Dr. Chula Rajapakse MNZM

4/18 to 3/19

Since it’s inception over three decades ago USLA has fervently furthered  it’s main founding objective viz. doing what it takes to support Sri Lanka in preserving it’s independent and unitary status. Through USLA’s  existence , the main threat to this came from the violent terrorism of the Tamil Tigers and the devious and vicious misinformation from them. With the complete annihilation of the Tigers as a fighting force in Sri Lanka in May 2009, USLA continued it’s role in the countering Tiger misinformation that now took an even more devious form.

This was initiated within days of their been vanquished in the fields and lagoons of Nandikadal by an internationally orchestrated allegation that this victory was achieved through HR violations claiming  a civilian casualty rate of over 40,000 in the last few weeks of the war, a number far in excess of what could be explained on the basis of collateral damage and suggesting targeted shooting of Tamil civilians. They found powerful allies in furthering these in  the UNSG appointed Darusman commission who concurred with this allegation  having heard from the Tigers only and not Sri Lanka, and UK Channel four who produced the film Sri Lanka Killing Fields” ,based on film strips, unauthored, undated, & from unknown sites showing acts of brutality, blaming it all on the Sri Lanka forces through a very effective commentary from producer Jon Snow. These allegations were orchestrated internationally and nationally with Joseph Gobellian zeal , that propounded that any lie, repeated frequently enough would eventually be believed.

It was my role as your spokesperson, in the past decade to counter these allegation at every opportunity with the media, politicians and even included the screening of the counter film lies Agreed Upon” in the NZ parliament.

More Importantly, I mustered the evidence supporting the impossibility of these allegations being true, including the fact that there were no where near that number of bodies identified post war, nor were there any where near the 120,000 injured as would be expected based on the internationally established injured to casualty ratio in war. Additionally, the initial estimate of the UN resident representatives suggested  a figure of seven thousand which tallied with figure of a census carried out for the dept of census in 2012 by Resident Tamil  Teachers of the region. Even  more strong counter evidence came from WIKILEAKS  leaked documents from the  defence attaches of both the the UK and Us embassies in SL who confirmed that the SL forces were exercising every care to safeguard Civilians without which the war might have been over much earlier with significantly less casualties for the SL forces.

With the change of govt in SL in Jan 2015, the field changed significantly with the new govt almost carrying the torch for the tigers , co sponsoring the infamous resolution asking for foreign judges to hear cases against security personnel  accused of engineering  civilian disappearances. and seeking  a new constitution that would weaken SL’s unitary status . These calls for foreign judges raises the specter of another Darusman Like Commission” open to being influenced by the Tiger war chest.

Sadly, even this week the SL govt  reinforced this commitment rather than orchestrate arguments sighted earlier by me  and the report of the Paranagama Commission   whose findings endorsed  by three international legal luminaries , clearly concluded against there being any war crimes by the SL forces.

The even greater disappointment  for most Sri Lankans was the failure to present and table  Lord Naseby’s revelations in October 2017 at the UK house of Lords clearly establishing  that the civilian casualties were more of the order of 5000, and not 40,000 , so leaving no basis for the UNHCR resolution and so calling for it’s withdrawal.

With the Sri Lankan govt  arguably, being the greatest threat to the SL’s unitary status, in my position as USLA spokesperson, my hands were rather tied this year. However, the political machinations in SL of the last few months would suggest that, SL may soon let go of the Tiger Torch , & leave the likes of me in more familiar territory.

Dr. Chula Rajapakse MNZM 23.3.19