Remarks by US Ambassador in Sri Lanka & Boston bomb blasts
Posted on April 17th, 2013
P.A.Samaraweera, Melbourne ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚
The US Ambassador in Sri Lanka, Michele J Sisson addressing Foreign Correspondents last week, had warnedƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ that if Sri Lanka does not show progress in reconciliation matters the country could see a return to war. She signalled about other options by the so called International Community as well. Sri Lanka did not comply to requests made by the US and her acolytes during the war. Therefore, they are still fuming over that.ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ Why should Sri Lanka dance to US tune now?
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With regard to the threat to USAID Funding cuts, the Governor of the Central Bank, Sri Lanka,ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ had said that USAID goes direct to NGO’s , Contractors and the Private Sector and not to the Govt.
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The US Amabassador hadƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ warned that terrorists could return to Sri Lanka. But, it is to the US that terroristsƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ have returned. On Monday, at the prestigious marathon race in Boston two terrorist bombs had exploded simultaneously killing 3 and seriously injuring 170. Two othersƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ which had not gone off had beenƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ detonated. The finishing line where the bombs went off had turned to a war zone, with smoke, shattered glass,ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ injured lying all over, people screaming for help and so on. This is what Sri Lanka experienced when suicide bombers had a field-day forƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ 3 decades.ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ A day of celebration in Boston had turned to a day of mourning. This had sent a chilling reminder to the US. Sri Lanka had successfully wiped out terrorism. So the US Ambassador should look after her own backyard first before making threats to Sri Lanka.
April 17th, 2013 at 2:00 pm
“Although it is not known yet who is responsible for Monday’s heinous bombings at the Boston Marathon that killed three and injured more than 100 people, a source within Iranian intelligence services told WND the Islamic regime was behind them and to look for trails through Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.”
He said that under Quds Force guidance, Hezbollah recruited Sunni terrorists allied with Al-Qaeda factions in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, who then entered the U.S. for terrorist activities.
-wnd.com
We KNOW AQ is in SL.
e.g. Violent Muslim attacks on the Bangladeshi mission in Colombo, etc.
We have to get rid of them.
April 17th, 2013 at 2:51 pm
I think Sri Lanka must take a serious note of the US Ambassador’s remarks to the international press. She is more than a CIA representative and her past records speak for it. It is very clear that she is now entrusted with the responsibility of “keep the ball rolling” towards the next “reports making” by the UNHRC and the sessions due to come in 2014. The adoption of the US resolution with words such as “transparency, accountability and meaningful reconciliation” is a carefully crafted action plan towards bringing in the next move to establish an “international monitoring mechanism” in relation to both national and international matters of Sri Lanka.
The question now: Has the Governmental Authorities identified this clearly and prepared to circumvent it? I doubt it.
April 17th, 2013 at 4:22 pm
Douglas
USA and its allies have ALREADY DECIDED what to do in 2014. We CANNOT change that no matter what we try.
We should PLAN for it NOW and SCRAP 13 amendment.
April 17th, 2013 at 11:51 pm
I find it very interesting that this story of the American finding is now be clarified with the details. If the money has been given to NGO’s , contractors and private sector then this should not be used against The Government. When money is granted there are very close guidelines and usually paid out in stages and the not just handed over all at once on a promise to do or deliver. So if this money was not used as to the terms of the grant then WHY NOT stop the funding. Money comes with conditions that all parties agree to prior. This story is now very much different then America reducing by 20 percent to Sri Lanka. At first the story presents as the money was given to “Sri Lanka” as in the government, now it reports that it was to NGO’s and contractor and private sector so hold them accountable and expose them for what is the reason for this change. PLEASE place accountability where it belongs. This is no different then holding adult children responsible for their actions and not the parents of the adult children.
Many things can and will change and improve between now and 2014 . Look at the great improvement since 2009! No need to borrow trouble that is not there. 8 Million dollars is only a lot of money to me and maybe you but not when it comes to America lending support.
Sri Lanka is getting stronger by the minute. What a great New Year you have entered into. A time for positive change and continued peace.
Become one of the “20 million smiles that await” I simply love that thought and idea. What a great positive imagine to portray 20 Million smiling faces welcomes people to Sri Lanka. How great is that! As some say in America “Keep on Keeping on”. Which mean keep moving forward. Peace
April 18th, 2013 at 12:06 pm
Lorenzo: I appreciate what you say. However, if and when that “event” takes place (as you predict), Sri Lanka must get ready to face the consequences and plan ahead the steps to be taken to secure the country from such “external audit” types of our internal and international affairs. This is what I referred to as “international mechanisms” of monitoring our own affairs that we have to resist and aviod at any cost. Have we got any plans and ready for it? Apart from that has our government appaised the situation and educated the public on what measures to be taken and how we should face such an eventuality?
Refering to your suggestion to “SCRAP 13 Amendment”. This is easy to say but please remember it is not as easy as that cry. Whether we like it or not the full effect and impact of this controversial amendment to the Constitution have been felt right through the country. The 13 Amendment certified on 14th November 1987 established and changed the whole Local Government system of the country with the Provincial Councils set up in all the Administrative Districts. With that by Lesgislation, Political, Judicial, Financial and Social functions have been “devolved” ,of course with certain exceptions, to these “semi autnomous” bodies. These functions are being carried out in the Provincail Levels for so many years. Just imagine the situation if that Constitutional provision is “SCRAPED” in compliance with a “hue and cry”. The entire Local Government System will become null and void and all those functions will cease to be legal. It will certainly create a very unmanageable crisis in the country.
The above comment does not mean in anyway that it cannot be done; but what I say is, before that step (to scrap) is taken a creful study must be undertaken and plan the next move (the alternative) to be established in place of these Provincial Councils to continue the Local Government System of the country. I do hope that you will understand this is not as a simple as the cry for “scraping” the existing system. This is a very massive and a wide subject to be deliberated separately.
Next the main point raised by “amy poirier”, the 20% cut of USAID to Sri Lanka. I am surprised with the statement made by the Chairman of the Cerntral Bank i.e. “the Government is not given this money”. Is he not aware that this money come into the country through the NGOs and utilized for various projects undertaken within, with the knowledge of the Government? There is a mechanism to monitor such projects and if he is not aware of such activities, what is he talking about? Does he only account for actual “money” received in his coffers? Will he not take into account the “added value” of those projects completed and undertaken? Does he say that, since the money is not coming into the Government coffers, such funds go into the “personal pockets” of the recipients?
Of course, I do grant that most of that money goes into the personal pockets. Yet, it is no doubt a loss, unless such projects are of no “economic value” to the country.
April 18th, 2013 at 12:33 pm
Douglas- you made some interesting points.
At the risk of repeating myself, would any one care to answer or provide a reasoned argument as to why MR with his 2/3 majority and his “robust” governance style not repeal an amendment (13th) that is supposedly hugely unpopular with the Sri Lankan electorate when, if i may add he introduced the 18th amendment to consolidate his power base using the same 2/3 majority.
I suggest you review the chronology of events and statements (by MR) since May 2009 before, one can fathom a reason.
As regards to the US aid cut to SL, not sure if our erstwhile Chairman of CB knows what comes into his coffers and what goes out.
Think his brother would have been a better and astute Governor of CB
April 18th, 2013 at 2:00 pm
Douglas,
Agree with the first point. So you agree it is BEST to prepare ourselves for the INEVITABLE anti-SL resolutions USA has ALREADY made for 2014, 2015, etc. We CANNOT stop USA doing this.
“Just imagine the situation if that Constitutional provision is “SCRAPED” in compliance with a “hue and cry”. The entire Local Government System will become null and void and all those functions will cease to be legal. It will certainly create a very unmanageable crisis in the country.”
TOTALLY WRONG! Local Government System has NOTHING o do with 13 amendment!!! Pratheseeya chapai, municipals, etc. were there before 13 amendment. They are the CLOSEST to the people. They are UNAFFECTED by SCRAPPING 13 amendment.
USIAD goes to NGOs. You are RIGHT! This is the problem. MOST of these NGOs are ANTI-SL including Pakiya’s CPA, groundviews website, etc.
USA cut aid to Endia by 16% too! So it has NOTHING to do with SL. It is USA don’t have money to waste.
Now USA borrows from China and gives to the world. How stupid!
April 18th, 2013 at 3:12 pm
Lorenzo: Thank you. Your comment: “TOTALLY WRONG! Local Government System has NOTHING to do with 13 amendment!!!’
I do not agree with you. Please read the Nith Schedule (List 1) of the Amendment (Provincial Council List). This list has included the Local Government (NO. 4) excluding the city of Colombo, Sri Jayawardanepura, Kotte and their environments the limit of which shall be specified by the President by Order Published in the Gazette.
For your information the jurisdiction of the Provincial Governor appointed by the President was recently ecxplicitly and legally demonstrated when he “sacked” the Mayor of Galle Municipalty. So if 13th Amendment is “scraped” without consideration of its implications on the Local Government System, all Municipal Councils, excepting Colombo and Sri Jayawaradanpura,Kotte: Urban Councils – now called Pradeshia Sabahs will cease to function as “Legal Entities”. Please se the big picture and be practical.
Marco: You are absolutely correct. Let someone say why the 2/3rd majority is not used to amend 13th Amendment or scrap it totally. He cannot and will not dare do it.
As regarads the 18th Amendments: That is the most “DRACONIAN” lAW PASSED ON TO THE LAW STATUTES. With that we lost all the SAFEGUARDS including that of Auditor General’s role as an independent”ADJUDICATOR” of the Government affairs. This how is the Government has “created” by its own actions, the issues relating to “tranparency, accountability and good governance”.
April 18th, 2013 at 4:20 pm
Douglas,
“So if 13th Amendment is “scraped” without consideration of its implications on the Local Government System, all Municipal Councils, excepting Colombo and Sri Jayawaradanpura,Kotte: Urban Councils – now called Pradeshia Sabahs will cease to function as “Legal Entities”.”
Will cease to function as legal entities?
This is the biggest joke I have heard!!
THE OPPOSITTE IS TRUE.
IF 13 amendment is SCRAPPED, these small councils will be BETTER OFF because no provincil council will be able to interfere in them!!
That is actually another ADVANTAGE of SCRAPPING 13 amendment.
Disagree on 18 amendment. It is WAY BETTER than 13 amendment. 18 amendment keeps 13 amendment UNDER CHECK which is very good.
Can you see the relation? IF there was NO 13 amendment, there is no need for a 18 amendment. Now it is MORE CONVINCING that we should SCRAP 13 amendment.
So we should SCRAP 13 amendment now.
April 18th, 2013 at 4:24 pm
So the USELSS 13 amendment created provincial council SACKED people’s elected mayor WITHOUT going through the courts!!
This is very very dangerous and draconian. 13 amendment is FAR WORSE than I thought.
When TNA takes control of northern provincial council, TNA will SACK the UPFA mayor of Jaffna munucipal council. Beautiful!
Thank god we have the 18 amendment. Now the president can SACK the provincial council in return.
April 19th, 2013 at 1:47 pm
Lorenzo,
Your guess about Al-Quaida affiliation of the Boston bombers may be DEAD RIGHT!
The Boston bombers have been identified through video information and public input to be Tamerlan Tsarvaev (26) and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (19). They are Muslim brothers, born in Chechnya. The elder brother is a car Mechanic and a forger engineering student at a community college, and the younger is an engineering student at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. Their uncle describes them as losers jealous of people who are doing better than them.
Tamerlan was killed last night in a shootout with the police; the Szhokar is still on the run on foot.
Significantly, after the Boston bombings, Dzhokar wrote that his fealty is to “Islam” on his Facebook page!! We know Chechnyans fight in significant numbers for Al-Quaida units in Afghanistan and elsewhere. It appears that these two guys have international connections and may have become radicalized and transformed into Islamist terrorists.
The police are clearly convinced that there two are the Boston bombers; Dzhokar will soon be caught alive, shot dead, or will commit suicide. Since there may be additional bombers working with them, I hope he will be caught. Then the US will have to grapple with whether to torture them for information, or will abide by the oft-repeated respect for “human rights” that the US hypocritically flings in Sri Lanka’s face at the UN! My guess is that Dzhokar will be shot down like a dog in the streets, as he RICHLY DESERVES!
April 19th, 2013 at 2:02 pm
Why Would Chechens Want to Bomb Boston?
By COLLEEN CURRY | Good Morning America – 3 hours ago
The two brothers suspected in the Boston Marathon bombings are of Chechen ethnicity, officials said today, identifying them with a group that has a long history of violence against Russia and ties to Muslim extremists groups.
Both Dzhokhar Tsarnaev 19, and his brother Tamerlan Tsarnaecv, 26, who was killed overnight by gunfire, were born in Kyrgystan, the brothers’ uncle told reporters today. The brothers’ father is currently living in the semi-autonomous Russian province of Dagestan, which is adjacent to Chechnya.
The entire region has been roiled by ethnic tensions, Islamic militants and corruption.
The history of Chechens may — or may not — shed light on the men’s lives in America or their motivation for the bombings.
Who are the Chechens?
Chechens are an ethnic group hailing from the southern edge of the Russian border, known as the North Caucasus region, whose history has been marked by its violent struggles for independence.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, Chechens launched two significant campaigns for independence, leading to the First Chechen War in 1994 (a year after the younger suspect was born) and the Second Chechen War in 1999, which has led to ongoing violence in the region.
Could this attack have something to do with those wars?
Maybe, according to Christopher Swift, a professor of National Security at Georgetown University, who said the second Chechen war has morphed into a “radical” and “virulent” war that has incorporated elements of the Muslim idea of jihad.
“That war initially began as a nationalist war, much like the first one, but very, very quickly metastasized into something that looks much more like the radical Salafi-Jihadi movements we’ve seen in other regions around the world,” Swift said.
“The movement that’s emerged from the 15 years of war is very radical, it’s very virulent, it’s very nasty, but up until now, it’s also been very, very local. Their ideology and rhetoric talks about fighting jihad against the West, but their operations have always been in Russia itself and predominately within the republics of Chechnya, Dagestan, and Ingushetia,” he said.
“So the bombing in Boston at the Boston Marathon, doesn’t really seem to comport with the operations we’ve seen from of this region in the past, but it does comport with the self-radicalizing ideology,” he said.
What connection do Chechens have to Islam?
The majority of Chechens are Muslims, and the Council on Foreign Relations say that there are several ties between Chechen militants and Al Qaeda, noting that the U.S. has publicly said that Osama bin Laden had “fueled the flames in Chechnya.”
The State Department has identified Al Qaeda financiers who also finance Chechen rebels, according to the CFR. The most prominent of these groups is the Islamic International Peacekeeping Brigade.
A terror group in Chechnya has also identified itself with Muslim extremists, calling itself the Special Purpose Islamic Regiment, recognized by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist group.
The Central Asia-Caucasus Institute has said that ideas of jihad and an Islamic state spread among Chechen people as they fanned out across the Middle East following the Second Chechen War.
Have Chechen groups launched terror attacks before?
The Chechens have claimed responsibility for a number of major terror attacks on Russia in the past 10 years, including a 2004 attack on a Russian school in which more than 350 people, many of them children, were killed.
In addition to bombing shopping plazas, apartment buildings, parades, and trains over the years, Chechens launched an attack on a theater in Moscow in 2002 in which they held more than 700 audience members hostage. Russian forces used gas to try and sedate the Chechens, but ended up killing many of the hostages and militants.
Many of the Chechen terrorists involved were women whose militant husbands had been killed by Russian forces, earning them the moniker Black Widows.
The Black Widows became known as a deadly part of the Chechen terror groups, willing to sacrifice themselves as suicide bombers for the Chechen cause.
In 2010, Chechen militants claimed responsibility for the bombing of two metro stations in Moscow, killing nearly 40 people.
What does Dagestan have to do with this?
Dagestan is also a region on the Russian border, part of North Caucasus, and shared a border with Chechnya. Though Dagestan did not fight against Russia for independence after the fall of the Soviet Union, it became known as a lawless and corrupt state. Eventually, Chechen militants began to gain a foothold in Dagestan.
Dagestan has replaced Chechnya as the most volatile region in Russia, with reports of bombings, shootings, and kidnappings occurring every few days.
April 19th, 2013 at 4:02 pm
So Islam terrorists are at it again!
The list of US cities of ISLAMIC TERROR keeps growing.
Oklahoma
NY
Washington
Boston
April 23rd, 2013 at 2:06 pm
“Talks with China fail, more troops may be sent to Ladakh
New Delhi: India and China on Tuesday failed to break the deadlock over the deep incursion by Chinese troops at Daulat Beg Oldi(DBO) sector in Ladakh at their second flag meeting and more Indian soldiers may be deployed in the area.
Sources here said the over three-hour-long meeting of Brigadier-level officers at Spanggur Gap in the Chusul sector did not produce any result as the Chinese troops refused to move out from the Indian territory. Brig BM Gupta and Senior Colonel Ayan Yanti led the respective sides.
The Chinese side maintained that the area where they have set up tented posts is part of their territory and denied any intrusion, they said.
India asked the Chinese side at the meeting to withdraw from DBO, which is at an altitude of 17,000 feet, and revert to status quo as was before the incursion, the sources said.
Sources said there was no positive response from the Chinese side and the matter continued to be deadlocked, the sources said.
At the meeting, the Chinese side raised objections to construction of bunkers by India at Phuktsey area and wanted the structures to be demolished.
Sources also said that India may ask for more flag meetings to resolve the issue and avoid any escalation in the situation. The first flag meeting was held on April 18.
Indian Army had earlier sent a team of Ladakh Scouts– an Infantry regiment specialising in mountain warfare- to the DBO sector, manned by the troops of Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP)–soon after the incursion was detected.
Additional troops may be deployed in the area if the situation does not de-escalate and Chinese troops do not go back to their old position, sources said.
A platoon-strength contingent of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had come 10 km inside the Indian territory in Burthe in DBO sector on the night of April 15 and established a tented post there.
Details of the agreed position of the Line of Actual Control(LAC) were also shared by both the sides.
Transgressions in the Ladakh sector have taken place earlier also due to differences in perception of the LAC. The Defence Ministry had earlier also maintained that the LAC is not properly demarcated in some areas.
ITBP troops have also established a camp approximately 300 m opposite the Chinese location and is monitoring the development.
PTI”