර සල්ලි යොදා කල බව දැන් එලිවී ඈත. මේ නිසා දෙමළ ජනයා අතරමං විය, අන්ද මන්ද විය. මේ

ව්‍යාපාරය ඔවුන් හිතූ ආකාරයට සිදු නොවුන නිසා දැන් රටින් පිට ඉන්නා දෙමළ බෙදුම් වාදීන් පිම්බීමට මිලිබෑන්ඩ්,

රොබට් බ්ලේක් හා ගෝඩන් බ්‍රවුන් ඉදිරිපත්වී ඈත. උතුරේ හා නැගෙනහිර සමහර දෙමළ ජනයා මේ ලනුව කෑමට

හොඳටම ඉඩ ඈත. බෑන් ඉදිරිපත්ව ඉන්නේ මේ ලනුවට තව හයියක් දීමටය. “අපේ සම්භන්ධන් කියන අන්දමට අපිට

අනාගතයේදී අපේම කියා රටක් ලංකාවේ ම සදා ගන්නට බෑන් හා බ්ලේක්ලා ඉන්නව නේද? ඒනිසා අපි සම්භන්ධන් ට

චන්දය දිය යුතු නේද? කියා නොසිතන දෙමළ අය විරල විය හැකිය.

    හැම ගෙදරකටම කාර් එකක් හා ගෙදර වැඩට සුරංගනාවියක් බැගින් දුන්නත් මේ මූලික මිනිස්

පුරුතග්ජන ගතිය වෙනස් කල නොහැකිය. බෑන් හරහ බ්ලේක් ගන්නේ මේ පාරය. අවුරුදු තිහක් පමණ නොයෙක් දුක්

වින්ඳත්, දෙමළ නායකයෝ ගවයින් රැළක් ලෙස අහිංසක දෙමළ ජනතාව දක්කන්නට සැදීම ඛේදජනකය. මෙය හරියට

ප්‍රථම දරු ප්‍රසූතියේදී කෙතරම් වේදනාව ආවත් ගැහැනු දෙවන තුන්වන  දරුවන් ලබා ගැනීමට ද ආශාකරනවා

වගේය. මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ රජය සෙසූ ලෝකයේ රටවල් ද සමඟ එකතුව බෑන් විරුද්ධව විශ්වාශ බංග යෝජනාවක්

ගෙන ඒ යැයි මම සිතමි. කවුරුන් හෝ ජගත් සංවිධානය නමැති හොර බලලා ගේ බෙල්ලේ සීනුවක් බැන්ඳ යුතු කාලය

එළඹව ඈත.

චන්ද්‍රසේන පණ්ඩිතගේ විසිනි.

ආයුබෝවන්
අපි ඔබතුමාට පලමුව ස්තුථිවන්ත වෙනවා අපට මේ අවස්ථාව ලබාදීම සම්බන්ධව. මේ වනවිට ඔබ නවක තරුණ පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රීවරයකු බවට පත්වී හමාරයි. මේ ජයග්‍රහණය ඔබ දකින්නේ මොනවිදියකටද?

ඕනෑම මනුෂ්‍යයකු තරගයකදී බලාපොරොත්තු වන්නේ ජයග්‍රහණයයි. මේ වනවිට මම ඒ ජයග්‍රහණය ලබාගෙන සිටිනවා; මේ ජයග්‍රහණය මගේ ජීවිතයේ එක්තරා කඩඉමක් පමණයි. තව දිනා ගැනීමට කරුණු කාරනා රාශියක් තියෙනවා.

ඔබ තරුණ මන්ත්‍රීවරයෙක් වශයෙන් ඔබගේ දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ සිටින තරුණ තරුණීයන්ගේ ප්‍රශ්න වලට මුල් තැනක් දෙන්න සිදුවේවි ඒ සදහා ඔබතුල ඇති සැලස්ම කුමක්ද?

ඔබ කිව් ලෙසම මම තරුණ මන්ත්‍රී වරයෙක්. නමුත් මම මේ දිස්ත්‍රික්යේ සිටින තරුණ තරුණීයන්ගේ මන්ත්‍රීවරයා නොවෙයි. සන්ධානයේ ජයග්‍රහණය උදෙසා චන්දය දුන් සියලු දෙනාගේම මන්ත්‍රීවරයෙක්.
ඒ මන්ත්‍රීවරයාගේ එක වගකීමක් තමයි මේ දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ සිටින සියලුම තරුණ තරුණියන්ගේ ගැටලු විසදීම: ඒ වගකීම මා සතු වගකීමක් ලෙස මා ප්‍රබලව දකිනවා.

හොදයි, ඔබතුමා නියෝජනය කරන දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ ඇති ජනතා ගැටලු විසදීමට ඔබතුමා සතු සැලස්ම කුමක්දැයි පැහැදිලි කරන්න පුලුවන්ද?

මම නවක පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රීවරයෙක්, දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ ජනතා ගැටලු විසදීමට නම් පලමුව, සැබෑ ජනතා ගැටලු මොනවාදැයි හදුනා ගත යුතුයි. ඒ සදහා ජනතාව අතරට යා යුතුයි. ජනතාව අතරට යෑමේ අරමුණ, මූලික කරගත් සුපැහැදිලි වැඩපිලිවෙලක් අපට තියෙන්න ඕනි. මම පලමුව කරන්නේ ජනතාවයි අපයි බද්ධ කරන ඒ යාන්ත්‍රණය ගොඩනැංවීමයි; මම හිතනවා අමාරුම කර්තව්‍යය එයයි කියල. පලමුව එය ජය ගත යුතුයි.

ඔබට, ඔබ කියන්නාවූ යාන්ත්‍රණය ගොඩනගන්නයි, දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ ඇති ජනතා ගැටලු විසදන්නයි ලබාදී ඇත්තේ සීමිත කාලයක්, ඔබට මේ හැම දෙනාගේම ගැටලු විසදන්න මේ කාලය ප්‍රමාණවත්ද?

ගගකින් එගොඩ වන ක්‍රම කීපයක් තියෙනවා. තම තමන්ට පීනමින් එතර විය හැකියි. එහෙම නැත්නම් බෝට්ටුවකින් එතෙර වෙන්න පුලුවන්; මේ ක්‍රම දෙකෙන්ම අනාගත පරපුර මත යම් කාර්යය භාරයක් පටවනවා. පලමු ක්‍රමයට අනුව ඉපදෙන හැම අයෙක්ම පිහිනන්න පුරුදු විය යුතු වෙනවා. දෙවන ක්‍රමය අනුව බෝට්ටුව හා තොටියා නඩත්තු කරන ක්‍රමවේදයන් යොදා ගන්නට සිදුවෙනවා. නමුත් මෙහිදී අප අනුගමනය කරන්නේ; ශක්තිමත් පාලමක් ගොඩනැංවීමේ සම්ප්‍රධායයි. ඒක ක්ෂණික වැඩක් නොවෙයි නමුත් පරම්පරා ගනනක් පවතිනවා. අප ගොඩනංවන යාන්ත්‍රණය ඉතාමත් ශක්තිමත් එකක් බව මට නොබියව ප්‍රකාශ කරන්න ප්‍රලුවන්.

ඔබ ජනතාවයි රජයයි සම්බන්ධ කරවන යාන්ත්‍රණයක් ගැන පුන පුනා කථා කරනවා; ඇයි මේ යාන්ත්‍රණය පිහිටවීම මෙතරම් වැදගත් කරුණක් ලෙස ඔබ දකින්නේ?

මහජන මන්ත්‍රීවරු වශයෙන් අප අවංකව කටයුතු කල යුතුයි. අපට විසදිමට ඇත්තේ එම දිස්ත්‍රික්කයේ ජනතා ප්‍රශ්නයි. තවද මහජන මන්ත්‍රීවරයා යනු ජනතා ප්‍රශ්න විසදන කොන්ත්‍රාත් කරුවා විය නොහැකියි. ජනතාවට සිය ප්‍රශ්න විසදා ගැනීමට අවශ්‍ය පරිසරය සකස් කරන මාර්ගෝපදේශකයා හා මිතුරා විය යුතුයි. ඒ අනුව ජනතා ප්‍රශ්නය සංවේදීවූ වහාම ඊට පිලියම ගෙනෙන මන්ත්‍රී වරයකුගේ අවශ්‍යතාවය ජනතාවට තදින්ම දැනෙන යුගයක් තමයි අප පසු කරමින් ඉන්නේ.
අපට ස්වභාව ධර්මය විසින් ඕනෑවටත් වැඩිය පාඩම් උගන්වලා තියෙනවා; අප කල යුත්තේ මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශයක් හොද සරු මී වදයක් බවට පරිවර්තනය කිරීමයි. එය කල යුතු හා  ඒ වගේම කල හැකි කාර්යයක් බව වටහා ගන්න.

අහන්නත් සන්තෝසයි; මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශයක් හොද සරු මී වදයක් බවට පරිවර්තනය කිරීමට අධිෂ්ඨාන කරගෙන සිටින, තරුණ, නවක, මන්ත්‍රීවරයකු සමග සාකච්ඡා කිරීමට ලැබීමත් භාග්‍යයක්සේ මට හිතෙනවා. ඔබ මේ කටයුත්ත ආරම්භ කරන ආකාරය පිලිබද යම් අදහසක් අපතුල තියෙනවා; නමුත් ඔබගේ යාන්ත්‍රණය අපට තවම ගැටලුවක්?

කල්පනා කරල බලන්න. අද බරපතල සමාජ අර්බූදයක් බවට පත්වෙලා තියෙන ඕනෑම ප්‍රශණයක ආරම්භය සිදුවන්නේ. කවුරු හරි මිනිහෙකුගේ මනසක් තුල. ඒ ආරම්භ වෙන බීජය තමයි ක්‍රමානුකූලව සමාජය පුරා ගලාගෙන ගිහිල්ලා, මුලු සමාජයම වෙලාගෙන සමාජ අර්බූද නිර්මාණය කරන්නේ. මේ සදහා අපට දිය හැකි උදාහරණ සංඛ්‍යාව අති විශාලයි.

අපි මුලින් වටහා ගන්න ඕනි; අප කියන්නේ කවුද කියල. අපට ජීවත් වෙන්න නියමිත කාල සීමාවක් තියෙනවා. කන්න පුලුවන් ආහාර වල ප්‍රමාණයක් තියෙනවා. අදින්න පුලුවන් ඇදුම් වලද උපරිම සීමාවක් තියෙනවා. මේ වාගේ හැම දෙයකටම උපරිම සීමාවන් යටතේ පැමිණෙන අප, කාලයට සාපේක්ෂව ගමන් කරන බුද්ධිමත් සත්වයෙක්. අපට තියෙන වැදගත්ම සාධකය කාලයයි. කාලය නිසිලෙස කලමනා කරණය කිරීම හරහා අප ජීවත්වෙන කාලය අඩු වැඩි කර ගැනීමේ හැකියාවක් අපට උදාවෙලා තියෙනවා. මැතිවරණයකින් බලයට පත්වෙන මන්ත්‍රීවරයාට විසදන්න වෙන්නෙ, මුලින් කිව් ආකාරයට කාගේ හෝ මනසකින් ආරම්භ වී සමාජය පුරා ගලාගොස් ඔඩුදුවා ඇති ප්‍රශ්න නම්; අප කල යුත්තේ, ප්‍රශනයේ දැන් ඇති තැනින් ආරම්භ කර එම ප්‍රශනය සමනය වන ආකාරයනට ගලායාමට සැලස්වීමයි.

අපි උදාහරණයක් වශයෙන් ළදරු කිරිපිටි ප්‍රශ්ණය සාකච්ඡාවට බදුන් කරමු. මේ ප්‍රශ්ණය හරහා සමාජ අර්බූද ගනනාවක් නිර්මාණය වී ඇත.
1.ළදරුවාට හිමිවිය යුතු මව්කිරි නොලැබීම.
2.මේ අනුව ස්වභාවය අපේක්ෂිත ශරීර සංයුතියකින් යුත් නියම දරුවා    සමාජයට හිමි නොවීම.
3.ළදරු කිරිපිටි සදහා අමතර විදේශ විනිමයක් රජයට දැරීමට සිදුවීම.
4.මවට එම කිරිපිටි මිලදී ගැනීමට අමතර මුදලක් වැය කිරීමට සිදුවීම.
5.දරුවාට කිරි ලබාදීමට සැකසුන මව් ශරීරය එසේ නොකිරීම හේතුවෙන් පැන නගින සෞඛ්‍ය ගැටලු වලට මවට මුහුණ දීමට සිදුවීම.

ආදී වශයෙන් ගැටලු දාමයක් සමාජය තුල පැන නැගී ඇත. මේ සියලු ගැටලු වලට එකම සුදුසු පිලියම; මව තමන්ගේ දරුවාට මව් කිරි ලබාදීමයි. මවගේ මනස එය ඉටුකිරීමේ  තත්වයට පත්කරවීමේ සමාජ වගකීම තරුණ මන්ත්‍රීවරයකු වශයෙන් මා වෙත පැවරී තියෙනවා. ඒ සදහා මා ගොඩනංවන යාන්ත්‍රණය අතිවිශාල කාර්යය භාරයක් ඉටු කරනවා ඇති. ” මව්කිරි දරුවන්ට ලබා දෙන සමාජයක්” සමාජ ගැටලු රාශියක් උත්පාදනය කිරීම අහෝසි කරන ආකාරය ඔබට පැහැදිලි ඇතැයි මට සිතෙනවා.

ඔව් ඔබ කියන දේ පැහැදිලියි. නමුත් යාන්ත්‍රණයේ අපැහැදිලි භාවයක් අපට පෙනෙනවා.

ශ්‍රී ලංකාවේ මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශයක් කියන්නේ, සම්පත් සම්භාරයක්. පලමුව එම සම්පත් හදුනාගත යුතුයි. වර්ගී කරණයකට භාජනය කල යුතුයි. ඊටපසු ජනතා ශුභ සිද්ධියේ දිසාවට යොමුකර, කලමණාකරණය කල යුතුයි. මූලික වශයෙන් මේ සම්පත්, මානව සම්පත, සත්ව සම්පත හා ශාක සම්පත වශයෙන් ජීවීමය වශයෙන් බෙදෙනවා.

අද මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශයක ඇති මේ සම්පත් වලට මොකක්ද සිද්ධ වෙලා තියෙන්නේ කියල බලන්න. මානව සම්පත තමන් හුරුවුන කාර්යයන් ඔහේ කරගෙන යනවා. සත්ව සම්පත බොහෝවිට ඉබාගාතේ ඇවිදිනවා; ශාක ප්‍රජාව තමන්ට ඇති සම්පත් ප්‍රමාණයට අනුකූලව උපරිමව සිය දෛනික කාර්යයන් සිදු කරනවා. මන්ත්‍රීතුමා මෙහෙම ප්‍රජාවන් ඉන්නවද කියල දන්නෙ නැති; මොවුන්ගේ කාර්යයන් තමන්ට අයත්ද කියල දන්නෙවත් නැති සමාජයක් අපට උරුම වෙලා තියෙන්නේ. මෙම සමාජයයි වෙනස් කල යුත්තේ. මෙම සමාජයයි මම කලමණාකරනය කරන්නට යන්නේ.
ඕනෑම අයෙකුට ඉතා පහසුවෙන්ම හසුරුවන්න පුලුවන් වන්නේ ශාක ප්‍රජාවයි. ඒ නිසා ප්‍රතම පියවර වශයෙන් ශාක ප්‍රජාව කලමණාකරනයට බාජනය කිරීම ආරම්භ කලයුතු වෙනවා. ඒ සදහා අවශ්‍ය පියවර ගන්නවා.

හොදයි ඔබ සදහන් කරන ශාක කලමණාකරණය කියන්නේ මොකක්ද? ඒකෙන් මේ සමාජයට ඇති යහපත කුමක්ද? 

ශාක කියන්නේ ජීවයේ පැවත්මයි. ඒ නිසා මේ මැතිවරණ කොට්ඨාශයේ වෙසෙන ජනතාවගේ ජීවිත වලට මෙම කොට්ඨාශයේ ඇති ශාක ප්‍රජාවගේ බලපෑම කොතරම්දැයි. අපට වටහා ගැනීමට හැකියි. පලමුව මගේ මූලිකත්වයෙන් කොට්ඨාශයේ ශාක සංඝණනයක් සිදු කරනවා. ඒ අනුව මෙහි ඇති ඒ ඒ වර්ගයේ ශාක ප්‍රමාණය සම්බන්ධව දැක්මක් අපට ලැබෙනවා. පොල් ගස් ප්‍රමාණය, කොස් ගස් ප්‍රමාණය දෙල් ගස් ප්‍රමාණය ආදී වශයෙන් සියලූම ආහාර මය වැදගත් කමකින් යුත් සියලුම ශාක හදුනාගෙන, එම ශාක හිමිකරුවන්, පලාතේ ගොවිජන සේවා මධ්‍යස්ථානය හා පලාතේ මන්ත්‍රී වරයා සම්බන්ධීකරණය වූ යාන්ත්‍රණයකින් පලාතේ ඇති සෑම ශාකයකටම පොහොර යෙදීම මගින් පලදාව වැඩි කිරීම හා ඒවා නිසි වෙලාවට නෙලා ගැනීම හා කල්තබා ගැනීම යන කාර්යයන්ට ප්‍රමුකත්වය ලබා දෙනවා. මේ අවස්ථාව වන විට කාර්මික සංවර්ධන මණ්ඩලයේ ආහාර කල් තබා ගැනීමේ සේවාවන් හා ජනතාව ඒකාබද්ධ කිරීමෙන් ඔවුනව මේ යාන්ත්‍රණයට වඩ වඩාත් කිට්ටු කර ගැනීමේ කාර්යය මම ඉටු කරනවා. ඊටපස්සේ අපට හමුවෙනවා දිස්ත්‍රික්කය පුරාම ජනතාව වෙනුවෙන් ගොඩනැංවූ නමුත් මේ වනවිට අතරමංවූ ආයතන රැසක් උදාහරණයක් වශයෙන් සමූපකාරය, ග්‍රාමීය බැංකුව මේ ආයතනත් මෙම යාන්ත්‍රණයට බද්ධ කර ගැනීමත් සමගම මෙම යාන්ත්‍රණයට පලාතේ හැම දෙනාගේම දායකත්වය ලැබෙනවා. දැන් මේ යාන්ත්‍රණය වැඩ කරන්නේ පලාතේ මන්ත්‍රීවරයාගේ හෝ ලේඛම් වරයාගේ යන දෙදෙනෙකුගේ හෝ කීප දෙනෙකුගේ මොලවලින් නො‍වේ පලාතේ ජීවත්වන ජනතාව සතු ලත්ෂ ගනනක මොලවලින් වන අතර, එයින් ලැබෙන සියලුම ප්‍රතිලාබ සෘජුවම ජනතාව අතටම ලැබෙන බැවින් ජනතාව මෙය වැලද ගන්නවා ඇත. මෙයින් සිදුවන විශාලම ප්‍රතිලාභය නම් මන්ත්‍රීවරයා, ජනතාව හා ජනතා උන්නතිය සදහා බිහිකර ඇති නමුත් අතරමංව ඇති ආයතනද අත්වැල් බැද ගැනීමයි. මෙම අවධියට පත්කර ගත් යාන්ත්‍රණයකින් පලාතේ සංවර්ධනය උදෙසා කර ගන්න බැරි දෙයක් නැහැ. මෙය නිවැරදිව ක්‍රියා කරවන මන්ත්‍රීවරයාට ඊලග චන්දයේදී කටවුට් බැනර් උවමනා වෙන්නේත් නැහැ.

ඔව් දැන් අපට පැහැදිලියි ඔබගේ ශාක ප්‍රජාව සදහා වූ යාන්ත්‍රණය හා එහි ප්‍රතිලාභ සම්බන්ධව. අපගේ කාලය අපට හරස් කරනවා. ඔබට ශුභ අනාගතයක්!

චන්ද්‍රසේන පණ්ඩිතගේ විසිනි.

චන්ද්‍රසිරි විජයවික්‍රම

දැන් හැමෝම, රටම, හෙළ උරුමයේ ය කියමින් උද්දාම විය හැකිද යන්න හොඳින් ව්මසා බැලිය යුතුව. මීට හේතුව මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ ආණ්ඩුවට එකතු වී සිටින කොටස් අතරේ පෙඩරල් වාදයට පක්‍ෂව ක්‍රියා කල බොහෝ අය සිටින නිසාය. මේ නිසා 13-ඒ කාරයන් හා පෙඩරල් කාරයින් පරදා, පලාත් සභා නමැති සුදු අලියා එලවා දමා දෙමළ නිජබිම් මිථ්‍යාව නීතියෙන්ද ඉවත් කරන තෙක් අපට උද්දාම වීමට නොහැකියැයි මම සිතමි. දෙමළ, සිංහල හා මුස්ලිම් ජනයාට සාධාරණය ඉටු කිරීමට 13-ඒ අවශ්‍ය නැත. දෙමළ ජනයා ඉල්ලන්නේ වතුර, පාරවල්, ඈලවල්, ගෙවල්, රක්‍ෂාවල් මිස ඊලම් හෝ පෙඩරල් හෝ නොවේ. ඊලම් ඉල්ලන්නේ මිලිබෑන්ඩ් හා රොබට් බ්ලේක් ය.
    
 පෙඩරල් වාදී ශන්තුවරු කවුද? එස්. බි. දිසානයක, රාජිතා සේනාරත්න, ඩිලාන් පෙරේරා, ඩිව් ගුනසේකර, ජී. එල්. පීරිස්, තිස්ස විතාරන යන සිංහල නම් ඈති අයත්, ඩග්ලස් දේවානන්ද, පිලියාන් චන්ද්‍රකාන්ත යන දෙමළ දෙකත් මෙහිදී මගේ මතකයට ඒ. අළුතෙන් එන තරුන පිරිසට ලනු දී නොමඟ යැවීමට මේ අය උඩින් හා යටින් ක්‍රියා කිරීමට පුලුවන. බොහෝ දේශපාලන හොරු පලාත් සභා නම් මඟඩියට රිංගා ගෙන තමන්ගේ ඥාතීන් ගැන බලා ගන්නා නිසාත්, එය පාර්ලිමේන්තුවට ඒමට කෙට්ම මඟ නිසාත්, 13-ඒ කොටි වලිගය ඉවත් කිරීමට විරුද්ධව විශාල බලවේගයක් ක්‍රියාත්මක වීමට හොඳටම ඉඩ කඩ තිබේ.

 ජාතික හෙළ උරුමයේ හාමුදුරුවරු එය ගිහියන්ට භාරදී ඉන් ක්‍රමයෙන් ඉවත් වීමට යන බව වාර්තා විය.  රට දෙකඩ වීමේ භීතිය අවසාන වූ නිසා එතුමන්ලාගේ සේවය තවදුරටත් පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේදී අනවශ්‍ය බවත්, ආගමික සේවය සඳහා කැප වන් බවත් උන්වන්සේලා පවසා ඈත. රට බේරා ගැනීමට ඉදිරිපත්ව මේ හාමුදුරුවරු නොයෙක් ගැරහුම්, බැනුම් වලට මුහුන දුන්නේය. මේ ගැන මට මතක සමහර කාරණා මෙසේ ය.

අලිමංකඩ අහිමි වීම ලංකාවේ තීරණාත්මක පරාජයක් විය. සීහල උරුමය (සිංහල උරුමය නොව) නමින් පක්‍ෂයක් බිහි වුයේ මේ සිද්ධියට පසුවය. අධිනීතිඥ එස්. එල්. ගුණසේකර මෙහි මුල් තැනක් ගත්තේය. තිලක් කරුනාරත්න තවත් කෙනෙකි. ඒ කාලයේ ම පක්‍ෂයේ නම වෙනස් කරන ලෙස මම ඔහු සමඟ වාද කලෙමි. නම සිංහල නොව සීහල යැයි ඔහු කීවේය. පක්‍ෂයේ හතුරන් මේ වෙනස ගැන සලකන්නේ නැති බවත් ,පක්‍ෂය ජාතිවාදී පක්‍ෂයක් කියා ලෝකය පුරාම කථාවක් යන බවත් මම ලියූ විට ඔහුගේ බෑනා යයි පසුව මා දැනගත් කෙනෙක් මට චෝදනා කලේය. මගේ එම ක්‍රියාව පක්‍ෂයේ නම ජාතික හෙළ උරුමය කියා වෙනස් වීමට උපකාර වුනා දැයි මම නොදනිමි.

තිලක් කරුනාරත්නගේ බෑනා අවාසනාවන්ත ලෙස ඔහුගේ භාර්‍යාවත් (දෙදෙනාම දොස්තරවරු), බිළිඳු දරුවාත් සමඟ බොල්ගොඩ ගඟේ ගිලී මිය ගියේය. හෙළ උරුමයේ හාමුදුරුවරුන්ට කහ කුරුල්ලන් කියා ලියූ අයද සිටියේය. දැන් වෙනස් වී සිට්න වෝල්ටර් ජයවර්ධන, මගේ නම වරදවා තේරුම් ගෙන (චන්ද් විජේ)  මා හෙළ උරුමයේ හාමුදුරු කෙනෙක් ද කියා මගෙන් ඈසුවේය. ඔහු කෙතරම් මා සමග මා හෙළ උරුමයට පක්‍ෂව ලිවීම ගැන උරණ වුනාද කිව්වොත් ඔහු මගේ යාහූ ඊමේල් ගිනුම ද කොම්පනියට ලියා අවලංගු කෙරෙව්වේය. මේ අතරතුර එංගලන්තයේ බාත් විශ්ව විද්ධ්‍යාලයේ වැඩ කරන හාමුදුරු කෙනෙක් නෝර්වේ  අධාර ලබා ගෙන හෙළ උරුමයට හානි කර ආකාරයේ සම්මේලනයක් ද පැවත් වීය. මේ ගැන ප්‍රශ්න කල විට ඒ හාමුදුරුවන්ට ද බෙහෙවින් කේන්ති ගියේය.

ජාතික හෙළ උරුමය ලංකාවේ ඉරණම විසඳූ පක්‍ෂයකි. ඩිව් ගුනසේකර කථානායක වීම වැලැක් වූයේ ඔවුන් ය. මෙසේ නොවන්නට චන්ද්‍රිකා, ජී. එල්. පීරිස්-නීලන් තිරුචෙල්වම් පැලෑන ක්‍රියාවට යොදවා මෙලහකට රට දෙකට කඩා දී අවසානය.  මෙම චන්ද විමසීමේදී එක බලු මන්ත්‍රී මිනිහෙක් එක හාමුදුරු නමක්ගේ යටි බඩට සෙල් ෆෝන් එකකින් ඈන එතුමාට ඉස්පිරිතාලයේ ඉන්නට ද සැලැස්සුවේය. ජාතික හෙළ උරුමය ආනන්ද සංගාරීට මන්ත්‍රී ආසනයක්ද නොමිලේ ප්‍රධානය කලේය. එය භාර ගෙන රටටත්, දෙමළ ජනයාටත් සේවයක් කිරීමට තරම් භාග්‍යයක් ඔහුට නොවීය. ඔහු අතරමංවූ දෙමළ මිනිහෙක් ලෙස මිය යනු ඈත.

 මෙම කෙටි ලිපියේ අරමුණ වූයේ මෑත අතීතය අමතක නොකරන ලෙස හෙළ උරුමයේ ගිහි සාමාජිකයින්ට පෙන්නා දීමය. උදය ගම්මන්පිල වැනි තරුනයින්, කාලෝ ෆොන්සේකා වැනි අය සමඟ වැඩ කල යුතු ඉතාමත් ප්‍රවේශමිනි. ජාතික හෙළ උරුමය විනාශ කිරීමට බලා සිටින්නේ ලංකාවේ කළු සුද්ද්දන් පමනක් නොව, 1505 දී බයිබලය හා කඩුව ගෙන පැමිනි අය අද එන්නේ නිදහස් වෙළඳාම, දෙවියන් හා ප්‍රජාතන්ත්‍රවාදය (ෆ්රී-මාකට්, ගෝඩ්, ලෙජිටිමසි) යන අවතාර ලෙසය.

   සිංහලෙන් ලියන්න පහසුම විදිහ:

Dual-script Sinhala

By Shelton A. Gunaratne 2010

On arrival in Wellington (current population 386,000), the capital and the third largest city in New Zealand, Monday (21 Dec. 1981) evening, we—my almost 2-year-old son Junius, wife Yoke-Sim and I—checked into the now defunct Waterloo Hotel. After dinner, I went for a stroll from Boulcott Street, down Willis Street, to Vivian Street.

Wellington is approximately 400 km northeast of Christchurch on the South Island, which we toured since 12 Dec. Now the contrasts between the two islands were gradually becoming clear to us.

The South Island is dominated by the mighty Southern Alps from one end to the other with 200 perpetually snow-capped mountains. This geographical phenomenon has created distinct climatic divisions within the island—a wet West Coast, a sunny north, a cold south, and a mild east. The warmer North Island contains all of New Zealand’s volcanoes and thermal springs. It accommodates 76 percent of the country’s 4.3 million population although South Island is 33 percent bigger in land area. Glaciers and the very high peaks are on South Island.

Ivan Brown, who took over as our coach captain on the Tiki Tour of North Island, guided us on a sightseeing excursion of Wellington the next morning. We skirted the Lambton Harbor, Oriental Bay and Evans Bay; then drove through the 623-meter-long Mount Victoria Tunnel opened in 1931 to connect the suburbs of Mount Victoria and Hataitai. Pedestrians and cyclists use an elevated ramp on the north side of the tunnel roadway, which became part of Highway 1 in 2001. Atop the tunnel is Alexandra Park.

Brown steered us to the lookout on Alexandra Road, just south of Roseneath, but the fog marred our view of much of the city, five km to the west. On our return to the city, we saw the New Zealand Parliament Buildings on Molesworth Street before we stopped for tea at the Wellington Botanical Gardens by the bay [photo].

On the Way to Napier

Our Tiki Tour was not designed to give anyone an in-depth understanding of any of the major NZ cities. So, that’s all we saw of Wellington, when we commenced the day’s 346-km trip to Napier at 11.30 a.m.  We reached our destination at 6 p.m. via Carnarvon and Waipukurau. Our lunch turned out to be an enjoyable barbecue at the Duralyn

Stud owned by the Gloyn family in Carnarvon. Yoke-Sim and Junius tried some horseback riding at the stud [photo]. At Sanson, a few kilometers to the north on Highway 1, we turned southeast on Highway 3 to Palmerston North and then northeast to Woodville, where we continued northeast on Highway 2. The next two short stops were at a lookout on a hill overlooking Waipukurau, and at Hastings (population 65,100). The detours added an extra 30 km to the direct distance between the start and the finish.

In Napier (population 58,100), a port city on Hawke’s Bay in the east coast, we checked into the Masonic Establishment Hotel on Tennyson Street. The Twin Cities (also called the Bay Cities) of Napier and Hastings, less than 20 km apart, have a combined population of 123,200, a high concentration of urban people by NZ standards.

After dinner, we went for a family stroll on the Marine Parade (the “Golden Mile”), the location of the statue of Maori mythology’s Pania of the Reef, a beautiful maiden who lived in the sea. Then I relaxed in my hotel room reading The (Napier) Daily Telegraph and the (Hastings) Hawke’s Bay Herald Tribune. These two papers later merged to become the Hawke’s Bay Today.

We spent Wednesday (23 Dec.) morning enjoying the attractions of Napier. We took Junius to the Lilliput animated village and Model Railway ($2 per head) and the Hawke’s Bay Aquarium ($2.50 per head) [photo]. Napier’s unique concentration of Art Deco architecture, a byproduct of reconstruction that followed the havoc caused by the 1931 earthquake, attracts many admirers, particularly in February.

Thermal Country and Maori Culture

Brown got us back on the coach at noon to start on the 222 km trip to Rotorua. He drove 62 km northwest along Highway 2 and Highway 5 before stopping briefly at Te Hanoto. Our lunch stop, Taupo, was a further 79 km to the northwest, located on the northeastern tip of the lake bearing the same name. When I went to purchase a copy of the Taupo Times, I noticed the presence of Indian and Chinese retail merchants in the town.

Then we visited the beautiful Huka Falls of the Waikato River, six km to the northeast [photo]. The Wairakei thermal valley, which has the world’s second geothermal power station, was only three km away [photo]. The sight and smell of thermal activity in the valley gave us a much different experience than the glacier and fjord experience we had on South Island.

About 5 p.m., we reached Rotorua (permanent population 55,600) on the southern tip of the lake bearing the same name. With 17 other lakes dotting the city’s east and the south, Rotorua has developed into an aquatic paradise for fishing, water-skiing and swimming. We checked in at the now defunct Grand Establishment Hotel on Hinemoa Street for two nights.

After dinner, our tour group attended the Tudor Towers Maori Entertainers Concert, which included three acts. I was thrilled by the Maori love song of all time, “Pōkarekare Ana.”

Pōkarekare ana                       [They are agitated]
ngā wai o Waiapu,                  [the waters of Waiapu]
Whiti atu koe hine                    [But when you cross over girl]
marino ana e.                          [they will be calm.]

Rotorua represents the heart of Maori culture in New Zealand in addition to being a resort and a health spa. The next morning, we immersed ourselves in three of its famous attractions: the Maori Arts and Crafts Institute and Whakarewarewa Thermal Reserve; the Agrodome; and the Rainbow Springs.

 At the thermal reserve, we saw the silica terraces, the boiling springs and the geysers, notably the Pohutu (“Big Splash”) whose spurts sometimes reach 100 meters [photo]. At the Agrodome, we saw 19 of New Zealand’s top rams. At Rainbow Springs, we saw a kiwi, in the Nocturnal Kiwi House, and thousands of rainbow and brown trout. Junius became friends with a 10-year-old girl while we ate lunch here. We also stopped at the Ohinemata Maori Church.

In the afternoon, Junius and Yoke-Sim joined for a stroll on the Government Gardens and walked up to Lake Rotorua behind the Tudor Towers. After dinner, the three of us walked to the Polynesian Pools to bathe in a private thermal pool ($2 per head). We liked the satin smooth (37-to-40-degree) mineral water fed by Priest, Rachael and Radium springs. Back in my hotel room, I read The (Rotorua) Daily Post and The (Auckland) New Zealand Herald.

Christmas in Big City

Christmas morning, Brown took us to explore the Waitomo Caves, 147 km west from Rotorua on Highway 5 and Otorohanga Road. Our first stop was at Arapuni, the location of the seventh and penultimate hydroelectric power station on the 425-km Waikato River, the longest river in New Zealand. It was late morning when we reached the caves, situated nine km southwest of Hangatika.

A mishap delayed our cave tour when Merle Grubb, an elderly woman from San Diego, Calif., fell down while stepping off the coach and hurt her forehead. Brown took the Grubbs—Elsie and John—to the Te Kuti Hospital. They quit their tour on our arrival in Auckland. (Two years later, on 23 Aug. 1983, we had the privilege of being the guests of the Grubbs at their home in San Diego.)

The Waitomo Caves system includes four main caves: Waitomo Cave, Ruakuri Cave, Aranui Cave and Gardner’s Gut—all noted for their stalactite and stalagmite displays, and for the population of glowworms known as Arachnocampa luminosa. Therefore, they are similar to the caves we had already visited in Lake Te Anau on South Island.

The tour took us through three levels, starting with the Catacombs. The second level, called the Banquet Chamber, linked us back to the upper level to see the Pipe Organ, the cave’s largest formation. The third level led us into the Cathedral, demonstration platform, and the jetty. The Cathedral, an 18-meter-high enclosed area with rough surfaces, provides for great acoustics. Dame Kiri Te Kanawa is among the artistes who reputedly performed here. A boat ride through the Glowworm Grotto took us onto the underground Waitomo River where the only light came from the tiny glowworms creating a sky of living lights.

We ate lunch at the Waitomo Hotel [photo], perched on the brow of a hill. Brown picked up the Grubbs at the hospital and steered us 200 km north to the country’s big city, Auckland (current urban population 1.3 million). On the way, our first stop was at the Te Awamutu Rose Garden, 45 km from the caves. We passed 61 km through Obaugo, Hamilton and Ngaruwahia to reach Huntly, where we stopped next.

We reached Auckland about 4 p.m. and checked in at the Royal International to spend the Christmas night.

Junius, Yoke-Sim and I spent the Christmas evening strolling on Auckland Domain, Albert Park and Quay Street.  As we returned to the hotel, we ran into three Sri Lankan sailors working for a Greek ship.

I wondered whether we could ever experience another Christmas of sulphor smells, glowworm sights and big city phobia as this one was. However, as Buddhists we did not have to worry

Next: Tiki Touring North Island: A Peep into the Far North

(The writer is a professor of mass communications emeritus, Minnesota State University Moorhead.)

 Figure 1– Our tour route on North Island:  A=Wellington, B=Hastings-Napier, C=Rotorua, D=Waitomo Caves, E=Auckland, F=Kaitaia, G=Russell.

After visiting the Waitomo Caves on Christmas Day 1981, we  had lunch at the Waitomo Hotel, perched on a hill.  The author and his son Junius are admiring the surrounding scenery..

Insight By Sunil Kumar March 7th 2010

Quite within reason and well within the independent jurisdiction and jurisprudence of Sovereign Sri Lanka,  President Mahinda Rajapaksa has objected to the intention of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon to appoint a panel of experts to advise him (Mr. Ban) on Sri Lanka and has said the move was totally uncalled for.

 While the President’s response that Moon’s request is not only uncalled for, given the facts available indicating many conflicts of interest surrounding the ever bungling Ban Ki Moon and his forays into what he mistakenly beleives is within his jurisdiction he also seems to be leaning in favour of Sri Lanka’s political opposition in pursuance of dissent against the Government of Sri Lanka where Moon seems to be dancing ( perhaps a moondance!) to the tunes of the right wing anti UPFA enemies whose clout in the western world is mostly a foregone conclusion regardless of whether their anti governmental tirades are justified or not!

 Add to this pot  the rhetoric of the overseas pro Liberation Tamil Tiger dissentors comprising of diaspora scattered around the globbe and the UN circus of gullible swallowers of  all the backyard bilge they are fed ( attention Mr Moon!) is complete with its somewhat befuddled leader at his wits end towards proper reasoning about how well directed Sri Lanka is as A Nation In Progress Towards Unprecedented Growth  with an astute leader at the helm and one who accomplished what no other leader has done in putting down a decades long insurgency, the magnitude of which the world rarely sees but is now astoundedly aware of!

 Lately  as well as  going back to the days of Koffi Annan, the UN seems to recruit seemingly characters to its highest office who carreen along unabated and unchallenged, meting out their ludicrous policies to the world via an already tarnished United Nations Organization which by comparison with the once rock solid world organization it was, which held its own towards protocols and integrities relative to world affairs but today is nothing but a circus swathed in a comedy of errors led by an apparently bungling clown, which probably  merits its discontinuation as it seems to prioritise meddling into the affairs of sovereign nations for all the wrong reasons where the likes of Ban Ki Moon probably needs to be asked to go to hell which seems to be what the President of Sri Lanka seems to be doing in veiled diplomacy and all kudos to that!

 What makes the actions of the likes of Ban Ki Moon an affront to world affairs is the manner in which he chooses to ignore areas in the world glaring to be noticed and acted upon towards arresting the violation of human rights and much more, there being more than just a single example and outstanding in the crying need for restitution where the horrors and injustices which transpire in nations like Burma. Tibet to name some seem to be conveniently ignored and what further transpires in many African Nations, the Middle, Near and Far East totally bypassed and a blind eye turned although the momentum towards investigating Sri Lanka seems to be a gnawing albeit ludicrous priority!

 Ban Ki Moon certainly seems to have stepped into boots which are far too oversized for him as well as donning a hat much too wide for his miniscule cranium of limited grey matter  according to some of his critics by continuously haranguing and pestering Sri Lanka which seems to have been based upon the sources who egg him on to the task and about time the man took a deep breath and sorted out his administrative priorities to address the real felt needs of the world and get his act together and in the event of failure to do this, either discontinue his circus act or hand over the reins to someone more capable having the wherewithal it takes than his whimsical self to do his job rather than becoming a global annoyance where the only eventual direction for him would be to follow the same path as his predecessor and dissapear into oblivion and quit amidst global derision and anger over his apathetic and at times puerile manouverings!

 When on February 26, a UNSG Ban Ki Moon spokesperson had said in New York that Mr. Ban had informed President Rajapaksa in the course of a telephone conversation about his intention on the panel, Mr. Ban’s spokesperson had said the panel would advise him on the way forward on accountability issues. What accountability does Sri Lanka owe Ban Ki Moon asks many discerning analysts where the Sri Lankan Leadership has made all his accountabilities pretty much obvious barring media hype and the usual lies and innuendo which follow, through very pellucid and crystal clear policies and actions which are deserving of acccollades rather than petty minded accountability requests spurred on by the forces of adversity that once contributed to much detriment in the Island Nation?

 Since the military defeat of the LTTE last May, various and at times dubious functionaries  with a need to establish their proper bona fides and credentials in the U.N. have been issuing statements on the need for a committee to investigate alleged human rights violations in the 34-month long Tamil Tiger terrorist insurgency.Sotto Voce on behalf of the Tamil Tigers as some seem to beleive!

 Very justifiably The Rajapaksha Administration has rejected the somewhat incongruous suggestion and repeatedly pointed out  and cited the resolution by the Human Rights Commission lauding Sri Lanka on the military defeat of the Tigers which probably has far deeper insight into related matters than a speculative UN and Ban Ki-Moon!.

 The President’s Secretariat here on Saturday quoted Mr. Rajapaksa as pointing out to Mr. Ban that no such action had been taken regarding other states with continuing armed conflicts on a large scale, involving major humanitarian catastrophes and visible human rights violations which were man created.

 Mr. Ban has also been informed by way of a Government statement that Sri Lanka has concluded its armed conflict with the most ruthless terrorist organisation in the world, more than nine months ago within accepted norms of dealing with such issues despite grave adversities presented by the enemy and was in the process of working towards strengthening national reconciliation.

The statement quoted Mr. Rajapaksa as telling Mr. Ban how interested forces attempted the interference ( refered to previously ) including  trying to draw in the U.N. and other international sources in the recently-concluded presidential election too, which has been internationally accepted as being peaceful, free and fair and there seems nothing further to add by way of speculative anxieties and doomsday predictions created by Sri Lanka’s enemies to which Ban Ki Moon certainly seems to have a penchant towards assenting as gospel when it has more exaggeration and speculative innuendo where he needs to get his facts right!.

 President Rajapaksa also seems to have picked up the need to educate the apparently misinformed Ban Ki Moon that he had already, as a further measure of reconciliation, appointed a special committee to study and report on the lessons from the conflict situation that prevailed in some parts of Sri Lanka which if insufficient to clear the mindset of the UN Secretary General. would only portray the kind of muddied bias he and his associates seem to love to wallow in!

Asoka Weerasinghe (Mr.)Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario . K1J 6G1 . Canada

March 6, 2010

Ms. Navanetham Pillay United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Palais Wilson 52 rue des Paquis; CH1201 Geneva, Switzerland

Dear Ms. Navi Pillay:

You sure haven’t given up wanting to nag, bully and beat-up Sri Lanka with a fresh call to investigate the alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka during the latter stages of the Eelam War IV before the Tamil Tigers were annihilated on 18 May last year after ruling their de-facto Eelam for 30 years.

Your insistence is certainly getting to be a bit tedious and parceled with a vulgar sentiment, purely for two reasons. One is that your slip is showing and it exposes your sentiments in favour of the Tamils as you did forget to wash the slip as it is still soiled with the muddy paw markings of the Tamil Tigers whom you obviously cuddled during their final days of their existence to provide them with some moral support to fight another day. And secondly that you are a Tamil, and which ever way you may try to splice to tell the world that you are an impartial adjudicator on Human Rights the fact remains that you are a true blooded Tamil and that your ‘Blood is thicker than water’.

You are certainly bringing a tone of disrepute to your office when you are blatantly disrespecting the decision made by the international governmental UN Human Rights Council on this call for an investigation on Sri Lanka last year. This is certainly a good enough reason to impeach you and have you kicked out of your office.

For you to make this call for an investigation on alleged war crimes stating that not doing so would damage prospects of reconciliation after 25 years of the civil war is asinine. Are you trying to tell us that you are bleeding for Sri Lanka? That amounts to your knickers full of cods wallop Navi. Just cut it.

“I am convinced that Sri Lanka should undertake a full reckoning of the grave violations committed by all sides during the war , and the international community can be helpful in this regard”, you said.

Right lady! Where the hell were you when the Tamil Tigers were violating Human Rights, killing the unarmed innocent civilians with claymore mines and blasting them to smithereens? Where the hell was your voice Navi, when these Tamil Tiger bastards plucked infants from the arms of young Sinhalese mothers and bashed their heads on rocks to enjoy the symphony of cracking skulls as if they were breaking coconuts in the front lawn of the Nallur Hindu temple in Jaffna. Yes, now that these rascals have been wiped out, it is too damn easy for you to pretend to be impartial by saying, “…violations committed by all sides….” You know that you cannot bring Prabhakaran and the rest of his murderers from their graves to present them to an International Court of War Crimes. Give me a break Navi!

And who did you have in mind when you said, “…and the international community can be helpful in this regard”?

Were you thinking of David Miliband, Gordon Brown, Keith Vaz , Joan Ryan, Andrew Dismore, Virendra Sharma, Andy Love, Lee Scott, Susan Kramer, Robert Evan. John McDonnell, Mike Griffths, Suibhain McDonagh, Bishop John Arnold of Westminster and Bishop John Rawstorne of Sheffield, all from England; Jim Karygiannis, Derek Lee, Maria Minna, Judy Sgro, John McKay, Albina Guaneiri, Bob Rae and Jack Layton from Canada; Eric Solheim and Oystein Tveter from Norway; Bernard Kouchner and Francois Zimeray from France; Arcbishop Desmond Tutu from your South Africa; Francois Hoiutart from Belgium; Rajindar Sachar, Vaiko, Sushmar Swaraj and Karunanidi from India; Philip Alston and Bob Brown from Australia; Francesca Martone from Italy; Daniel Feierstein from Argentina, Hillary Clinton, Robert Blake and Senator Kerry from the US, and Mary Lawlor from Ireland?

Well, the problem with this crowd from the international community is that they were on scholarships from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and graduated from the College that taught – Let’s carve out Sri Lanka and give the Tamils their Eelam. You might as well forget it Navi because you are on a slippery slope on that thought.

It does seem that your ego has been shattered with what we all saw how Sri Lanka pulled out a thumping victory at the UNHRC vote when you engineered to take Sri Lanka to the International Court on War Crimes. We also witnessed how this stupid issue advocated by you triggered the Clash of the Civilizations of the West and the East and the Remaking of the World Order. The West is not a power any more and will have little impact when wanting to bully little Sri Lanka that has survived the game of geo-political bullying and international terrorism.

It certainly doesn’t auger well for you, the stubborn UN High Commissioner for Human Rights who is determined to take Sri Lanka to International Criminal Courts when your own country South Africa shunned your efforts and supported Sri Lanka at the vote. That is telling you something, isn’t it Navi?

So just pack it up. Don’t push the envelope anymore as you have become a loser big time on this issue of trying to investigate the alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka and just leave Sri Lanka alone as it has more important things to do like looking after your own people, 288,000 Tamils that they rescued from the clutches of your Tamil brethren, the ruthless Tamil Tigers.

Sincerely,

Asoka Weerasinghe (Mr.)

Janaki Chandraratna – Perth, Australia

Un Secretary General has informed the Sri Lankan Govt. of his intention to set up a panel of experts to advise him on the way forward on the accountabilities of Sri Lankan issues.

 It is pretty obvious that the Presidential elections had confirmed to the main players of the West (US, Britain and the European Union) that Sri Lankans were overwhelmingly supportive of the war against terrorism. They also believe the parliamentary elections would validate the anti terrorist support, despite the offer of higher wages and promises to cut down the cost of living by the opposition parties. In view of the lack of significant evidence against war crimes the West through the UN Special Rapporteur, Philip Alston, appears to have pressured Mr Moon for some action against Sri Lanka.

 Mr Alston’s moves no doubt have the potential to impact the sovereignty of our nation, in case the self appointed panels turn out to be one sided fact finding missions. I hope we would not be victims of the UN like Palestine and Iraq. Whilst Mr Moon has the right to set up his own panels, our Govt. should ensure the sovereignty of our country is not compromised by entertaining any such panels in Sri Lanka. We are sufficiently mature enough to understand that the credibility and sincerity of these panels are never to be taken for granted. It is obvious that the LTTE Diaspora and quite sadly some of our lack lustre politicians are evidently behind this move. I hope the electorate is sufficiently astute to understand the vicious conspiracy of the West and send a strong message, at the forthcoming elections, against the western interference. The media has an obligation and a moral right to stand up for the nation and assist the Govt. to counter any sinister moves of the West. We also need to solicit the support of our friendly countries against malicious and illegal intrusions by the UN, for at this rate no second or third world country can be safe from the bullies of the West.

 Unfortunately, it is too late for the other UN victims like Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Palestine etc. We still have the energy and resources to get our act together to rally against any potential sinister moves vigorously. Remember United States was successful in justifying the Iraq war in part due to the inaction of Sadam Hussein. Sri Lankans need to come to terms with the fact that to be divided on allegations of nepotism and fraud are indeed petty and imprudent in a time of potential violations against the sovereignty of the nation.

චන්ද්‍රසිරි විජයවික්‍රම

    ඊයේ ටෙලිවිෂන් එකෙන් මා දුටු වේ අපූරු කථාවකි. මනමාලියක් වේල් එක දමා ගෙන හිට ගෙන නෑ මිත්‍රයින් ඉදිරිපිට මංගල උත්සවය කරගෙන යද්දී විලි රුදාව ඈතිවී දරුවෙක් ලැබීමට ඉස්පිරිතාලයට ගෙන ගිය බවය. මංගල කේක් එක කැපීමට නොලැබීම ගැන ඈය පසුව කණගාටු වූවාය. ඒ ඈරුනු විට ඈයත්, මනමාලයාත්, ටෙලිවිෂන් එකේ කාන්තාවත් මේ උදාර  වැඩේ ගැන සන්තෝෂය ප්‍රකාශ කලේය. මේවා මේ අබුද්ධස්ස කාලයේ හැටිය. සුද්දන්ට, රොබට් බ්ලේක්ලාට, මිලිබෑන්ඩ්ලාට ආවඩන කොළඹ කළු සුද්දන් ද මේ කතාව ඈසුනොත් උදාර වැඩක් කියා කියනවා නිසැකය.

    ඊට දවසකට පමණ කලින් මා දුටුවේ ස්විස්ටර්ලන්තයේ උපත් පාලනය (බර්ත් කන්ට්‍රෝල්) කාර්‍යක්‍ෂම කිරීම සඳහා ගත් තීරණයක් ගැනය. මේ අනුව අවුරුදු 12-13 ළමයින්ට පාවිච්චි කිරීමට කුඩා ප්‍රමාණයේ කොන්ඩොම් නිපදවීමට තීරණය කර ඈත. ලොකු පිරිමින් ගේ භාවිතයට සැදූ ඒවායේ වටප්‍රමානය ලොකු වැඩි නිසා ලමයි ඒවා නැතිව සංසර්ගයේ යෙදෙන එක මේ ලෝකයේම අනර්ග රටක් සේ සැලකෙන ස්විස්ටර්ලන්තයට ගැටලුවක් වී ඈත.  එංගලන්තයද මෙය කොපි කිරීමට බලා පොරොත්තු වන්නේ එරට ගැටවරවියේ  ගැබ් ගැනීම් ප්‍රමාණයේ අඩුවීමක් සිදුවී නැති නිසාය. මේ කතාව කිව් විට මගේ යාලුවෙක් කිව්වේ දැන් ලංකාවේ දවසකට ගප්සා කිරීම් දාහක් පමන වාර්තා වෙනවාය කියා පත්තරේ තිබුනා කියාය.  වාර්තා නොවන ගණන කුමක්ද?

    1805 දී පමන මේට්ලන්ඩ් ආණ්ඩුකාරයා ලංකාවේ සිවිල් සේවය ප්‍රතිසංවිධානය කලා කියා අපි ඉතිහාස පාඩම් වල දී ඉගෙන ගත්තෙමු. ඔහුගේ මේ සිවිල් සේවකයින් අවුරූදු හතේ, දොලහේ දහතුනේ කොලු ගැටව් බව මා දැනගත්තේ බොහෝ කාලයකට පසු වෙනත් ඉංග්‍රීසි ජාතිකයෙක් ලිවූ පොතකිනි. මේ අනුව බලන විට වික්ටෝරියා රැජිනගේ කාලයේ මුලු ඈඟම වසා ගත් ගෑනු ඉන් පසු මුලු ඈඟම වාගේ නොවසා (ලංකාවේ  දකින්නට තිබුනේ කාන්තාවගේ ඔබේ තීරය පමනි) ගෙන දැන් නැවතත් අතරමැදි තත්වයකට යනවා සේ පරම්පරා විප්ලවයක් ලෝකයේම සිදුවෙනවා වගේ සේ පෙනේ.   

    ඈමෙරිකාවේ පසැල් වලට ගැබ් ගත් ගෑනු ලමයිද බඩ උස්සා ගෙන පොත් බෑග් එක පිටේ එල්ලා ගෙන එනු මම දැක ඈත්තෙමි. මට මතක් වන්නේ පසේනදී කොසොල් රජතුමාගේ  සිහින දෑ සැයෙන් හත්වන එකය. කිරි දරුවන් ගර්භනී වීමය.පසේනදී කොසොල් රජතුමා දුටු සිහින සැබෑවන කාලයක් ඈමෙරිකාවේ හා යුරෝපයේ පමනක් නොව ලංකාවේ ද ඉතා ශීග්‍රයෙන් උදාවීමට ආරම්භ වූයේ 1978 සිටය. ලංකාවට කල සේවය ගැන ජේ.ආර්,ජේ ත්, ආර්. ප්‍රේමදාසත් දිව්‍ය (?) ලෝකයේ සිට බලා ගෙන
ඉන්නවා නිසැකය.  ඈමෙරිකාවේ, යුරෝපයේ සිට එන ඕනෑම ගොන්, අසික්කිත දෙයක් බදා ගන්නා පිරිසක් කොළඹ අවටින් බිහිවිය. රෝසි සේනානායකලා, සිසිලියා කොතලාවලලා මේ ව්‍යාපාරයේ පුරෝ ගාමික කාන්තාවන් බව නිසැකය. මෙවැනි ව්‍යාපාර අද යන්නේ තරුනයින්ගේ, තරුනියන්ගේ මානව අයිතිවාසිකම්වල කොටසක් කියාය. මානව අයිතිවාසිකම් කියන සංකල්පයේ වලිගය පැත්තෙන් අල්ලා ගෙන දඟලන එක එක්තරා උපක්‍රමයකි. මිනිසුන් ගේ මූලික අයිතිවාසිකම ආහාර, වස්ත්‍ර හා ආවරණය කියා ඒ කාලයේ අපි ඉගෙන ගත්තා කියා මට මතකය. ඒ වා පෙරට ආවොත් සිතීමේ, ලිවීමේ නිදහස ඉබේම එලියට එනු ඈත.

    මෙම බටහිර බලපෑම් කොතරම් උග්‍ර ද යන්න ගැන හොඳ උදාහරණ දෙකක් අන්‍යාගම් වලට දූෂිත ලෙස බෞද්ධයින් හැරවීම පිලිඹඳ 2009 සමස්ත ලංකා බෞද්ධ මහා සම්මේලනයේ වාර්තාවේ මම දැක්කෙමි. කුඩා ලමයින් මහණ කිරීම බාල වයස් අය අනිසි ලෙස යොදනවා කියා ක්‍රිස්තියානි අලෙවිකාරයන් කියයි. පන්සල් වල පූජා කිරීමට මල් කඩන නිසා මීමැස්සන්ට මල් පැනි නැතිව යනවා කියා ඔවුන් කියා සිටී. පන්සල් නැති ඈමෙරිකාවේ මී මැස්සන් වඳවී යෑම බරපතල ප්‍රශ්නයක් ව ඈති බව මොවුන් නොදන්නේද? සමාජයෙන් හා අවට පන්සල් පරිසරයෙන් බලපෑම් ආවත් සිවුර හැරදා යාමට නිදහසක් මහණවූ අයට ඈත. සමහර අය මහණ වන්නේ සසරේ පෙර පුරුද්දක් නිසා බවද අප පිලිගත යුතුය.

ලංකාව විනාශවන මාර්ග (1) – සංචාරක ව්‍යපාරය

    සංචාරක ව්‍යාපාරය ගැන දැන් ලංකාවේ ලොක්කන් කතා කරන ආකාරය අනුව ඊට විරුද්ධව කට ඈරීම දේශ ද්‍රෝහී ක්‍රියාවක් යැයි හංවඩු ගැසීමට ද පුලුවන. ජලය හා ගින්දර කීකරු සේවකයින්, නමුත් භයානක ස්වාමීන් යැයි කීවා සේ  සංචාරක ව්‍යාපාරයද දැලිපිහියෙන් දී කිරි කන්නා සේ වැඩකි.  සල්ලි පස්සේම දුවන කොළඹ හෝටල් ව්‍යාපාර-සංචාරක ව්‍යාපාර වලට එකතුවුන රජයේ නිලධාරීන් හා බොරු රක්‍ෂා ව්‍යාපාර ගැන කතා කරනා දේශපාලන මැති ඈමති වරු ඉබාගාතේ , නිමක් කොනක් සීමවක් නැතිව හැම ගමක් ම, ඈල දොලක් ම සුද්දන්ගේ ප්‍රීතිය විනෝදය සඳහා විවුර්ත කරදීම ගම් වල තරුනියන්, තරුනයන් සදාචාරාත්මකව විනාශකර දැමීමට පාවා දීමක් බව තේරෙනු ඈත්තේ ඉන් වන හානිය මුලු රටම විනාශ කල පසුවය.

    බොහෝ සංචාරකයින් ලංකාවට එන්නේ පාහියන් ගල, දිඹුලාගල නැරඹීමට නොව විකුර්ත කාමාශාවන්  ඉතාමත් ලාභ යට සංසිඳවා ගැනීමටය. ඒ කාලයේ හොර දේශපාලකයින් ගස් කපා ගෙන විකුනා ගැනීමට රජයේ කැලෑ ඉඩම් බෙදා දුන්නා වගේ (ප්‍රතිපලය – නාය යෑම්, නියං, ගංවතුර) අද සංචාරක ව්‍යාපාරය නමැති පිස්සුවකින් අද දේශපාලකයින් දඟලමින්, නලියමින් සිටී. දේශපාලන පෙන්දන් වැදගත් තනතුරුවලට නොදා ලංකාවේ සංචාරක ව්‍යාපාරය ලංකාව විනාශ නොවන ආකාරයට හසුරුවා ගැනීමේ විශාල වගකීමක් මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ රජයට පැවරී ඈත. නැත්නම් සිදුවන්නේ ඉදිරි පසින් රටේ ඉතිහාසය, සමාජ ගුණ ධර්ම, සාර ධර්ම,  පුරා විද්‍යාව රැක ගැනීම ගැන ක්‍රියාකලත්  පිටුපස්සේ දොරෙන් රට සංචාරක ගණිකා මඩමක් බවට ක්‍රමයෙන් පරිවර්තනය වීමය. දැනටමත් පුතා දුව අම්මා තාත්තාවත්, අම්මා තාත්තා දුව පුතාවත් ඩොලර් වලට විකුණන තාලයේ රටක් බවට ලංකාව පිරිහී ගොස් ඈත.

ලංකාව විනාශවන මාර්ග (2) – ජංගි හා යට ඈඳුම් මැසීම

    ආර්. ප්‍රේමදාස ගෙන් ඈරඹුන ව්‍යාපාරයක් වුන ගම් වල රෙදි පැක්ටරි සැදීම ගම් සුර ලෝකයට ගෙන යන ක්‍රියාවක් ලෙස හුවා දක්වමින් වන්දි භට්ටයින්  ගී ගැයුවේය. මෙවැනි ව්‍යාපාර වලින් ගමට හෝ ගමේ තරුනියට ලැබුන සෙත කුමක්ද? මෙය ගාන්ධි ගේ හස්ත කර්මාන්ත ව්‍යාපාරය වැනි දෙයක් නොවීය. ගමේ ශ්‍රමය සූරා කා රජයෙන් සියලුම වාසි ලබගත් අතලොස්සක් සල්ලි හම්බකරගත්තේය. ලලිත් කොතලාවලගේ සක්විතිගේ බැන්කු වල මිලියන දැම්මේ මේ අයය. ගමේ තරුනියට අලුත් සාරියක්, දෙකක් ගන්නට ලැබුනත් තරුන ජීවිතය කියන්නේ රෙදි පැක්ටරියට දවසේ පැය දහයක් දොලහක් පූජා කිරීමද?

    මෙහි අනිත් පැත්ත ගමෙන් බස් එකේ උදේ හවස නගරයේ රක්‍ෂාවට යෑමය. නුගේගොඩ සාප්පුවක රෙදි විකුණන ගැහැනු ලමයෙකු ගෙන් ඈය පැය කීපයක් වැඩකරනවාදැයි වරක් මම ඈසුවෙමි. බස් එකේ ගත කරන කාලයට අමතරව සාප්පුවේම පැය 12 ක් පමන ඈය ගතකරයි. පඩිය ගැන කුමට කතා කරන් වාද? නිදහස් වෙලදාම, රට දියුනු කිරීම කියන්නේ මෙයටද? 1978 න් පසු ලෝකයේ සිදුවූ පරිදි ලංකාවේ ද ඇති-නැති පරතරය තීව්රවී සුරංගනා ලෝකයක් මැවී නැද්ද? ආණ්ඩුව මෙම සූරා කෑමට ඉඩදී නිහඩව ඉන්නේ ඈයි? කටු නායක-මීගමුව පැත්තේ රෙදි පැක්ටරි වල මොන මොන මඟඩි සිදුවනවා ඇද්ද?

    හැම දෙනාම කතා කරන්නේ යුරෝපය නැති කරන්නට යන් ජී.එස්.පී ප්ලස් සහනාධාරය ගැනය.  මා නම් සලකන්නේ මේ සහනාධාර කැපීම රට ගැන ආදරයක්ඇති දේශපාලන නායකයෙකුට ලැබුන මහඟු අවස්ථාවක් ලෙසය. නැව් පිටින් රෙදි ගෙනවිත්, ලංකාවේ ශ්‍රමය සූරා කා ඒ රෙදි වලින් ජංගි, යට ඈඳුම්, බ්‍රෙෂියර්, කමිස, කලිසම් මසා නැව් පිටින් පිටරට යැවීමෙන් සමුර්ධිමත් වූ එකම රටක් වත් ලෝකයේ නැත. මේ නිසා ක්‍රමයෙන් මේ උගුලෙන් රට ගලවා ගැනීමට රජය ක්‍රියා කල යුතුය.

    පාරවල් හා විදුලි බලය ගමට ලබා දීමෙන්, තමන්ගේම ව්‍යාපාරයක් හෝ සුලු පරිමාන වෙනත් ව්‍යවසානයන් දියුනු කිරීමට ණය පහසු කම් දී මේ රෙදි කම්හල් වලින් ගැලවී ගමට යෑමට තරුනියන්ට ඉඩ සලසා දීම රජයේ වගකීමය. බංග්ලා දේශයේ ග්‍රාමීය බංකු වලින් මොහමඩ් යුෂුෆ් කරන්නේ මෙයය. ඉස්සර කාලයේ ගමේ ගෑනු මෙය කලේ දහදෙනෙක් පමන එකතුව සීට්ටුවක් දමාය.

    ලෝකය ගොවි තැන් යුගයෙන් කර්මාන්ත යුගයට මාරු වූයේ රෙදි කර්මාන්තය හරහා ය. මීට හේතුව වූයේ රෙදි කර්මාන්තයට එතරම් පුලුල් දැනුමක් පුහුනුවක් අවශ්‍ය නොවීමත්, ඒ සඳහා අවශ්‍ය බලය ජල පාරවල් වල දිය ඈලි මගින් ලබා ගත හැකි වීමත් ය. එංගලන්තයේ මැන්චැස්ටර්, ලිවර්පූල් වැනි තැන් වලත්, ඈමෙරිකාවේ මැසචූෂෙට්ස් වලත් මුලින් රෙදි කර්මාන්ත දියුනු වූයේ මෙසේය.  මෙම සිද්ධීනුත්, මැලේසියාවේ, පිලිපීන් දූපතේ, ඉන්දුනීසියාවේ, බංග්ලා දේශයේ හා දැන් ලංකාවේත් සිදුවන දෙයත් අතර ඈති මූලික වෙනසක් ඈත.

    යුරෝපයේ හා ඈමරිකාවේ රෙදි කර්මාන්තය කල අය ඉන් ලැබුන ධනය ඒ රටවලම වෙනත් කර්මාන්ත, වෙනත් ආයෝජන සඳහා නැවත යෙදෙව්වේය. ඊට අමතරව රෙදි කර්මාන්තය ආශ්‍රිතව ගොඩ නැගුන කාර්මික දැනුම දෙගුන-තෙගුන වී ලියැලී ගියේය. මේ පුහුනු ශ්‍රමය කාර්මික විප්ලවයට මග පෑදුවේය. ලංකාවේ රෙදි පැක්ටරි කාරයින් කරන්නේ උපරිම ලාභයක්, අඩුම කාලයකින් ලබා ගෙන ලාභ රටින් පිටට ගෙන් යාමය. ඈමති ජී. ඈල්. පීරිස් වැනි අය මේවා නොදන්නවා නොවේ.  ඔවුන් කරන්නේ චන්ද දේශපාලනය මිස රටේ අනාගතය ගැන වගකීමෙන් ක්‍රියා කිරීම නොවේ.

    පිට රට ආයෝජන නැත්නම් ලංකාව සුන් කියන කතා බටහිර ආභාෂය නිසා ඊට වහල් වූ අයගේ දොඩවිලිය. රටක් දියුනු වන්නේ කකුල් දෙකක් නිසාය. එක කකුලක් නම් ගොවිතැන ය. අනිත් කකුල ගොවිතැන හා ආශ්‍රිත කර්මාන්තය (ධීවර හා පශු කටයුතුද ගොවිතැන් ලෙස සැලකේ). මේ දෙක අනුව පදනමක් සදා ගත් රටකට, ජාතියකට ඉන් පසු වෙන බොහෝ කර්මාන්ත, සේවා කර්මාන්ත (හෝටල්, සංචාරක, කන්තෝරු, කොම්පියුටර්, තාක්‍ෂනික, කාර් එන්ජින්, ගුවන් යානා කොටස්) දියුනු කර ගත හැකිය. මේවා ගැන බටහිර අදහස් වලට යටත් නොවුන පිරිස් වල සහාය ලබා ගැනීම රජයේ වගකීමය. 

    ගාර්වින් කරුණාරත්න මේ වාගේ අදහස් ගැන නිතරම ලියන මේ ගැන හොඳ අත්දැකීම් ඈති අයෙකි. මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂ රජයේ ජනාධිපති උපදේශකයින් 100 කට වඩා සිටිති.  මේ අය මේ ගාර්වින් වගේ අය ගැන ඔහුට නොකියන්නේ මන්ද කියා මට සිතේ.  මෙවැනි බොරු උපදේශකයින් වෙනුවට තවත් ගෝඨාභය ලා දහයක් හොයා ගත්තොත් මහින්ද රාජපක්‍ෂට රටේ මීලඟ දෙවන යුද්ධය කජු කනවා වගේ විය හැකිය. ඔහුට ලැබී ඈති මේ අවස්ථාව නැවත වෙන කිසි කෙනෙකුට ලැබේ යැයි මම නොසිතමි.  

Sunil Vijayapala Oxley, Australia

Dear Sir,
 
I sincerely feel I should respond to some of the comments made by Lanka Peiris, in your prestigious journal (Oh what an outlet for desperados like us) on my article on What Mahinda Should Be Doing.
 
I truly respect the views of Lanka and observations made by him/her (I am confused of the gender).  However I need to clarify a single point as I take Anglo Saxons as a whole be it the American, English, Australian, Canadian and New Zealand variety, although I targeted and focused in this instance the English specifically along with Americans. Lanka it seems is a bit inclined towards England, probably living over there.
 
As I have my exposure to both Canada and Australia I sincerely feel Canadians and Aussies are far more enlightened creatures than their counterparts in England when it comes to simplicity of living leading a life in a non-rigid  Classless society.  However their inclinations and amity towards their ‘mother country’ still
remain and promoting English and Holding examinations (Aussies are virtually bankrupt and Services in Education is one of their main earners in  foreign exchange) are on their cards.
 
My suggestion of establishing a Ministry for Development of North and East could be a venture, on a temporary basis, as these areas have been neglected far too long, for decades and need special attention at this crucial point in time, be it for Tamils, Muslims, Sinhalese, Burghers(in Batticalo), Malays and Sri Lankans of African origin(in Puttalam).  We need not take this issue on racial grounds as I read in between the lines
on Lanka’s response.
 
Also it is of paramount importance that we Expats, especially the Sinhalese,  and also expats who sympathise with our mother country, to form a front as we did at the time of challenging the dreaded 13th Amendment(yours truly represented the World Federation of Expatriates at Supreme Court hearing) and offer advice to Mahinda on issues pertaining to challenges posed by Tamil diaspora, (95% dispersed on their own initiative or self-excile rather than been driven away) as we lack politicians of the calibre of Lalith and Laxman, who could have taken on Anglo Saxons head on as they were intelligent, brilliant and articulate.  Especially on the issue of War Crimes and Trade sanctions, top notch law firms need to to be tapped either within or outside of Britain and US and to form lobby groups in places like Washington, Boston and London.
 
As for others who had the care to read and comment on my article I feel they need no further enlightenment on the subject of Anglo Saxons.  We have a tough time ahead of us and the country needs us at this juncture.  Personally I feel US embassies in all countries are branches of CIA and every worker from top to bottom, work for this most dreaded organisation in the world, who eliminated those nationalists who failed to tag the Anglo Saxon line, like Lumumba, Bandaranayake, Allende, JFK, King, the list goes on and on and we should be aware of countries like Norway who are just puppets of CIA.  Mahinda needs to be careful and needs protection both inside the country and outside especially when he travels abroad.
 
Sunil Vijayapala
Oxley, Australia

Daily News

President Mahinda Rajapaksa informed the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon on Friday the move to appoint an expert panel to advise him on Sri Lanka was ‘totally uncalled for and unwarranted.’

In a telephone conversation with the UN Chief the President has emphasized, in the backdrop where there is no such action against countries with continuing armed conflicts, involving major humanitarian catastrophes and mass scale civilian deaths, the UNSG’s action was unprecedented.

He has also stressed that ‘Sri Lanka looked forward to treatment as per the United Nations Charter that provides for equal treatment to all members of the UN, while respecting the principle of non-interference in the internal matters of states.’

The telephone conversation ensued a letter written by the UN Chief to the President on February 25.

President Rajapaksa has also pointed out that this action was totally unwarranted since Sri Lanka was in a process to work towards strengthening national reconciliation after concluding an armed conflict with the most ruthless terrorist organisation in the world, nine months ago.

In this light “Implementation of such an intention would certainly be perceived as an interference with the current general election campaign,” he has stressed adding that the people of the North and the East who were not free to participate in such elections earlier were being given their franchise rights respecting the highest standards of democracy.

“The UNSG was told that the allegations about Sri Lanka were motivated by misrepresentations by apologists of the LTTE, and by some Non Governmental Organisations that were clearly working on agendas directed against Sri Lanka.”

“There are also sections of the western world being increasingly subjected to electoral pressure by the same apologists of the LTTE”

He has also briefed the Secretary General that as a further measure of reconciliation, he has appointed a special committee to study and report on the lessons from the conflict.

The discussions have also touched on the Panel of Eminent Persons working on human rights violations and other charges reported by the US state Department and the actions of UN special Rapporteur Phillip Alston on the much disputed Channel 4 video.