– සංජය ලියනගේ http://www.lankanews.org/2016/12/full-report.html

මුදල් අමාත්‍ය රවී කරුණානායක කොළඹ මොනාක් එපාර්ට්මන්ට් හි අතිසුඛෝපභෝගී නිවසක් රුපියල් ලක්ෂ 1700 කට මිලදී ගෙන ඇතැයි පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත්‍රී මහින්දානන්ද අලු‍ත්ගමගේ පවසයි.

කොළඹ මොනාක් එපාර්ට්මන්ට් හි අතිසුඛෝපභෝගි නිවසක් රුපියල් ලක්ෂ 1650 කට මිලදී ගැනීමේ කටයුත්ත වෙනුවෙන් අමාත්‍යවරයාගේ බිරිඳ ද සම්බන්ධ බවට ලැබුණු තොරතුරු මත මේ ගනුදෙනුව පිළිබඳ විමසා බැලීම සඳහා අප ඇය අමතනු ලැබුවත් එය සාර්ථක වූයේ නැත.

 lanka C news | ලංකා සී නිවුස්

ගාළු මුවදොර ඉදිවන ලෝකයේ ලොකුම නත්තල් ගස සම්බන්ධයෙන් අගරදගුරුතුමන්ගේ ස්ථාවරය එලෙසම බවත් රජය නත්තල විකුණාගෙන කන බවත් කතෝලික විභාවනය චෝදනා කරයි.

මේ බව සදහන් කරමින් එම සංවිධානය විසින් ජනාධිපතිරවයා මෙත යොමු කර ඇති ලිපිය මෙහි දැක්වෙයි.

චමිල් රුපසිංහ උපුටා ගැන්ම ලංකාදීප

‘රටේ අනාගතය ගැන හිතන්නටවත් බෑ. මහා භයානක තත්වයක් උදාවෙලා තියෙන්නෙ. යාන වාහන, මුදල් නොයෙක් ජාති දීල හැම දේකටම අත උස්සල සම්මත කරන්න ඔළුගෙඩි ටිකක් හදාගෙන ඉන්නෙ. ඕකෙ සල්ලි නැති හිඟන්නු ටික කැමැති වෙනවා ඒවට. ‍ඕකෙන් වෙන්නෙ රටට හොඳක් නෙමේ රටේ අනාගතය අඳුරු විමක් හා භයානක තත්වයක්. ර‍ට ගැන හිතෙන කිසි කෙනෙක් ආණ්ඩුවෙවත් විපක්ෂයෙවත් නෑ‘ යැයි ගැටඹේ රාජෝපවනාරාමාධිපති කැප්පෙටියාගොඩ සිරිවිමල හිමියෝ පැවසූහ.

ලංකා පොදුජන පෙරමුණේ සභාපති ජී. එල්. පීරිස් මහතා ඒ හිමියන් බැහැ දැක යෝජිත ව්‍යවස්ථාව සම්බන්ධයෙන් දැනුවත් කිරීමට පැමිණි අවස්ථාවේ එසේ කීහ.

https://youtu.be/VggYRurSNDE

‘පත්තරේ මම දැක්ක රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහ මහත්තයටයි මලික් සමරවිර මහත්තයටයි බලය ඉක්මවා ගිය බලයක් දෙන්න යනවා. දැනටත් පාර්ලිමේන්තුව දෙවනත් කරනවා. කිසිම සදාචාරයක් නැ.මේක මහා භයානක තත්වයක්. මේ කරන්න හදන්නෙ ජනාධිපතිගෙ බලතල අයින් කරල හෙමිහිට පැත්තකින් තියල මෙයාල බලය අරන් රජය ගෙනයන්න තමා මේ හදන්නෙ. මේ මිනිස්සුන්ට මොලයක් තියෙනවනම් හිතන්න ඕන මේ මොනවද මේ කරන්නෙ හදන්නෙ කියලා‘ යැයි ද ඒ හිමියෝ කීහ.

‘ආණ්ඩුවට බයක් තියෙනව ආන්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථාව ගේන්න බැරි වෙයි කියල. ජන මත විචාරණයක් පැවැත්තුවත් මෙයාලට ඒක අවාසි වෙනවා. ආණ්ඩුක්‍රම ව්‍යවස්ථාව ඇතුළේ කරන්න හදපු දේවල් වක්‍රාකාරව සංවර්ධන විශේෂ විධිවිධාන පනතින් ගේන්න හදනවා‘ යැයි එහිදී ජී.එල්.පීරිස් මහතා කීය.

BEN NORTON

The little-told history of the U.S.-Saudi “special relationship” is a story of blood, oil & violent fundamentalism

(Credit: AP/Susan Walsh)

Everybody’s worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there’s a really easy way: stop participating in it.” So advised world-renowned public intellectual Noam Chomsky, one of the most cited thinkers in human history.

The counsel may sound simple and intuitive — that’s because it is. But when it comes to Saudi Arabia, the U.S. ignores it.

Saudi Arabia is the world’s leading sponsor of Islamic extremism. It is also a close U.S. ally. This contradiction, although responsible for a lot of human suffering, is frequently ignored. Yet it recently plunged back into the limelight with the Saudi monarchy’s largest mass execution in decades.

On Jan. 2, Saudi Arabia beheaded 47 people across 13 cities. Among the executed was cleric Nimr al-Nimr, a leader from the country’s Shia religious minority who was arrested for leading peaceful protests against the regime in 2011-12.

Sheikh al-Nimr was known throughout the Islamic world for his staunch opposition to sectarianism. The outspoken Saudi dissident firmly insisted that Sunnis and Shias are not enemies, and should unite against the sectarian regimes oppressing them. The oppressed should unite together against the oppressors, instead of becoming tools in the hands of the oppressors,” he declared.

 By executing a dissident who challenged sectarianism, the Saudi monarchy was only further fomenting it.

Human rights organizations condemned the executions. Amnesty International said the Saudi regime is using the death penalty in the name of counter-terror to settle scores and crush dissidents,” sentencing activists to death after grossly unfair trials.” Amnesty called this a monstrous and irreversible injustice.”

Yet atrocities like the mass beheadings are by no means new in Saudi Arabia. What is new is the global attention to them.

Ali Mohammed al-Nimr, the nephew of the murdered cleric, was arrested at age 17 for attending a peaceful pro-democracy protest in 2012. He was allegedly tortured, before being sentenced to death by beheading and crucifixion.

Saudi Arabia is one of the last places on the planet where crucifixions are still practiced — ordered by the government itself.

In recent years, the Saudi monarchy has also arrested at least two other peaceful teenage pro-democracy activists and sentenced them to death.

Furthermore, a Palestinian poet was sentenced to death by Saudi Arabia in November for renouncing Islam and criticizing the royal family.

In 2015, the Saudi regime executed 158 people, largely by beheading. On average, approximately half (47 percent) of people executed in Saudi Arabia are killed for drug-related offenses, according to Amnesty International. Every four days, then, on average, the Saudi monarchy executes someone for drugs — while its own princes are caught with thousands of pounds of drugs at foreign airports.

Journalist Abby Martin devoted an episode of her show The Empire Files” to exploring the Saudi-U.S. relationship. The episode, aptly titled Inside Saudi Arabia: Butchery, Slavery & History of Revolt,” displays the brutality of the monarchy in excruciating detail.

If the Saudi kingdom were an enemy of the U.S. government, we’d be shown these images and facts every day on the mainstream media,” Martin observes.

The internal repression and human rights abuses inside Saudi Arabia is one thing. Perhaps even more troubling, however, is the monarchy’s support for violent religious extremism. It is here that Chomsky’s advice on stopping terrorism becomes so important. By continually aligning itself with the Saudi regime, the U.S. is fueling the very fire it is fighting in the so-called War on Terror.

(Credit: AP/Reuters/Mian Kursheed) AP/Reuters/Mian Kursheed

Saudi support for extremism

Saudi Arabia is a theocratic absolute monarchy that governs based on an extreme interpretation of Sharia (Islamic law). It is so extreme, it has been widely compared to ISIS. Algerian journalist Kamel Daoud characterized Saudi Arabia in an op-ed in The New York Times as an ISIS that has made it.”

Black Daesh, white Daesh,” Daoud wrote, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS. The former slits throats, kills, stones, cuts off hands, destroys humanity’s common heritage and despises archaeology, women and non-Muslims. The latter is better dressed and neater but does the same things. The Islamic State; Saudi Arabia.”

In its struggle against terrorism, the West wages war on one, but shakes hands with the other,” Daoud continued. This is a mechanism of denial, and denial has a price: preserving the famous strategic alliance with Saudi Arabia at the risk of forgetting that the kingdom also relies on an alliance with a religious clergy that produces, legitimizes, spreads, preaches and defends Wahhabism, the ultra-puritanical form of Islam that Daesh feeds on.”

Since the November Paris attacks, in which 130 people were massacred in a series of bombings and shootings for which ISIS claimed responsibility, the West has constantly spoken of the importance of fighting extremism. At the same time, however, the U.S., U.K., France, and other Western nations have continued supporting the Saudi regime that fuels such extremism.

Saudi political dissidents like Turki al-Hamad have constantly argued this point. In a TV interview, al-Hamad insisted the religious extremism propagated by the Saudi monarchy serves as fuel for ISIS.” You can see [in ISIS videos] the volunteers in Syria ripping up their Saudi passports,” al-Hamad said.

In order to stop ISIS, you must first dry up this ideology at the source. Otherwise you are cutting the grass, but leaving the roots. You have to take out the roots,” he added.

In the wake of the November 2015 Paris attacks, scholar Yousaf Butt stressed that the fountainhead of Islamic extremism that promotes and legitimizes such violence lies with the fanatical ‘Wahhabi’ strain of Islam centered in Saudi Arabia.”

If the world wants to tamp down and eliminate such violent extremism, it must confront this primary host and facilitator,” Butt warned.

In the past few decades, the Saudi regime has spent an estimated $100 billion exporting its extremist interpretation of Islam worldwide. It infuses its fundamentalist ideology in the ostensible charity work it performs, often targeting poor Muslim communities in countries like Pakistan or places like refugee camps, where uneducated, indigent, oppressed people are more susceptible to it.

Whether elements within Saudi Arabia support ISIS is contested. Even if Saudi Arabia does not directly support or fund ISIS, however, Saudi Arabia gives legitimacy to the extremist ideology ISIS preaches.

What is not contested, on the other hand, is that Saudi elites in the business community and even segments of the royal family support extremist groups like al-Qaida. U.S. government cables leaked by WikiLeaks admit donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.”

It has been an ongoing challenge to persuade Saudi officials to treat terrorist financing emanating from Saudi Arabia as a strategic priority,” wrote former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a leaked 2009 cable.

Supporters of the Saudi monarchy resist comparisons to ISIS. The regime itself threatened to sue social media users who compared it to ISIS. Apologists point out that ISIS and Saudi Arabia are enemies. This is indeed true. But this is not necessarily because they are ideologically different (they are similar) but rather because they threaten each other’s power.

There can only be one autocrat in an autocratic system; ISIS’ self-proclaimed Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi refuses to kowtow to present Saudi King Salman, and vice-versa. After all, the Saudi absolute monarch partially justifies his rule through claiming that it has been blessed and ordained by God, and if ISIS’ caliph insists the same, they can’t both be right.

Some American politicians have criticized the U.S.-Saudi relationship for these very reasons. Former U.S. Sen. Bob Graham has been perhaps the most outspoken critic. Graham has called extremist groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda a product of Saudi ideals, Saudi money and Saudi organizational support.”

Sen. Graham served on the Senate Intelligence Committee for a decade, and chaired the committee during and after the 9/11 attacks. He condemned the illegal U.S. invasion of Iraq, which he deemed a distraction” from the U.S.’s real problems, and has warned that Saudi Arabia may have played a role in the 9/11 attacks that left almost 3,000 Americans dead.

This is not in any way to suggest that there was a conspiracy, and that the U.S. government was involved in the attacks; such a notion is preposterous, and can be refuted with even rudimentary knowledge about the Middle East and a basic understanding of history. There was no inside job”; the conspiracy theory is absurd. Rather, critics like Sen. Graham have suggested that the U.S. government sees its close relationship to Saudi Arabia as so critical that it may have downplayed potential Saudi involvement in the attacks.

Of the 19 Sept. 11 attackers, 15 were citizens of Saudi Arabia. Zacarias Moussaoui, a convicted 9/11 plotter, confessed in sworn testimony to U.S. authorities that members of the Saudi royal family funded al-Qaeda before the attacks. The Saudi government strongly denies this.

The 2002 joint House-Senate report on the Sept. 11 attacks has 28 pages on al-Qaeda’s specific sources of foreign support,” but this section is classified, leading Graham and others to suggest it may contain information about potential Saudi involvement. The 9/11 Commission insisted in its 2004 report, however, that it found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded” al-Qaeda.

Sen. Graham has nevertheless insisted that the possibility that elements of the Saudi royal family supported the 9/11 attackers should not be ruled out. In his 2004 book Intelligence Matters: The CIA, the FBI, Saudi Arabia, and the Failure of America’s War on Terror,” Graham further argued these points, from his background within the U.S. government.

The independent, non-partisan Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania has detailed the allegations and possible evidence — or lack thereof — of Saudi ties to the 9/11 attacks on its website FactCheck.org.

Whatever its role, what is clear is that Saudi Arabia’s support for violent extremist groups is well documented. Such support continues to this very day. In Syria, the Saudi monarchy has backed al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate. The U.S. government has bombed al-Nusra, but its ally Saudi Arabia is funding it.

Yet despite its brutality and support for extremism, the U.S. considers the Saudi monarchy a close ally.” The State Department calls Saudi Arabia a strong partner in regional security and counterterrorism efforts, providing military, diplomatic, and financial cooperation.” It stated in September 2015 it welcomed” the appointment of Saudi Arabia to the head of a U.N. human rights panel. We’re close allies,” the State Department remarked.

In order to understand where this intimate relationship came from, and why it is so important to the U.S., it is important to look back at history.

FDR meeting with King Ibn Saud on Feb. 14, 1945 (Credit: Public Domain/Wikimedia Commons)

A history of precious jewels”

The U.S.-Saudi relationship has its origins in the early 20th century. It was at this time that Saudi Arabia was discovered to have what were believed to be the world’s largest oil reserves. The largest oil reserves are now known to actually be in Venezuela, but Saudi Arabia has the second-largest. And when Saudi Arabia is combined with neighboring Gulf states Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, it is by far the most oil-dense region of the planet.

This abundance in natural resources has led to a kind of special relationship, if you will, like the one between the U.S. and the U.K. or the U.S. and Israel.

In 1945, just before he died, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt met with Ibn Saud, the first king and founder of modern Saudi Arabia. Roosevelt promised the regent the U.S. would support his kingdom in return for oil. This relationship has continued to this day.

Still now, American politicians openly cite these oil reserves as an important reason for U.S. support. In October 2015, Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Bahrain, where he declared, Our engagement today is grounded by our deep and enduring commitment to the Middle East and to its people. This region is home to some of our oldest and closest friends and allies.”

The region’s oil supplies have powered industries and economies for generations since the Gulf prospectors first struck oil in Bahrain in 1931,” Sec. Blinken continued. And while we are now more energy sufficient, Middle East oil continues to drive the global market, and we remain determined to secure its supply.”

Every U.S. president since Roosevelt has worked with the Saudi monarchy — from Truman to Carter to Obama.

Eisenhower’s administration emphasized the close cooperation” between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia on economic and military grounds. Saudi Arabia, by virtue of its spiritual, geographical, and economic position, is of vital importance in the Middle East,” his administration insisted. It is in the interests of world peace that this Kingdom be strengthened for the maintenance of its own stability and the safeguarding and progressive development of its institutions.”

The Nixon administration created a Twin Pillars” Middle East policy, in which the U.S.-backed monarchies in Saudi Arabia and Iran were considered pillars of stability. In 1953, the CIA backed a coup that overthrew Iran’s first and only democratically elected head of state, Mohammad Mosaddegh. The U.S. subsequently propped up the Iranian monarch, known as the shah, until the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which permanently changed the U.S. relationship with Iran, moving the U.S. even closer to Saudi Arabia and Israel.

In September 2015, President Obama commended the longstanding friendship between the United States and Saudi Arabia.” President Obama’s administration has in fact moved the U.S. even closer to the Saudi regime, particularly in the realm of military coordination. In the past five years, the U.S. has done more than $100 billion in arms deals with the Saudi monarchy.

Some analysts have downplayed the significance of oil in this special relationship, but it is hard to overstate the importance of oil to the modern industrial economy. To put it simply, things would simply collapse were it not for oil. Petroleum is in practically everything. It’s in our cars, airplanes, roads, buildings, and even products like toothpaste. The entire modern global economy is based on oil. This is why even a relatively small fluctuation in the price of oil can have enormous global economic effects.

A recent television program by National Geographic tried to envision what exactly would happen if the modern world ran out of oil. Its depiction is bleak and dystopian —it is a world in which life truly is nasty, brutish and short.

But critics do have a point; it is not just about oil — although petroleum is at the center of the U.S.-Saudi special relationship. Saudi Arabia, along with Israel, has also been an important political and military ally in the Middle East, that ensures U.S. dominance in the region.

Of all past U.S. presidents, President Reagan’s relationship with the Saudi monarchy is particularly relevant in these regards.

The friendship and cooperation between our governments and people are precious jewels whose value we should never underestimate,” Reagan declared at the 1985 welcoming ceremony for then Saudi King Fahd.

Reagan told the monarch you rightfully exert a strong moral influence in the world of Islam, and the people of the United States are proud of their leadership role among the democratic nations.” The U.S. president dubbed his country the regent of the West, and Saudi Arabia the regent of the Middle East.

I firmly believe that in the years ahead, there should be and will be a more powerful recognition of the common interests shared by these two significant world forces. Already, the bonds of commerce are strong, especially between our two countries,” Reagan continued, adding, Petroleum from Saudi wells helps drive the engines of progress in the United States.”

Reagan characterized the Saudi regime as a crucial ally in the fight against Marxist tyranny.” The U.S. president warned that communists would impose dictatorship on all of mankind” — at the very same moment that he was propping up the most authoritarian and fundamentalist monarchy on the planet.

At the time, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, through Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, were funding extremist groups in Afghanistan, including those that would later become the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Reagan infamously characterized Islamic extremist mujahideen militants as freedom fighters.

During the Soviet War in Afghanistan in the 1980s, the U.S. knowingly funneled millions of dollars to fanatics like Afghan militant leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who told his followers to throw acid in the faces of women who did not cover their heads. With CIA backing through the ISI, Hekmatyar also massacred Kabul schools because communists let women get educated alongside men.

Rumors circulated in mid-2015 that Hekmatyar and his Salafi militant group Hezb-e-Islami had proclaimed support for ISIS. He later denied it, but his militant group has already aligned with al-Qaeda, and is hardly very different.

During the Cold War — and particularly during the Soviet war in Afghanistan throughout the 1980s — the U.S., hand-in-hand with Saudi Arabia, actively encouraged religious extremism. They stressed that socialist and communist movements were often atheistic, and pitted far-right religious fundamentalists against the secular leftists. The remnants of this policy are the extremist movements we see throughout the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia today.

In order to decimate the left in the Cold War, the U.S. emboldened, armed and trained the extreme-right. The Frankenstein’s monsters it created in the pursuit of this policy are the al-Qaedas and ISISes of the world.

(Credit: Reuters/Carolyn Kaster) Reuters/Carolyn Kaster

21st-century feudalism

Saudi Arabia is truly a country that was created through Western imperialism. Before Roosevelt met with King Ibn Saud, Saudi Arabia was a relatively weak country with little global political influence. It was Western, and principally U.S., patronage that turned Saudi Arabia into what it is today.

The Saudi monarchy presents itself as modernized, yet it is still feudal in essence. There is almost no developed civil society in Saudi Arabia, because the regime has made all independent institutionalized forms of dissent illegal.

Women are essentially second-class citizens in Saudi Arabia. They are given nowhere near equal rights with men — who basically own their wives and daughters — and cannot travel without men accompanying them. Unemployment rates are skyrocketing among women, even though many are educated, and they were only just granted the right to vote in December 2015 — although they do not have any actual effectual politicians to vote for under an absolute monarchy.

Moreover, Saudi Arabia only abolished slavery in 1962, at the behest of President Kennedy. Even now, however, the Saudi regime still relies heavily on slave labor — like other neighboring Gulf monarchies.

The Saudi regime is essentially a form of modern feudalism, one that has only continued into the 21st century because it has been preserved by Western patronage.

Feudalism was overthrown or rendered effectively powerless in much of the West in the 18th and 19th centuries. The monarchy in Egypt was overthrown by the Free Officers Movement in 1953, after the first Egyptian Revolution, under the leadership of Muhammad Naguib and Gamal Abdel Nasser. It is likely that the Gulf monarchies would have been toppled too, were it not for Western imperial policies.

The places in which governing, non-symbolic monarchies still remain — not just Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations, but also Jordan — are preponderantly Western-allied nations. A longstanding policy pursued by Western colonial and imperial powers was to prop up monarchies that were friendly to their interests. These repressive feudal regimes were invariably unpopular to their citizens, who were in turn also antagonistic to the foreign colonial powers occupying and controlling their nations in order to exploit labor, extract resources, and forcibly open up new foreign markets. Imperial powers, hence, understood that it would be much easier to control a nation by aligning with its tiny autocratic power base than to try to win the hearts and minds of the masses of people.

Saudi Arabia is a product of precisely this imperial legacy. Were it not for Western support, the Saudi monarchy would likely have fallen, or rather have been toppled, many decades ago — just as it was in Egypt.

In the past few decades, Saudi Arabia’s influence and role in the Middle East has increased, with steady U.S. backing. After the catastrophic U.S. war in Iraq, Iran emerged as a new regional super power. Saudi Arabia, Israel and the U.S. have worked to weaken Iranian influence in the region. Just in the past few years, in particular, the Saudi monarchy has begun acting more aggressively against Iran, violently asserting its influence, leading a relentless war on Yemen and funding rebel groups in Syria.

Today, in the 21st century, violent religious extremism has taken control of much of the Middle East. The U.S. has ended millions of lives and invested billions upon billions of tax dollars in its putative fight against such extremism. But the increasing prominence of Saudi Arabia, and the U.S.’s increasing support for the absolute monarchy, has only perpetuated this fight.

The reasons behind the surge in violent extremism in the past decade are of course multitudinous. None of this is to say Saudi Arabia is the only factor. There is also the catastrophic and bloody U.S. wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya; along with the illegal Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, which has carried on now since 1967; and the brutal repression of the al-Assad dictatorship in Syria.

Saudi Arabia is not the sole reason for the extremism in the world today, but it is one of the primary sources of it. More crucially, the fanatical Wahhabi ideology the Saudi monarchy exports is one of the main reasons many rebel groups resisting these forms of injustice and oppression become Salafi Islamists, and not secular leftists, as most resistance groups were in the mid-20th century.

In the wake of the Paris and San Bernardino attacks, the West has again asked itself what it can do to stop Islamic extremism — while it is actively supporting Saudi Arabia, the world’s principal proselytizer of Islamic extremism.

If it is truly interested in stopping terrorism, then, the U.S. and the rest of the West will heed Chomsky’s advice. The U.S. will realize that there really is an easy way to stop terrorism: It will stop participating in it, and end its alliance with Saudi Arabia.

Ben Norton is a politics reporter and staff writer at Salon. You can find him on Twitter at @BenjaminNorton.

MORE BEN NORTON.

By Simon Lewis | YANGON Courtesy: Reuters

A group of Rohingya Muslims that attacked Myanmar border guards in October is headed by people with links to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the International Crisis Group (ICG) said on Thursday, citing members of the group.

The coordinated attacks on Oct. 9 killed nine policemen and sparked a crackdown by security forces in the Muslim-majority northern sector of Rakhine State in the country’s northwest.

At least 86 people have been killed, according to state media, and the United Nations has estimated 27,000 members of the largely stateless Rohingya minority have fled across the border to Bangladesh.

Predominantly Buddhist Myanmar’s government, led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, blamed Rohingyas supported by foreign militants for the Oct. 9 attacks, but has issued scant additional information about the assailants it called “terrorists.”

A group calling itself Harakah al-Yakin claimed responsibility for the attacks in video statements and the Brussels-based ICG said it had interviewed four members of the group in Rakhine State and two outside Myanmar, as well as individuals in contact with members via messaging apps.

The Harakah al-Yakin, or Faith Movement, was formed after communal violence in 2012 in which more than 100 people were killed and about 140,000 displaced in Rakhine State, most of them Rohingya, the group said.

Rohingya who have fought in other conflicts, as well as Pakistanis or Afghans, gave clandestine training to villagers in northern Rakhine over two years ahead of the attacks, it said.

“It included weapons use, guerrilla tactics and, HaY members and trainees report, a particular focus on explosives and IEDs,” the group said, referring to improvised explosive devices.

It identified Harakah al-Yakin’s leader, who has appeared prominently in a series of nine videos posted online, as Ata Ullah, born in Karachi, Pakistan, to a Rohingya migrant father before moving as a child to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

“Though not confirmed, there are indications he went to Pakistan and possibly elsewhere, and that he received practical training in modern guerrilla warfare,” the group said. It noted that Ata Ullah was one of 20 Rohingya from Saudi Arabia leading the group’s operations in Rakhine State.

Separately, a committee of 20 senior Rohingya emigres oversees the group, which has headquarters in Mecca, the ICG said.

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a news briefing on Thursday that the United States was aware of the report and reviewing it, but declined to comment further.

Groups like Islamic State and al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent have referred to the plight of the Rohingya in their material, and the battlefield experience of at least some of the Rohingya fighters implied links to international militants, the ICG said.

However, ICG said the group has notably not engaged in attacks on the civilian Buddhist population in Rakhine. Harakah al-Yakin’s statements to date indicate its main goals are to end the persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar and secure the minority’s citizenship status.

“It is possible, however, that its objectives could evolve, given its appeals to religious legitimacy and links to international jihadist groups, so it is essential that government efforts do not focus only or primarily on military approaches, but also address underlying community grievances and suffering,” the ICG said.

(Additional reporting by David Alexander in Washington; editing by Robert Birsel and Dan Grebler)

http://myanmar.mynews.club/news/myanmars-rohingya-insurgency-has-links-to-saudi-pakistan—report.html

Courtesy: Reuters

by PETA Australia

Australian artist Jo Frederiks is about to open her latest exhibition, a bold and striking commentary on modern animal consumption titled The Animal Holocaust”.

Having grown up on a million-acre cattle station in central Queensland, Frederiks has always felt a strong connection to animals, and she uses mainly oil paints and graphite to draw attention to the way modern society and industry treat living beings.

The Animal Holocaust” will showcase over 50 of Frederiks’ paintings and 150 of her drawings, and 50 per cent of all sale proceeds will be donated to Farm Animal Rescue.

In 1968, Yiddish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer had one of his fictional characters observe that to [animals], all people are Nazis; for the animals it is an eternal Treblinka” – and this comparison to the Holocaust is sometimes seen as controversial or even disrespectful.

It is not animal rights people who have linked the death of animals and the death of [humans]. It is those who were appalled at the human carnage of Nazi Germany, who likened it to a holocaust – to the death of millions of animals.

– JR Hyland, Editor, Humane Religion

Used in the translation of biblical Hebrew scrolls as early as 250 BC, the term is taken from the Ancient Greek ὁλόκαυστος, or holókaustos, meaning the total immolation of sacrificed animals.

For more information, visit JoFrederiks.com or check out Frederiks’ Facebook page.

The National Joint Committee Press Release

 The Government on the 19^th of November presented to Parliament several reports of subcommittees appointed by them on constitutional reform, which includes reports on centre-periphery relations and police powers.

The subcommittee on centre-periphery relations was chaired by Mr Dharmalingam Siddharthan Member of Parliament. The report in its introduction states that the unitary character of the constitution is an impediment to the effective functioning of provincial councils. Mr. Dharmalingam Siddharthan has reiterated this position in an interview he had given to the Daily Mirror on 22^nd of November. Therefore it appears that the approach of this subcommittee is to propose a structure which is federal in character. We are in total disagreement with this damaging approach and hence reject such an approach.

The National Joint Committee wish to place on record that we are against any attempt to change the unitary character of Sri Lanka. It needs to be said that the unitary character should not be limited to a mere label to deceive the public, but the contents of the constitution should be unitary in character.

In this regard it is necessary to point out that the structure introduced by the 13th Amendment has considerably eroded the supremacy and sovereignty of Parliament and thereby the unitary character of the State. Article 154 G(3) requires a majority of 2/3 of the members of Parliament to repeal or amend any statute passed by a Provincial Council, whereas it only needs a simple majority to repeal or amend its own laws. The Parliament would need a 2/3 majority to only amend the constitution and not amend ordinary laws, thus in effect we have elevated the laws made by Provincial Councils to that of constitutional provisions. Therefore Article 154 G (2) and (3) should be repealed forthwith.

The 13th Amendment gives to the Provincial Councils legislative and executive powers with regard to 73 subjects included in the provincial and concurrent lists, including police and land powers. It is necessary that Parliament should be able to repeal any legislation passed by a Provincial Council with a simple majority in the same way Parliament can repeal its own laws if it so desires in the National Interest. We therefore wish to state categorically that the impediments placed on the sovereignty of the people by the 13th Amendment should be removed forthwith and restore the unitary character of the State as it existed prior to the 13th Amendment. It is clear from the recommendation of this subcommittee that they are in a process of further deteriorating the unitary character of the State.

The subcommittee on centre-periphery relations has identified several provisions in the existing constitution which they are not agreeable to, in addition to their objection to the unitary character of the State, namely –

1) The concurrent list,

2) National Policy included in the reserve list,

3) Powers of the Governor

And

4) Fiscal control by the Centre.

We wish to point out that many countries that have devolved political power including India and South Africa, have included a concurrent list in their respective constitutions to enable the Centre to intervene against wrongful action of Provincial/regional Governments.

This is considered as a step in the right direction if we are to continue with a structure which devolves power. The concurrent list will provide an opportunity for the centre to intervene if the acts of Provincial Governments affect the rights of regional minorities.

We also wish to point out that we strongly object to any attempt to abolish the office of the Governor or to remove the executive powers vested in him, to enable the Provincial Board of Ministers to exercise executive power as they wish. Article 154 B (2) introduced by the13th Amendment provides for Presidential intervention through the office of Governor against any improper or illegal exercise of executive power by a Provincial Government. It is our view and strongly pursue that a Cabinet Minister be empowered to override any unlawful or improper action taken by a Provincial Minister.

There appears to be a move to do away with the powers of the Centre to decide on matters of National Policy in respect of all subjects. We note with regret that the attempt to take away powers of the Government to decide on matters of National Policy is also done with view to destroy the unitary character of the State and the sovereignty of the people. If this subcommittee had even a semblance of concern to stand up as one Nation, they would never have made such a proposal.

We wish to reiterate that the powers regarding fiscal policy should continue to remain with the Government of Sri Lanka. Any proposal made by this subcommittee to incorporate in the constitution a compulsory allocation from the national income to a Provincial Council is yet another attempt to destroy the unitary character of the State.

We also strongly object to Police and Land powers being granted to Provincial Councils as it will render law and order management and land management chaotic in the whole country and incorporating provisions into the constitution to amalgamate the Northern and Eastern provinces. The National Joint Committee strongly objects to the establishment of a constitutional court providing for ethnic representation. We do not consider that it is a prudent move to select judges and other holders of office based on their ethnicity.

Therefore we urge the Government of Sri Lanka to refrain from implementing these disastrous proposals made by this subcommittee in the preparation of a new constitution for Sri Lanka. We would after careful study, make a fuller statement on all the other proposals made by other subcommittees in the near future.

Yours sincerely,

National Joint Committee

Signed – Dr Anula Wijesundara – Joint President

Col. (rtd) Anil Amarasekera – Joint President

Dimuth Gunawardena – Hony. Secretary

Mr Pani Wewala – Adminstrative Secretary

Dr Ranjini Rathnapala – Hony. Treasurer

Mr Manohara de Silva (PC) -Exco Member

Dr. Lalithsiri Gunuruwan – Exco Member

Mr Gamini Gunawardena – Exco Member

Mr Gevindu Cumaratunga – Exco Member

Mr Neville Laduwahetty – Exco Member

Mr Kulathunga Rajapakse – Exco Member

Rear Admiral Sarath Weerasekara – Exco Member

Dr P. G Punchihewa – Exco Member

Mr S. P. Weerasekara – Exco Member

Mr Tilak Godamanne – Exco Member

ජ්‍යෙෂ්ඨ කථිකාචාර්ය සුමේධ වීරවර්ධන

‘දෙමළ ඊළාම් නිජබිම් ප්‍රශ්නය’ නමින් කෘතියක්‌ සහ වාර්තාමය චිත්‍රපටයක්‌ ‘සිංහල හඬ’ සංවිධානය විසින් පසුගියදා එළිදක්‌වන ලදී. එහිදී එම කෘතිය සිංහල, දෙමළ සහ ඉංග්‍රීසි යන භාෂා ත්‍රිත්වයෙන්ම එළිදැක්‌වීමට කටයුතු කිරීම විශේෂත්වයකි. එම කෘතිය සම්පාදනය කිරීමේදී ඒ සඳහා දායක වූ පේරාදෙණිය විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයේ දර්ශන හා මනෝවිද්‍යා අංශයේ ජ්‍යෙෂ්ඨ කථිකාචාර්ය සුමේධ වීරවර්ධන සමග  කළ සංවාදයේ සංක්‍ෂිප්තය පහතින් පළ වේ.
‘දෙමළ ඊළාම් නිජබිම්’ කෘතිය ඒ හා සම්බන්ධ වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටය බිහිවීමේ පසුබිම කුමක්‌ද?

මම පේරාදෙණිය විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයට පැමිණියේ 2000 පෙබරවාරි 07 වැනිදා. ඒ වෙද්දි විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයේ ශිෂ්‍ය ව්‍යාපාරය මෙහෙයවූයේ ජනතා විමුක්‌ති පෙරමුණ විසින්. මම විශ්වවිද්‍යාලයට ඇතුල් වීමට පෙර ආචාර්ය නලින් ද සිල්වාගේ ප්‍රධානත්වයෙන් තිබුණු චින්තන පර්ෂදයත් සමග වැඩ කළා. ඔහුගේ අදහස්‌වල ආභාසයෙන් පෝෂණය වූ අයෙක්‌ හැටියට මට අවශ්‍ය වුණා ජාතිකවාදී ශිෂ්‍ය සංගමයක්‌ ආරම්භ කිරීමට.

ඉතිං මම තව පිරිසක්‌ සමග එකතු වෙලා සරසවි සංවාද කේන්ද්‍රය ආරම්භ කළා. 2002-2003 ශිෂ්‍ය සාහිත්‍ය උළෙලට අපි ප්‍රදර්ශන කුටියක්‌ ඉදිරිපත් කළා ‘යාපනයේ ඉතිහාසය’ නමින්. ඒකට අවශ්‍ය විස්‌තර අපි සපයා ගත්තේ මූලික වශයෙන්ම අපේ ප්‍රධාන පුස්‌තකාලයෙන්. පසුව අපි තොරතුරු සෙවීමට යාපනේටත් කීප වතාවක්‌ම ගියා. ඒ ප්‍රදර්ශනයට චින්තන පර්ෂදය වෙනුවෙන් ආවේ එරික්‌ ගාමිණී මහතා. ඔහු තමයි අපේ ප්‍රදර්ශන කුටියේ කරුණු සහ තවත් කරුණු එකතු කරලා මෙවැනි කෘතියක්‌ සහ වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටයක්‌ සකස්‌ කිරීම වෙනුවෙන් මූලිකත්වය ගත්තේa.

අපේ ප්‍රදර්ශන කුටියේ කරුණු අන්තර්ගත කරලා අපේ සංගමයේ භාණ්‌ඩාගාරිකවරයා වූ වෛද්‍ය කමල් පද්මප්‍රිය මහතා ‘යාපනයේ සිංහල බෞද්ධ උරුමය හා දෙමළ නිජභූමි මිථ්‍යාව’ කියල කෘතියක්‌ රචනා කළා 2003දී. මගෙන් පස්‌සේ සභාපතිවරයා වුණේ ආචාර්ය චන්න ජයසුමන. ඔහු ඊළඟ වසරේ ඒ කියන්නේ 2003-2004 වර්ෂයේ සාහිත්‍ය උළෙලේ දී ඒ කුටියම වැඩිදියුණු කරලා ඉදිරිපත් කළා. ඒ වගේම ඔහු 2009 දී ‘දෙමළ ජනතාවගේ සංක්‌ෂිප්ත ඉතිහාසය’ නමින් කෘතියක්‌ ලිව්වා. අපි හොයපු කරුණු වගේම අලුත් කරුණුත් ඒ කෘතියේ අන්තර්ගත වෙනවා. පසුගියදා එළිදැක්‌වුනු ඔබ සඳහන් කළ කෘතිය සහ වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටය අපි මුලින්ම සකස්‌ කළේ 2008දී. සිංහල කෘතිය දෙමළ සහ ඉංග්‍රීසි භාෂාවලට පරිවර්තනය කළා. වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටයත් සංශෝධනය කරලා තමයි අලුතින් ඉදිරිපත් කළේ.

මේ වනවිට අලුත් ව්‍යවස්‌ථාවක්‌ ගෙනැල්ල රට දෙකඩ කරන්න කටයුතු කරමින් ඉන්නවා. මේවායේ මූලිකත්වය අරගෙන ඉන්නේ නම ගිය පෙඩරල්වාදීන්. එදා රට වෙනුවෙන් හිටපු ජ.වි.පෙ., ජාතික හෙළ උරුමය වැනි පක්‌ෂ අද මේ සම්බන්ධයෙන් නිහඬයි. හැමදාම සිංහලයන්ට පිහිටක්‌ වුනු ශ්‍රී.ල.නි.ප. යත් අද දියාරු කරලා. මෙවැනි තත්ත්වයක්‌ තුළ සිංහලයින්ට විශේෂයෙන්ම සිංහල බෞද්ධයින්ට තමන්ගේ අනාගතය ගැන බියක්‌ ඇතිවෙන එක සාධාරණයි. ඒ බිය නිසා තමයි ඇත්ත තත්ත්වය පැහැදිලි කරලා ඒ කියන්නේ දෙමළ නිජභූමි මිත්‍යාව පැහැදිලි කරල මේ කෘති සහ වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටය සකස්‌ කළේ. ඉන්දියාව, ඇමරිකාව සහ යුරෝපා රටවල් දෙමළ ජාතිවාදීන්ගේ බෙදුම්වාදයට උදව් කරනවා. මෙවැනි පසුබිමක්‌ තුළ තමයි අපි මේ කෘතිය සහ චිත්‍රපටය නිර්මාණය කරන්නේ.

මෙහි කතෘවරයෙක්‌ ගැන සඳහනක්‌ නැහැ. මේ කෘතිය සහ චිත්‍රපටය සම්පාදනය කිරීමට දායක වූ පිරිස කවුද?

බොහෝ පිරිසක්‌ ඉන්නවා. අපි කාටත් අවශ්‍ය වුණේ අපේ රට දැය සමය වෙනුවෙන් වැඩ කිරීමට මිස නම් ප්‍රදර්ශනය කරගැනීමට නොවෙයි. එහෙත් මූලිකත්වය ගත්ත කීප දෙනෙක්‌ ගැන කිව යුතුයි. මෙහි කරුණු මූලික වශයෙන්ම එක්‌රැස්‌ කළේ මා විසින්. ඒ කරුණු ප්‍රදර්ශන කුටියකට අවශ්‍ය පරිදි සකස්‌ කිරීමේදී වෛද්‍ය රොෂාන් ජයසූරිය, වෛද්‍ය කමල් පද්මප්‍රිය ඇතුළු සරසවි සංවාද කේන්ද්‍රයේ සියලු දෙනාගේ සහයෝගය ලැබුණා.
චිත්‍රපටය සහ මේ කෘතියේ පිටපත ලිව්වේ මාධ්‍යවේදී එරික්‌ ගාමිණි ජිනප්‍රිය. ඒ වගේම ‘සිංහල හඬ’ සංගමයේ අයත් මේකට දායක වුණා. මනෝජ් අබයදීර, රුවන් විඡේසුන්දර, ශ්‍රීනාත් ගනේවත්ත, උදයසිරි වික්‍රමරත්න වැනි අයට මේකට මූලිකව ක්‍රියා කළා. ඒ වගේම කැමරාකරණය, අධ්‍යක්‌ෂණය වගේ පැතිවලින් ගාමිණි වර්ණසූරිය වගේ අය උදව් කළා.

ඒ වගේම අපට මේ අදහස්‌ නිකම්ම පහළ වුණේ නැහැ. චින්තන පර්ෂදය වගේම ආචාර්ය නලින් ද සිල්වා මහාචාර්ය ජී. එච්. පීරිස්‌, මහාචාර්ය කේ. එන්. ඕ. ධර්මදාස, මහාචාර්ය කේ. එම්. ද සිල්වා වැනි අයගේ ලිපි ලේඛන අපිට බලපෑවා. ඒ වගේම සෙනරත් පරණවිතාන, විමල විජයසූරිය, අබය ආර්යසිංහ, සිරිමල් රනවැල්ල, එල්ලාවල මේධානන්ද නාහිමි, ඇම්. එච්. සිරිසෝම, පෝල් ඊ. පීරිස්‌, පී. වීරසිංහ, අරිසෙන් අහුබුදු, සිරිසමන් විඡේතුංග, සිssරිල් මැතිව් යන අයගේ අදහසුත් අපට බලපෑවා. ඒ විද්වතුනුත් අපි ගෞරවයෙන් සිහි කරනවා.

උතුර නැගෙනහිර ගැටලුව විවිධ පාර්ශ්ව නොයෙක්‌ දෘෂ්ටිකෝණයන්ගෙන් අර්ථ දක්‌වනවා. ‘සිංහල හඬ’ සංවිධානය ඒ ගැටලුව හඳුනා ගන්නේ ‘දෙමළ ඊළාම් නිජබිම් ප්‍රශ්නය’ ලෙසයි. එහි විශේෂත්වය කුමක්‌ද?

ඔව්. ජ. වි. පෙ. මෙය හඳුනා ගන්නේ ජාතික ගැටළුව ලෙසයි. රාජ්‍ය නොවන සංවිධානවලට එය ජන වාර්ගික ගැටළුවක්‌. මේ හඳුනාගැනීම් දෙක වැරදියි. මෙතන ජාතීන් දෙකක්‌ නැහැ. දෙමළ ජනවර්ගය ජාතියක්‌ ලෙස හැඳින්වීම වැරදියි. මේ රටේ ශිෂ්ටාචාරය නිර්මාණය කළ සිංහල ජාතියට, සංක්‍රමණිකයන් සහ ආක්‍රමණිකයන් ලෙසට මෙරටට ආපු ජනවර්ග සමාන කරන්න බැහැ.

උතුරු නැගෙනහිර පළාත්වල දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ පැවතියේ නැතැයි ඔබ කියන්නේ කවර පදනමකින්ද?

අභිලේඛන, කාසි, සාහිත්‍ය මූලාශ්‍ර ඇසුරින් බැලුවම ලංකාවේ කිසිම ප්‍රදේශයක දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ පැවතුණු බවට සාධක නැහැ. ඒ කියන්නේ ඒ මූලාශ්‍රවලට අනුව වෙනත් පළාත්වල තිබුණු ශිෂ්ටාචාරයම තමයි, ඒ පළාත්වලත් තිබිල තියෙන්නේ. ඒ කියන්නේ සිංහල බෞද්ධ සංස්‌කෘතියමයි.

අභිලේඛන මූලාශ්‍ර ගත්තොත් දැනට හමුවන අභිලේඛනවලින් ආනෙයිකෝට්‌ටේ ලෝහ මුද්‍රdව, කදුරුගොඩ මැටි බඳුන් කැබැල්ල, වල්ලිපුරම් රන්පත, කදුරුගොඩ අත්තානි කණුව සහ තුනුක්‌කායි සෙල්ලිපිය යන ඒවා සිංහල ප්‍රාකෘතවලින් සහ ඒ ඒ යුගවලට අයත් සිංහල භාෂාවෙන් ලියවුණ ඒවා. අරම්කැලේ සහ මැදගොඩ සන්නස්‌වල සඳහන් වනවා වීදාගම තෙර සාමීන් යාපාපටුනට වැඩ  බුවනෙකබාහු රජුට ධර්මය දෙසුවා කියලා. දෙමළ භාෂාවෙන් රචිත ශිලා ලේඛන 05ක්‌ තියෙනවා යාපනයෙන් හමු වුණු. ඒවායෙන් එකක්‌ ඉරාජරාජපුර හෙවත් මාතොට (මන්නාරම) ගැන සඳහන්වන නිසා ඒක ඒ ප්‍රදේශයෙන් ගෙන එන්න ඇති. කෙසේ වෙතත් කයිට්‌ස්‌ හි ඇති දෙමළ ශිලා ලේඛන දෙකත්, යාපන කොටුවේ ශිලා ලේඛනයත් පිහිටුවලා තියෙන්නේ 11වැනි සියවසේදී ලංකාව ආක්‍රමණය කළ රාජරාජ චෝල සහ රාඡේන්ද්‍ර චෝල කියන දෙමළ රජවරුන්ගේ සෙන්පතිවරු. කයිට්‌ස්‌වල තිබිලා දැනට නාගදීපයේ කෝවිලකට ගෙන ගොස්‌ ඇති ශිලා ලිපිය දෙමළ එකක්‌ වුවත් ඒක පිහිටුවල තියෙන්නේ මුළු සිංහලයම පාලනය කළ

වන මහ පැරකුම්බා රජු විසින්. දෙමළ කියන්නේ ඒ කාලයේ කලාපයේ ජාත්‍යන්තර භාෂාව. ඒ නිසයි ඒක දෙමළ බසින් ලියල තියෙන්නේ. යාපනය නගරයෙන් හමු වූ අනෙක්‌ ශිලා ලිපිය දෙමළ බසින් ලියපු එකක්‌ වුවත් ඒක පිහිටුවල තියෙන්නේ ෂඪ වැනි මහ පැරකුම්බා රජතුමා.

මේ ශිලා ලිපි මගින් මහාවංශයේ සඳහන් ඉතිහාසයමයි පැහැදිලි කෙරෙන්නේ. ක්‍රි. ව. 10වැනි සියවස වන තුරු යාපනයේ තිබුණේ සිංහල පාලනයක්‌. එතෙක්‌ යාපනයෙන් හමුවන සෙල්ලිපි සිංහල ඒවා. ඊට පස්‌සේ දෙමළ ආක්‍රමණිකයන් ලංකාව අල්ලා ගන්නවා. ඒ කාලේ පිහිටවපු සෙල්ලිපි තුන දෙමළ ඒවා. ඊට පස්‌සේ දෙමළ ආක්‍රමණිකයෝ පලවා හැර ලංකාව එක්‌සේසත් කළා ෂ මහ විජයබාහු රජු. ඊට පස්‌සේ හමුවන අභිලේඛන ඇතැම් ඒවා සිංහල. ඇතැම් ඒවා සිංහල පාලකයන් පිහිටවපු දෙමළ සෙල්ලිපි.

ඉතිං මේ ඉතිහාසයම තමයි නාණක හා දේශීය විදේශීය සාහිත්‍ය මූලාශ්‍රවලිනුත් තහවුරු කෙරෙන්නේ. ඒනිසා යාපනයේ දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ පැවතුණාය කියන එක අමූලික බොරුවක්‌. ඒ බොරුව මත පදනම්වෙලා තමයි, මේ ජාතිවාදී, බෙදුම්වාදී, ත්‍රස්‌තවාදී ව්‍යාපාර කටයුතු කරන්නේ.

දෙමළ නායකයන් මුළු උතුර නැගෙනහිර දෙපළාතම ඔවුන්ගේ නිජභූමිය යෑයි පවසනවා. ඔබ පවසන්නේ යාපනය ඔවුන්ගේ නිජභූමිය නොවන බවයි. එසේනම්, ඉතිරි ප්‍රදේශවල නිජ භූමියක්‌ තිබුණාද?

කිසිසේත්ම නැහැ. ඔවුන් පවසන්නේ යාපනය ඔවුන්ගේ නිජභූමියේ කේන්ද්‍රස්‌ථානය කියලයි. ඔවුන්ගේ අගනුවර එහි පැවැති බවයි. යාපනයේ දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ නොතිබුණ බව තහවුරු කළොත් අනෙකුත් ප්‍රදේශ ගැන අමුතුවෙන් කියන්න අවශ්‍ය නැහැ.

දෙමළ ඊළාම් සංකල්පය තහවුරු කිරීම සඳහා භාවිත කෙරෙන ‘යාල්පාන වෛපවමාලෙයි’ නම් කෘතිය පිළිබඳ මෙම කෘතිය තුළ විවේචන එල්ල වෙනවා. මොකක්‌ද මේ ‘යාල්පාන වෛපවමාලෙයි’ කෘතිය…?

එය තමයි දෙමළ ජාතිවාදීන්ගේ පැරණිම කෘතිය. ඒක ලිව්වෙ මයිල්වාගනම් පුලවර් නම් වියතෙකු විසින් 1736දී. එවකට යාපනේ ලන්දේසි පාලකයා තමයි ජාන් මක්‌කාර්. එයා තමයි ඒක ලියන්න ආරාධනා කළේ. මෙම කෘතිය මගින් ඔහු ප්‍රකාශ කළේ විජය රජතුමා දෙමළ කෙනෙක්‌ බවයි. ඊට පස්‌සේ හිටියෙත් දෙමළ රජවරු. ඒ නිසා ලංකාව දෙමළ රටක්‌ කියලයි ඔහු එහි සඳහන් කළේ. ඊට පසුව සයිමන් කාසිචිට්‌ටි වගේ අයත් මේ මතය ප්‍රකාශ කළා.

ඊට පස්‌සේ එස්‌. ජෝන් වී. සදාසිවපිල්ලේ, සී. රාසනායගම්, සී. බ්‍රිටෝ, ඒ. මුත්තුතම්බිපිල්ලේ, පොන්නම්බලම් අරුණාචලම්, සචි පොන්නම්බලම්, සී. සුන්දරලිංගම්, වැනි දෙමළ ජාතිවාදී වියතුන් ඊනියා දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ ගැන විවිධ කෘති සහ ලිපිලේඛන ලියල තියෙනවා. මොවුන් අතරින් වැඩි දෙනෙක්‌ දෙමළ ක්‍රිස්‌තියානි අය.

ඒත් වැදගත්ම දේ තමයි, මේ දෙමළ ජාතිවාදී වියතුන් ඉදිරිපත් කරන කරුණු සංගත නොවීම. යාල්පානම් වෛපවමාලයේ දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ ගැන කියල නැහැ. ඒ කෘතියේ සඳහන් වන්නේ මුල්ම කාලෙ ලංකාවෙ හිටියෙ වැදි ජනතාවයි, වන සතුනුයි විතරයි කියල. ඊට පසු විජය රජු විසින් සිංහල බෞද්ධයෝ ලංකාවේ පදිංචි කළා කියල එහි දැක්‌වෙනව. යාපනේ හිටියෙත් සිංහලයො විතරයි. දෙමළ ජනයා සංක්‍රමණය වුණේ ඊට පස්‌සේ කියල එහි කියවෙනව. ඒ ආකාරයට සංක්‍රමණය වූ දෙමළ නායකයන්ගේ නම් සහ ඔවුන් යාපනයට ඇවිල්ල පදිංචි වූ ගම්වල නම් පවා එහි සඳහන් වී තිබෙනව. ඉතින් යාල්පාන වෛපව -මාලයෙනුත් පැහැදිලි වන්නේ ලංකාවේ දෙමළ නිජභූමියක්‌ තිබුණෙ නැහැ කියලයි.

යාපනයේ ස්‌වාධීන රාජධානියක්‌ පැවතුණු බව ඉතිහාසයේ සඳහන් වෙනව. එය දෙමළ රාජධානියක්‌ද? නැද්ද?

කාලිංග මාඝ පළවා හැර රට එක්‌සේසත් කරපු දෙවැනි පැරකුම්බා රජුට රටම එක්‌සේසත් කරන්න බැරි වුණා කියලයි මට හිතෙන්නේ. මේ කාලෙදි තමයි ස්‌වාධීන රාජධානියක්‌ යාපනේ ඇති වෙන්නෙ. මෙහි පාලකයෝ වුණේ ආරිය චක්‍රවර්තීවරු. ‘ආරිය’ කියන අභිධානය දෙමළ රජවරු භාවිත කළ එකක්‌ නොවෙයි. පරණවිතාන මහතාට අනුව යාපනයේ රජ පරපුර ඇරඹෙන්නේ ගණ්‌ඩ ගෝපාලගෙන්. ඔහු කාලිංග මාඝගෙ පුතෙක්‌. කාලිංග මාඝ කියන්නේ සිංහල රජ පවුලට සම්බන්ධකම් තිබුණු පරපුරක කෙනෙක්‌. නිශ්ශංකමල්ල රජු වගේම ඔහුත් කාලිංග වංශිකයෙක්‌. ඒ වුණාට සිංහල කිරීටයට උරුමයක්‌ තිබුණු කෙනෙක්‌.

ඔරිස්‌සාවේ හතිගුම්පා සෙල්ලිපියට අනුව ‘ආරිය’ කියන අභිධානය භාවිත කරල තියෙන්නෙ කාලිංග වංශිකයෝ. දෙමළ රජවරු එය භාවිත කළ බවට සඳහනක්‌ නැහැ. මෙරට පැරණිම දෙමළ ඉතිහාස කෘතියේ තියෙන්නේ යාපනේ බහුතරය වූ සිංහල බෞද්ධයෝ වන්නියට හා උඩරටට පළවා හැරියේ සංකිලි රජතුමා කියල. ඒ වන තෙක්‌ම යාපනයේ බහුතරය සිංහල බෞද්ධයෝ. ඒනිසා යාපන රාජ්‍යයේ රජවරු දෙමළ නෙමෙයි නම්, එහි ජනතාව දෙමළ නොමෙයි නම්, ඒක දෙමළ රාජ්‍යයක්‌ වෙන්න බැහැනේ.

ඒ විතරක්‌ නෙමෙයි, යාපනයේ සිටි සිංහලයෝ නිරතුරුවම ආර්ය චක්‍රවර්ති පාලනයට එරෙහිව සටන් කළා. එහෙම සටන් කරපු පුංචි බණ්‌ඩා, විජයබාහු සහ බුවනෙකබාහු (සපුමල් කුමරු) වැනි සිංහල නායකයො ගැන මයිල්වාගනම් පුලවර් සඳහන් කරල තියෙනවා. සපුමල් කුමාරය තමයි ඔය නල්ලූර් දේවාලය, කතරගම දෙවියන් උදෙසා ගොඩනංවල තියෙන්නෙත්.

මෙරට ඉතිහාසය නිවැරදිව සඳහන් කෙරුණු කෘති දෙමළ බසින් මෙතෙක්‌ පළවී නැද්ද?

මෙතෙක්‌ පළ වෙලා නැහැ. නමුත් දෙමළ විද්වතෙක්‌ හිටිය මහාචාර්ය කාර්තිගේසු ඉන්ද්‍රපාලා කියල. එතුමාගෙ ආචාර්ය උපාධි නිබන්ධයේ සඳහන් වෙනව ක්‍රි.ව. 13 වැනි සියවසට පෙර ලංකාවේ ස්‌ථිර දෙමළ ජනාවාස තිබුණු බවට සාක්‌ෂි නැහැ කියල. එහි සාරාංශයක්‌ ඔහු රාජකීය ආසියාතික සමිතියේ, ලංකා ශාඛාවේ සඟරාවට ලියූ ලිපියකත් සඳහන් වෙනව. දැන් එතුමා ඉන්නේ ඔස්‌ටේ්‍රලියාවේ. එතුමා මෑතකදී ලියූ ලිපියකින් පෙනී යන්නේ ඔහුත් තම මතය වෙනස්‌ කරගෙන කියලයි. එතුමත් දැන් වැඩ කරන්නේ දෙමළ ඩයස්‌පෝරාවේ කෙනෙක්‌ හැටියට බවයි පෙනෙන්නේ.

ඒ අඩුව පුරවන්න තමයි අපි අපේ කෘතිය දෙමළ භාෂාවටත් පරිවර්තන කළේ. රජය මැදිහත් වෙලා මේ රටේ ඇත්ත ඉතිහාසය කියවන්න දෙමළ ජනතාවටත් ඉඩ ප්‍රස්‌ථා විවර කර දිය යුතුයි.

සිංහල භාෂාව රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව කිරීම, දෙමළ ජනතාව වෙනම රටක්‌ ඉල්ලන්නට හේතු වූ බව ඇතැමුන් පවසනවා…

සිංහල කියන්නෙ අනාදිමත් කාලයක ඉඳල මේ රටේ රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව. එහෙත් අවශ්‍ය කරන තැන්වලදී දෙමළ භාෂාවෙනුත් රජයේ ආඥා පනවා තිබෙන බව නාගදීප ශිලා ලිපියෙන් පැහැදිලි වෙනව. කිසිම දවසක දෙමළ භාෂාව අතීතයේදි මෙරට රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව වෙලා තිබුණෙ නැහැ. ක්‍රි. පූ. යුගයේ ඉඳල ක්‍රි.ව. 1815 වන තෙක්‌ම ලංකාවේ රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව වුනේ සිංහල භාෂාව. පෘතුගීසි, ලන්දේසි සහ ඉංග්‍රීසි පාලන කාලවලදී මුළු ලංකාවටම බලපාන පරිදි ඔවුන් ගිවිසුම් අත්සන් කළේ ඔවුන්ගේ භාෂාවලින් සහ සිංහල භාෂාවෙන්. 1956දී සිංහල රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව කිරීම මගින් කළේ සිංහල භාෂාවට හිමි තැන ලබා දීමක්‌. ඒකෙන් කොහොමද දෙමළ ජනයාට සහ දෙමළ භාෂාවට අසාධාරණයක්‌ වෙන්නේ.

අනෙක්‌ කරුණ තමයි සිංහල භාෂාව රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව කරන්න බොහෝ කලකට පෙරයි දෙමළ උගත්තු දෙමළ නිජ භූමියක්‌ තිබුණ කියල ව්‍යාජ ඉතිහාසයක්‌ නිර්මාණය කළේ. සිංහලයන්ව රවට්‌ටන්න ෙµඩරල් පක්‌ෂය කියල හඳුන්වා දුන් ලංකා දෙමළ රාජ්‍ය පක්‌ෂය පිහිටුවල පනහට පනහ ඉල්ලුවෙත් 1956ට කලින්. අනෙක දැන් සිංහල වගේම දෙමළත් රාජ්‍ය භාෂාවක්‌. 1968දී පනතකින් දෙමළ භාෂාවත් රාජ්‍ය භාෂාවක්‌ බවට පත් කළා. 1972 ව්‍යවස්‌ථාවටත් ඒක ඇතුල් කළා. ප්‍රශ්නය ඇති වුණේ සිංහල භාෂාව රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව කිරීම නිසා නම්, දෙමළත් රාජ්‍ය භාෂාව වුනාම ප්‍රශ්නෙ විසඳෙන්න එපැයි. මෙතැන තියෙන්නෙ අද ටිකක්‌, හෙට ගොඩක්‌ කියන ප්‍රතිපත්තියට අනුව ඔවුන් වැඩ කිරීමයි. ඔවුන් බොහොම වේගයෙන් වෙනම රාජ්‍යයකට අවශ්‍ය පදනම සකස්‌ කර ගනිමින් සිටිනව. ඒකට ජගත් අධිරාජ්‍යවාදීන් උදව් කරනව. කරුණු හරිහැටි නොදන්න අනුවණ සිංහල නායකයෝ කිසිවක්‌ නොදැන මේවට උඩගෙඩි දෙනව. අධිරාජ්‍යවාදී රටවල් රාජ්‍ය නොවන සංවිධානවලට මුදල් පොම්ප කරල ඔවුන්ට අවශ්‍ය පරිදි අපේ රටේ ජන මතය වෙනස්‌ කරනව. කවද හරි වෙනම රටක්‌ හැදුනොත් එදාට තමයි සැබෑ ගැටුම පටන් ගන්නේ. මීට කලිනුත් එළාර මහියංගනය දක්‌වාත්, රාජ රාජ චෝල කතරගම දක්‌වාත් අපේ රට පාලනය කළා. එදාට අපේ රට දැය සමය විනාශ වෙනව. ඒක වළක්‌වා ගන්නයි අපි කටයුතු කරන්නේ.

මෙවැනි කුඩා කෘතියකින් හා වාර්තා චිත්‍රපටයකින් දෙමළ බෙදුම්වාදී ව්‍යාපාරයේ දාර්ශනික පදනමට අභියෝගයක්‌ එල්ල කළ හැකි යෑයි ඔබ විශ්වාස කරනවාද?

කෘතිය හා චිත්‍රපටය කුඩා වෙන්න පුළුවන්. ඒත් බෙදුම්වාදීන්ගේ සියලු මතවාද පුස්‌සක්‌ බව අපි පෙන්වල තියෙනව. අපේ පර්යේෂණ කටයුතු තවත් ඉදිරියට අපි කරගෙන යනව. අපිට කරුණු හොයල පොත් ලියන්න පුලුවන්. වාර්තා චිත්‍රපට, ප්‍රදර්ශන කුටි හදන්න පුලුවන්. මේවාට විශාල ශ්‍රමයක්‌ ධනයක්‌ සහ කාලයක්‌ වැය වෙනව. මේ වැඩේට වෙනත් දේශමාමකයින්ගේ උපකාර අපට අවශ්‍යයි. කෘතිය සහ චිත්‍රපටය ප්‍රදර්ශනය කරන්න අපට වෙනත් සංවිධානවල උපකාර අවශ්‍යයි. සංවිධානය කරල ආරාධනා කළොත් මෙරට හෝ පිටරට ඕනෑම තැනකට අපි එන්න ලෑස්‌තියි.

සංවාදය -ලක්‌මාල් බෝගහවත්ත

Noor Nizam. Peace and Political Activist, Political Communication Researcher, SLFP Stalwart and Convener – The Muslim Voice”, December 17th., 2016.

The Muslim Youth should group themselves into a powerful political Institution, Insha Allah, especially in the Eastern Province. 

General Secretary of the SLMC, Hassanali is reported in the national media that he has foregone the post of General Secretary of the SLMC for a slot as a National list MP of the SLMC in parliament.

This is indeed surprising news. It seems that all politicians are of the same creed. I had great RESPECT for General Secretary Hassanali, as a personal friend and a political leader, but it seems that Hassanali has lost his political vision of the Muslims of the East.

The Muslim Youth should group themselves into a powerful political Institution, Insha Allah, especially in the Eastern Province.  The Muslim politicians have hoodwinked and betrayed the Muslim Community wholesale.

We need to think with our heads” NOT our hearts”, Insha Allah. Politically analyzing the Muslim Community of Sri Lanka, we may be a community of around 1.97 million persons (Ummah) by population, but as a political power, WE ARE A POWER TO OURSELVES, you should realize, Insha Allah. That is the representation of our COMMUNITY and The Muslim Voice” is a VOICE from among that Community, Alhamdulillah.

We have a Muslim Vote bank of nearly 600,000 (maybe more) in the 26 districts and 9 provinces of Sri Lanka. The Muslim Voice” wants to tell the Muslim Community that – IT IS TIME UP THAT THE MUSLIMS SHOULD CREATE THIS POLITICAL FORCE NOW.

It is time up that a NEW POLITICAL FORCE that will be honest and sincere, to stand up and defend the Muslim Community politically and otherwise, especially from among the YOUTH, and safeguard the DIGNITY of our community has to emerge from within the Sri Lanka Muslim Community to face any new election in the coming future.

The Muslims should create a political force now to defend our position in the Constitution”. Insha Allah.The Muslims should harness the support of the friendly Nationalist Forces, be they Sinhalese or Tamils (North and Upcountry) in defending our political position in the Constitution”.

We should also support the MEDIA fully, Insha Allah.The rest we have to leave to God AllMighty Allah.

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

16 December 2016

Hon. Maithripala Sirisena
President of Sri Lanka
Presidential Secretariat
Galle Face
Colombo 1

Sri Lanka

cc.

His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo
Prime Minister Hon. Ranil Wickremesinghe.

 Re: The Tallest Christmas Tree Saga continues

Dear President Maithripala Sirisena:

Well…well…well….did you read the news item in the December 11, 2016, the SUNDAY TIMES, ‘Christmas tree builders erect Rs.12m private cash defence’.  This comment from me is the second on this subject.  The other I sent to you by e-mail on December 14th.  I hope someone briefed you on it in case you didn’t have time to read it.

You know what Mr. President, whichever way the Yahoopalanaya lot wants to cut the Christmas Tree Saga Pie, it comes out as a waste of money when you all could have done better using that money distributing Christmas hampers to the poor and bring Joy to their hand-out VAT scrimping world.

Each hamper could have had a coconut, a loaf of bread, a small bottle of cooking coconut oil, a packet of salt, a small packet of rice, a small packet of dhal and a small packet of curry powder.  Just seven items of a token gesture of ‘Christmas time Christian happiness, a Christian spirit of giving’, and that would have made thousands and thousands of people of all denominations living in thakaran roofed adobe huts smile   That colossal Christmas Tree was about Religious harmony you all said. I don’t get it.  That Christmas Tree Religious harmony needs some logical explanation.  That vacuous statement to me is a heap of dried patties of cow-dung.

You know what Mr. President, your Yahoopalanayos still think that the Sri Lankans are a bunch of idiots, don’t you.?,  You all keep lying to the people and pulling wool over their eyes.

I wonder whether Mangala Gunasekera, the Chairman of the Christmas Tree Construction Committee really understood the symbolism of the Christmas Tree.  It has nothing to do with any other religion.  At least the other three major religions in Sri Lanka – Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam.  And he talks of Religious harmony”  What stupidity!

That news item says Construction Committee Chairman says, the tree was to promote religious harmony and promote tourism.”

You know what Mr. President, that foolishness made my stomach do summersaults with Ha!….Ha!… Ha!…laughter … saying What a load of crap!”

The symbolic meaning of the Christmas Tree originates in pagan culture, where the evergreen represents life, rebirth and stamina needed to endure the cold, freezing winter months.  The Scandinavians and Norse traditionally honoured the winter solstice (December 25) by decorating evergreens.  This tradition also marked the end of the old year and the beginning of a new year.  Where does the religious harmony” come into play, Mr. President?

Please….please…..ask your Yahoopalanayos not to challenge the intelligence of the 21 million of your people.

Pagan lore indicates the time between December 25 until about early-mid January are some of the coldest days of the year. The lore believed that evil spirits were at their strongest during these months.  So to thwart the  ‘ red-eyed-Booo-nasties’, everygreens were brought into their homes as a symbol of protection.  And they were lit with candles to light up the darkest and the coldest days and shooing out these nasty spirits.  So where does the religious harmony” come in.  Stop lying and cheating your people, Mr.. President.

The nineteenth century Christianity absorbed the bright, cheery symbolism of a Christmas Tree. The Christians know their symbolism well, as they added candles and apples to their indoor Christmas trees.  These candles, generally white, represented the light of Jesus Christ.  The apples symbolized knowledge which spawned man’s original sin according to Christian belief.  Here we see the light of Christ absolving the fall of man” within the immortal; symbol of the Christmas Tree.  So where the hell, does ‘religious harmony’ come into play, may I ask Mangala Gunasekera, the Chairman of the Construction Committee of the humongous Christmas Tree?

Mr. President, enough…is….enough.  Stop cheating your people, and painting them as bunch of idiots.

And what your Yahoopalanaya crowd ought to know is that there was never a Christmas Tree in Bethlehem.   Ask Archbishop Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, and he will say so.

So you all decide to build the tallest Christmas Tree and think that you can bring religious harmony between the major religions in Sri Lanka – the Christians, the Buddhists, the Hindus and the Muslims.  For Jesus sake, don’t throw buckets of Hog’s-wash on the 21 million of your people to bathe them with your unconscionable  stupidity.

The present  day Christmas Trees are decorated with all sorts of ornaments and coloured lights  You name it, its all in Christmas Trees – chains of coloured beads, glass baubles,  silver stars, flying silver birds, sleighs, little toy animals, an angel at the apex of the tree, et cetera.  Not sure what all these symbolize, but this is how they decorate the Christmas tree.

But, if your people want to salvage the embarrassment of the Yahoopalanaya decadence, whether the Christmas Tree was built with Government Tax Payers money or money from the sponsors, it is not too late to cover your  orangutang  red behinds, by threading the Christmas Tree  to represent ‘religious harmony’ by hanging religious symbols on your tallest Christmas Tree in the world  in Galle Face Green like the – Dharma Chakra (Buddhism); Sacred cow or the Omkar’ (Hinduism); Cross (Christianity);  Star and Crescent  or a Minaret (Islam); Sikh Khanda (Sikhism); Zoroastrian Faravahar (Parsee); Star of David (Judaism); Pointed Star (Baha’is), Yin and Yang (Taoism) et cetera.  That certainly will have a sensible thread of ‘Religious harmony’.  But you will have to get permission from the religious hierarchy, whether they wish to participate in this decadent foolishness.

These mock religious symbols will have to be large all weather proof Christmas tree decorations.

Mr. President, here is where your Yahoopalanayo deliberately confused your people.  The cost, of constructing the colossal Christmas Tree would be a 12 million rupee show case with 300,000 bulbs, decorated with two million pine cones,  a Santa and a sleigh are also part of the installation, they announced.

This  Christmas Tree will be exposed to the Test Cricket abandoning inclement weather, where there will be a horrendous hidden cost for maintenance.  Do you know how much it is?  Of course, you wouldn’t as they would certainly like to hide the cost from the eyes of the people.

They say it is a tourist attraction.  Come again Mr. President.  Whom are you kidding.   Dream on,  Mr.President….dream on!  You certainly won’t have tourists in plane loads flying into Colombo to see this Yahoopalanaya foolishness.   Dream on…. Mr. President!

The Christmas hampers of a coconut, a loaf of bread, a small bottle of cooking coconut oil, a small packet of rice, a small packet of dhal and a small packet of curry powder, would have lit the skies with smiles of coconut-kernel white teeth of poor mothers, fathers and kids, who would have sung to you in union –

I see skies of blue/ and clouds of white
The bright blessed day/ the dark Christmas night
With Christmas hampers in our hands
and I think of myself/what a wonderful world.”

My plea to you Mr. President is, it is time your Yahoopalanaya crowd stop cheating and lying to the 21 million people.  For Jesus sake, stop underestimating their intelligence,  Little wonder when I asked 24 Gamme-minissu, Kohomadaha aluth arnduwa?”   They all said, Oya okkoma hora yakku. Mahaththaya!”   That was the pulse of the poor folk last February across your beautiful

Island, and I am not lying, and my heart sank with disappointment.
And now this tallest Christmas Tree in place and no Christmas hampers!
It is tough to understand the Yahoopalanaya charity on the days of Christian goodwill.

Sincerely,

Asoka Weerasinghe (Mr.)

(former Head, Thematic Research of the National Museums Corporation, Ottawa, Canada;
former Head of Exhibits of the National Museum of Natural Sciences, Ottawa, Canada;
former Head of Exhibits, Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Ottawa, Canada;
The designer, and producer of the 30 thousand square foot exhibition, ‘Hidden Face of the Oceans’, Pacific National Exhibition, Expo 86, Vancouver, Canada and
The designer and producer of the 30 thousand square foot exhibition, ‘The Oceans’, at the Canadian National Exhibition, Toronto, 1997)

Dr IMRC Iriyagolle

The Prime Minister of Sri Lanka  Mr Ranil Wickrmasinghe has admitted that he gave the illegal order to the Navy Commander Ravi Wijegunaratne to ‘break up the strike’ of the temporary workers at Hambantota Port by any method.  the workers were pleading not to privatise, ‘ sell the port’ to China and to consider giving them permanent employment.

This was an illegal order and a blow against democracy and the Nation.  Mr Wickremasinghe and his United National Party has a long history of violence against dissent and opponents.  He and his uncle the late JR jayawarden’s gave illegal orders, committed crimes against humanity torturing Sinhalese young men and women to death in the eighties and nineties.  Recently he was involved in a scam in the Central Bank involving billions of rupees.

Please help this traumatised and beleaguered Nation and the journalists that are endeavouring
against all odds to serve the public.

Please visit the websites that give evidence against Mr Wickrmasinghe who was involved with the ‘Batalanda torture chambers’.

Selling the port to China will have dangerous and devastating affects on the security of the world, shifting the balance of power.   Sri Lanka has a strategic position in the South Asian region.

This administration just as the previous administration has no social conscience, millions of citizens live in poverty whilst the corrupt, decadent debauched Sinhalese politicians live in luxury having created a pleasure island for the rich just as Cuba was before the great iconic legendary leader Fidel Castro  Cruz rescued the Nation and provided the best Welfare state in the world.  He created the best Health and Education systems in the world and there was freedom from hunger.  We need such a leader in Sri Lanka to rid our sacred country of the traitors in Parliament.   Sri Lanka is an island where murderers, drug barons, pimps, paedophile s, and fraudsters, thrive, an island debauched.

Sri Lanka known as Sinhale had just rule until the European invaders from the 15th century onwards then followed by the Coromandel coast Adrian-Jayawardena clan became the cruel, decadent leaders spreading corruption and cruelty, engaged in the use, misuse and abuse of power.

We would be grateful for your help.

With appreciation
Dr IMRC Iriyagolle
www.savethesinhalese.org

Dr Ruwan M Jayatunge 

 In 1988 I went to Minsk – the capital city of Belarus to find some facts about Lee Harvey Oswald who was believed to be the lone gunman in JFK Assassination. It had been 25 years after the President John F Kennedy‘s assassination. The Minsk had almost forgotten the American defector who lived in their city. No one talked about him.  Moreover the Soviet people had no interest in the JFK saga and they had other things to worry about. Perestroika and economic changes have caused dramatic changes in their lives. People were anxious about market economy and other reforms that rapidly changed the Soviet society.

It was mid January and temperature was about minus sixteen degrees Celsius. My Polish winter coat did not fully help me to fight the Russian winter that defeated Napoleon Bonaparte and Field-Marshal Friedrich Paulus. The cold wind was terrible and it was piercing through my bones.

The Limo that JFK was riding in when he was assassinated

Near the Minsk train station (Vokzal Minsk) I took a taxi cab- a black color Volga which was popularly known as the Russian Mercedes. The taxi driver was a middle aged man who knew the city of Minsk like the back of his hand. Where to? He asked in a polite manner. I immediately noticed his Belorussian accent. I did not know my destination. It was a frantic effort to look for someone who lived in this city some 26 years ago. I had no address, only had a name: Mr. Lee Harvey Oswald.

I need to find the apartment that Lee Harvey Oswald lived many years ago I told the taxi driver. Who? He asked with a surprise. I explained him again, Lee Harvey Oswald the guy who killed the president of the United States of America. The taxi driver had no clue about LeeHarvey Oswald. But he knew who JFK was. So we reached a Police Officer. I posed the same question to him. Instead of answering my question he checked my documents. I was a medical student on my winter vacation and I had obtained a visa to travel to West Germany. My documents were in proper order. So he returned my documents.

The policemen looked dumb and he had no intention of helping us. The weather was becoming bad and heavy snow fall made me nervous. I had to meet someone who knew the city’s history.  Nothing came to my mind. I was about to give up the Oswald mission. But suddenly I decided to go to a museum and meet a curator or someone. I asked the diver to go to the Belarusian National Arts Museum. At the museum I met an elderly gentleman who was a journalist. He had worked for the Literaturnaya Gazeta many years ago.

When I told him about Lee Harvey Oswald he knew who he was. Da Da Amarikanez  he replied. The old journalist gave us   directions. Oswald had lived in an apartment building near the Svisloch River.

After driving through heavy snow blizzard we reached our destination. It was an old apartment building with a gloomy look. He lived on the 3^rd  floor. This was the place where that well-known Lee Harvey Oswald had once lived. The weather was bad and we saw no one on the street. There were no sign boards or plaque. The city had forgotten its ignominious adopted son. This place could have been a major tourist attraction. But the city officials wanted to maintain a low profile on Oswald. May be he was an embarrassment to the Soviet officials.

Despite heavy snow fall we spent a few minutes there.  I imagined how Oswald and his Russian wife Marina walked through these streets. To me Oswald was not a hero, but an enigma. I could smell him near that old apartment building.  Something was in that atmosphere which I could not explain. May be I was superstitious. Who was Lee Harvey Oswald?  An unstable insignificant man who changed the modern history?

I went back to the Minsk train station to take a train to go to Kishinev – Moldavian Republic. I tried to forget Oswald completely and concentrate on my exams. But he was in my thoughts.  After many years in 2002 this trip inspired me to write a book on JFK. It was the first book about JFK in Sinhala language. The book was titled John F Kennedy Jevithaya Ha Maranaya (JFK Life and Death) published by the Wijesuriya Grantha Kendraya. In 2010 I went to the Henry Ford museum in Dearborn Michigan and saw the ill fated limousine -Lincoln Continental 4-door convertible in which JFK was riding in Dallas.

Now fifty years have passed after the JFK assassination. Still we know little about the assassination and many conspiracy theories are circulating.  Who killed John F Kennedy?  Did Lee Harvey Oswald pull the trigger? Still there are no satisfactory answers. There are many gaps and unanswered questions.

Lee Harvey Oswald lived in the Soviet Union from October 1959 to June 1962. During this time period Nikita Khrushchev was the head of the state. After his defection to the USSR Oswald was given a job in a Radio factory in   Minsk – Belorussia. There he met a Russian girl named Marina whose uncle was a KGB officer. Oswald fell in love with Marina and they got married. He lived in Minsk until 1962.

Lee Harvey Oswald

Oswald claimed that he was a Marxist -Leninist. But he knew very little about Marxism. According to Peter Savodnik- Lee Harvey Oswald biographer his defection was more psychological than ideological. The Soviets expected Lee Harvey Oswald to help in their propaganda effort against the West. But Oswald did not participate in propaganda work.

Some argue that after Lee Harvey Oswald defected to the Soviet Union the KGB found numerous secrets related to the U2 spy plane. In 1960 a Soviet surface to air missile shot down a U2 piloted by Francis Gary Powers. This incident jeopardized the peace talks between the USA and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

To Oswald life in Minsk was becoming monotonous. He was not happy with his life and he decided to come back to USA. Some reports indicate that after coming back to the United States he was involved in Free Cuba Committee which was an anti-Castro organization. After the Bay of Pigs fiasco Oswald became furious and determined to kill the President Kennedy.

Minsk apartment where Kennedy assassin Oswald lived three years

On November 22, 1963 President John F. Kennedy was killed by a sniper in Dallas, Texas. The Police arrested Lee Harvey Oswald   for the crime. While being escorted to the Dallas County Jail Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby. Oswald succumbed to his gun shot injuries. He was 24 years old. Oswald was buried in Shannon Rose Hill Memorial Park Fort Worth Texas. Oswald’s mother, his wife Marina and 22 months old daughter June attend the funeral.

Lee Harvey Oswald’s remains were exhumed in October 1981 following speculations made by a group of people. They claimed that a Soviet spy was buried in place of Lee Harvey Oswald’s grave. Finally the family members gave their consent to open the grave.  Oswald’s widow Marina Porter Oswald was present at the exhumation. The remains were examined by a team of Pathologists. They compared Oswald’s dental records and found a positive dental identification.  The team leader Dr Linda Norton pronounced that the individual buried under the name of Lee Harvey Oswald in Rose Hill cemetery was in fact Lee Harvey Oswald.

Dr Ruwan M Jayatunge 

Courtesy: nextbillion.net

The Union Finance Ministry said Friday that Islamic banking was not relevant any more in achieving the objectives of financial inclusion as the government has already introduced programmes like Jan Dhan Yojana and Suraksha Bima Yojna for all citizens towards that end.

In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Finance Santosh Kumar Gangwar also said various legal changes would become necessary if even limited products were to be introduced under Islamic banking.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had set up an inter-departmental group on Islamic Banking. Entire exercise was aimed at promoting financial inclusion, accessing huge market potential to attract finance from Gulf countries for infrastructure development. However, on consideration of inter-departmental group report, it is observed that even to introduce limited products, various legal changes would be required”, Gangwar said in the Lok Sabha on Friday.

Moreover”, he added, The objectives of financial inclusion for which Islamic Banking was explored by RBI has no relevance, as Government has already introduced other means of financial inclusion for all citizens like Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna, Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojna, Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojna, Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojna etc.”

Courtesy:

http://nextbillion.net/news/islamic-banking-has-no-relevance-in-india-union-finance-ministry/

LEONARD DOYLE, West Europe Editor Courtesy: The Independent

Sunday 29 May 1994

LAST THURSDAY, in a court in the northern Dutch city of Groningen, a trial took place of a sort that is only supposed to happen in despotic Third World countries. In the dock was writer Graa Boomsma, who penned what is believed to be the first fictional account of the Dutch experience in a brutal colonial war in Indonesia from 1945 to 1950. Also charged was a journalist whose interview with the author deeply angered Dutch war veterans.

Both were charged with tarnishing the honour and good name of Dutch troops by comparing their actions to those of the Nazi SS.

In the Netherlands there is a memory hole about this period, while volume after volume has been produced describing the horrors of life under the German occupation or the savagery of the Japanese forces in Dutch colonies in the Far East. The Dutch, quick to moralise about human rights abuses by other nations, have never properly examined or debated the unpleasant history of their own experience in the colonial war. Dutch society seems to suffer from collective amnesia when it comes to the murderous behaviour of the soldiers who tried unsuccessfully to suppress the Indonesian independence movement in the jungles of Java and other islands almost 50 years ago. Young conscript soldiers, acting under orders, put numerous hamlets to the torch and butchered men, women and children.

In the trial Mr Boomsma referred to the most notorious atrocities committed by the Dutch in Indonesia over Christmas 1946 in the south Celebes. A battalion under Captain Raymond Westerling killed at least 4,000 Indonesians over a two-month period. Charges were never brought against Westerling and his men, or the military and political leaders who ordered the action.

The war crimes against Indonesian villagers were committed with the direct knowledge of The Hague, at about the same time that Germany’s Nazi leaders were being tried in Nuremberg. Today The Hague is the site of a major UN investigation into war crimes committed during the war in the former Yugoslavia.

Dutch unwillingness to confront more unpleasant parts of its history does not stop at the harassment of writers and journalists. Last year the authorities refused to allow Ponke Princen, a Dutchman now resident in Indonesia, back into the country.

Mr Princen fought as a youth in the resistance against the Germans but opposed the war in Indonesia and resisted the draft in 1946. He was arrested and sent there anyway but deserted after six months and fought for Sukarno, the father of Indonesian independence.

Even though he works today as a human rights monitor and is a regular conduit of information to the Netherlands Foreign Ministry about abuses being committed by Jakarta, the same ministry denied him a visa to enter the country last year under pressure from veterans’ associations.

Official histories of the war of independence have reportedly been changed to produce a watered-down version of what really happened as the Netherlands struggled to hold on to the Dutch East Indies by keeping them divided and preventing the emergence of a single free nation. In all, around 6,000 Dutch soldiers died in the war and at least 150,000 Indonesians were killed.

Little is popularly known in the Netherlands about the atrocities. Mr Boomsma has written what he says is the only novel about the period, The Last Typhoon. Published in 1992, it is based on his father’s experiences as a young conscript. Mr Boomsma’s case has been taken up by International Pen, the writers’ group, which has expressed its concern that the case is being brought in a country that is considered ‘an example to others in its commitment to the highest principles of democracy’.

Mr Boomsma’s troubles began when he gave an interview to a provincial newspaper in which he stated that Dutch soldiers ‘were no SS, no, although they could certainly be compared to them because of what they did. But they were forced to do these things’.

For this he was accused of slandering the Dutch veterans who served in Indonesia during the period and charged under Article 261 of the country’s criminal code. Eddy Schaafsma, the journalist who interviewed him, was also charged. Both could be jailed for up to a year if they are found guilty on 6 June, although a fine is a more likely outcome.

Mr Boomsma was not the first to make a comparison between the Dutch soldiers and SS. According to Reinier Salverda of the Department of Dutch at University College London: ‘It has been said and published several times in the past in the Netherlands’. Mr Boomsma stands by his allegations. He told the court it was the military leaders and politicians of post-war Holland who should be on trial, not a writer and a journalist.

‘The task of a writer is to be the memory of a people,’ he said. ‘My book is about the military atrocities that my father saw and committed, which included the murder of soldiers, women and children. There is a taboo (about the subject). All these war criminals were never convicted. It’s not me who should have been accused, but the state.’

Jop Hueting, perhaps the most famous Dutch soldier of the Indonesian war, who was decorated for the bravery he displayed in an airborne assault on Jakarta, has compared some of the massacres he witnessed to the My Lai incident during the Vietnam War. Mr Hueting, who was also in court as a possible witness for the defence, says the comparison between the Nazi SS and the Dutch forces is appropriate, because ‘it is a metaphor for unbelievably violent behaviour by our forces’.

He said: ‘I went to war as a naive boy from a liberal family, so I don’t feel guilty for what happened.’ But while he has spoken out about the war crimes since the late 1950s, ‘it was impossible for me to break through the wall of silence’.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/colonial-atrocities-explode-myth-of-dutch-tolerance-1439153.html

Courtesy The Island

December 17, 2016, 7:12 pm
The sale of the Hambantota Port. The previous government had also signed agreements in 2013 or thereabouts to hand over a part of the Hambantota harbour to a Chinese company on a 40 year lease but on very different terms. There are four first major privatisation of the present government is set to take place in the first week of January with the  terminals in the Hambantota harbour – the general terminal, the terminal for cars, the terminal for bunkering and the one for containers. The agreement signed by the Rajapaksa government  was just for the container terminal and interestingly it was to be taken on lease jointly by two Chinese companies China Merchant Co and China Harbour Engineering Co – the same companies that had put in bids for the whole harbour under the present government.

The Rajapaksa government had signed a Supply, Operate and Transfer agreement with the two companies who would provide all the equipment for the container terminal and operate it for 40 years with 65% for the company and 35% for the government while a royalty of 2.50 USD per container (Which would increase by 1% per year) would be paid to the Ports Authority as well as a rental per hectare. There were also charges for warferage of 30 USD per container which would go to the Ports Authority.  Under this agreement the Chinese company would have 150 hectares outside the harbour on the payment of a yearly rental. The 2000 hectares within the harbour would remain with the Ports Authority. At the time the Rajapaksa government fell, the Ports Authority had negotiated deals with 11 Chinese firms to set up various operations such as cement, fertiliser, warehousing etc on this 2000 hectares with guaranteed royalties.

All these arrangements were halted after the new government came into power. The two Chinese companies that were to jointly take the container terminal on lease have now put in rival bids to take over the whole harbour lock stock and barrel and one of them, China Merchant Co, has won the lease.  The public, however, has not been informed as to what criteria were applied in selecting the present awardee. The minister in charge of the subject went on record saying that he preferred the bid that was put in by the other bidder China Harbour Engineering Co., which was on a 35%-65% basis. Furthermore, this writer learns that a 110 hectare islet that was formed has been just tossed into the deal and will be leased out with everything in the harbour to China Merchant Co for just over one billion USD. During the Rajapaksa regime a Malaysian company had offered 500 million USD for a 99 year lease on this islet alone.

The government may have to reveal details of the previous deals signed by the Rajapaksa government with much the same companies, and the present agreements and explain how the present agreements are more favourable than the ones entered into by the previous government. As of now, the government seems to be in the mood to bulldoze the agreement through.

The year 2017 promises to be an eventful year from day one, as a result of all this. Even the JVP which has largely been quiescent in the midst of all the upheavals that we saw over the past several weeks and months has already warned that demonstrations will bring the country to boiling point come January. They have in fact already started following through with that warning. Nihal Galappaththy the JVP parliamentarian from Hambantota was seen at a well attended demonstration against the alienation of 15,000 acres of land from the Hambantota district to a Chinese company.

Lack of transparency in H’tota deal

There is unease spreading throughout the public sector because the government’s sweeping privatisation plan includes not just the Hambantota Harbour and the Mattala Airport but literally everything that can be sold including the Norochcholai power plant. All this while, the government’s privatisation plans were largely restricted to paper but now with the agreement signed to sell the Hambantota harbour such sales have become a reality which the public sector will have to confront.

There is an entrenched anti-privatisation ideology in this country. One of the main political platforms that held the old left and the SLFP together within the UPFA was Mahinda Rajapaksa’s steadfast stand against privatisation. There is the distinct possibility that the privatisation of the Hambantota harbour may become the rallying point for all those opposed to privatisation to try and stop the programme from going any further. Signs of this were already manifest last week with Dullas Alahapperuma saying at the press briefing of the Joint Opposition that if things go on like this,  by 2020, the only government owned institutions left will be the police department, the prisons department and the judiciary with everything else having been privatised!

There is of course no question about the fact that the Chinese were always a major part of the plan to develop the Hambantota harbour. Sri Lanka does not have enough exports or imports to be able to sustain another harbour. Hambantota was supposed to be a hub servicing the shipping route across the Indian ocean and one of the main nations serviced by those shipping routes is China. It was inevitable from the beginning that the construction of the Hambantota barbour would mean greater Chinese involvement in that part of Sri Lanka which is why the Indians were so unhappy about it. The problem however is in the manner in which the Chinese will get involved and the net benefit for Sri Lanka through that involvement. How a Hong Kong style 99 year lease of the harbour to the Chinese will benefit Sri Lanka will be a moot point.

The UNP has time and again proved abysmally incompetent in negotiating anything whether it be a ceasefire agreement, a joint resolution in the UNHRC or the ETCA with India. This deal with a Chinese company looks very much like another true-to-form blunder.

The government managed to end the strike by the workers of the Hambantota Port by pledging that they would be absorbed by the Chinese company that is to take the port on a 99 year lease. The question of course is why it took so long. On all previous occasions when the privatisations took place from the early 1990s onwards, the government owned business undertakings were sold with the workers and we don’t recall any previous instance when workers in enterprises earmarked for privatisation went on strike due to fear of job losses. In fact that rarely happens even when companies change hands. If the Hambantota port was to be privatised, then the party buying it, would need workers and who better than the existing workforce? Furthermore, in any deal to sell a going concern, one of the main clauses of the agreement would be the employees and arrangements with regard to payment of gratuity and other such payments in respect of those employees.

However the government took its time in giving the workers the guarantees they sought and in the meantime they had suffered even more opprobrium over the manner in which the Navy had been deployed to get the two ships stuck at the port due to the strike released. For days, demonstrations have been held throughout the country over the manner in which the Navy Commander had manhandled a journalist. This was the first time that the country had seen a service commander doing crowd control work, shouting obscenities and aiming blows at people.  One of the reasons why the Navy Commander himself led this mission could be because he could not find another officer who could be trusted to do the job. The armed forces are not equipped to do crowd control work and the memory of Rathupaswela would have been too fresh in the minds of many officers for the Navy Commander to be able to have the confidence that the job would be done.

In fact the way the navy contingent arrived at the Hambantota Harbour showed how unprepared and ill-equipped they were to handle a situation like a strike or a lockdown or do any kind of crowd control. The naval ratings arrived carrying assault rifles and wearing body armour. It was quite obvious that they would not have had rubber bullets either and if the protestors turned violent and started hurling stones, sticks, bottles and other such missiles, the Navy would have had no option but to open fire because that was the only means of retaliation they had. It was a foolhardy risk that the government took In Hambantota. A major disaster was averted only because of the restraint shown by the workers. If there were agents provocateurs among them as in Rathupaswela, the story may have been different.

One of the reasons why the Rathupaswela incident did not have a noticeable impact on the voting pattern of the area despite three deaths and the manner in which the riot was put down was because the people of the area are only too well aware that the whole thing was hijacked by agents provacateurs. Recently, when former President Rajapaksa visited that area to address a public gathering some people tried to organise a protest against him but it failed with less than a dozen people turning up. Nevertheless sending the army to quell the disturbances in Rathupaswela was a bad mistake made by the Rajapaksa government. It was obvious that the Rajapaksa government was actually trying to use the prestige of the armed forces in the hope that crowd would disperse due to the regard they had for the army. But that just did not work. In the light of that unsavoury experience, it was the height of irresponsibility for the present government to send in the the navy armed with assault rifles to deal with the Hambantota protest.

PM’s interview with N.Ram

The interview that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe gave to N.Ram of The Hindu was doing the rounds in Colombo last week. The original article in The Hindu had the rather bland title  ‘We’re all patriots, we’re all nationalists’. But what caught the eye of the local press was the dismissive comments made by the Prime Minister about the Rajapaksas. However, the most important part of that interview for the Sri Lankan audiences is what the PM said about constitutional change. Asked bout the proposed new constitution, the PM explained to The Hindu, that  the debate on the six subcommittee reports will be held after the first week of January after which the report of the steering committee will be tabled and the real debate on the constitution will take place. Once again, the PM has stressed that a referendum will have to be held to ratify the constitution.

We have reported earlier how President Maithripala Sirisena has always said that he is opposed to a referendum and members of the Sirisena camp like Champika Ranawaka have echoed his views. However now the PM has made an unequivocal statement to the Hindu that a referendum should be held. People like Champika Ranawaka who opposed the abolition of the executive presidency and the holding of a referendum when the 19th Amendment was introduced, may not be able to oppose such moves in the future because he is now an elected UNP parliamentarian and is dependent on the UNP for his political future.

What the PM told The Hindu in relation to the executive presidency is even more significant.Asked whether  everyone had agreed on doing away with the executive presidency, the PM answered in the affirmative and said “We are giving three options for how the Prime Ministerial system should function. The first option is the pure Westminster system. The second is a system where the Prime Minister is elected directly. The third option would require political parties to declare their Prime Ministerial candidates before the elections. In all three options, the President would be a non-executive head of state.” I

It’s all about the Prime Minister and nothing about the President. Back in January this year when the PM introduced the resolution to set up the Constitutional Assembly, the SLFP (Sirisena group) acting through Nimal Siripala de Silva got its entire preamble deleted. It was the preamble which stated that the purpose of the new constitution would among other things seek to abolish the executive presidency. Despite president Sirisena’s resistance we have an unequivocal statement from the PM that the executive presidency will be abolished and a referendum held.

Thus 2017 promises to be quite a political roller coaster ride with the privatisation of the Port, the new Constitution and ETCA all coming within days weeks and months of one another with the very real likelihood of overlap. The sparring between the two partners in the government continued even last week with minister Faizer Mustapha replying to the three UNP backbenchers who the week before last told the SLFP ministers to leave the government if they were not happy with the UNP. What minister Mustapha said at the UPFA press conference was that Maithripala Sirisena had not been made the presidential candidate because of any love that interested parties had for him but because Sirisena was the only candidate who could win against Mahinda Rajapaksa. Therefore he claimed the SLFP were equal partners in the government.

The interesting fact is that this sparring comes in the context where the largely UNP influenced constitution making process which will take centre stage in January seeks to abolish the executive presidency as the PM had unequivocally told The Hindu last week. Everyone knows that the only way to sell the new constitution to the people would be to incorporate in it the two principle pledges given to the people at the last Presidential elections which is the abolition of the executive presidency and the reform of the electoral system. Any constitution that comes before the people without these two key pledges, will not be accepted as a constitution but as a plot to divide the country. This could be why the UNP included both pledges in their working committee resolution the week before last.

The president and prime minister have been playing a cat and mouse game since last year with regard to the abolition of the executive presidency. To give the PM due credit, he did try to bring this key promise into the agenda even before the 19th Amendment but Sirisena with help from the likes of Champika Ranawaka managed to dodge abolishing it. Now however the time of final reckoning has arrived. President Sirisena will have to yield his position if the constitution is ever to see the day.

US interest rates and oil prices

In addition to the above, there will be other perils confronting Sri Lanka in 2017.  The oil price went up to 57 USD a barrel last Monday with the announcement of OPEC production cuts and came down again, but still remains above the 50 USD mark. However with other producers outside OPEC like Russia also cutting production in tandem, all forecasters anticipate only an upward movement in oil prices over the first half of next year. This government took power in a situation where oil prices were in steady decline and at one point went even below 30 USD per barrel. But now, oil prices are higher than they have ever been during the tenure of this government and are set to rise even higher. This is one major threat that the government will have to watch out for. The previous government was able to buy oil at more than 100 USD per barrel and still survive but not this government.

Another looming threat is the increase in US interest rates. The extremely low interest rates in the US brought about a situation where American institutional investors would be scouring the world looking for investments that produced a decent return. American investors held more than half of the foreign currency denominated bonds sold by the government before 2015. With last week’s increase in the US interest rate by 25 basis points or a quarter of a percentage point, Moody’s the global credit rating agency said that the US Federal Reserve’s increase of the federal funds rate reflects a strengthening US economy. Moody’s expects the Fed to tighten at a very gradual pace, with two to three more rate increases pushing the fed funds rate to around 1.25% to 1.5% by the end of 2017.

Moody’s has said that this interest rate hike could adversely affect countries like Sri Lanka  which have large external funding needs, because there could be a capital outflow from such economies.  Sri Lanka’s large external financing needs and macro economic imbalances were exactly what the IMF was talking about in its report on Sri Lanka released on 09 December. In addition to everything else scheduled for 2017 such as the constitution, the commencement of the privatisation programme, ETCA and so on, there are other things that have been lined up by the IMF for the first half of next year which could prove to be just as contentious. A new Inland Revenue Act is due to be tabled in parliament in March. One of the reforms envisaged in the new legislation is to broaden the tax base – which leaves no doubt that this proposed Inland Revenue Act is going to be discussed quite vigorously.

Among the other reforms that the IMF expects to see implemented during the next year is the automatic pricing formulas for fuel and electricity which have been talked about since last year but never implemented. The IMF also wanted greater flexibility in the exchange rate. This combined with their advice that SL should accumulate official international reserves through direct purchases from the foreign market, eschewing reliance on foreign exchange swaps with commercial banks may mean further depreciation of the rupee during 2017 with everything that it entails. The IMF also warned that Sri Lanka’s debt to GDP ratio remains higher than the median for emerging economies (57 percent) and noted that the risks to debt servicing in sri Lanka stemed from inadequate reserve coverage and exchange rate depreciation. So we are entering an year of uncertainty.

by Azhar Razak Courtesy The Island

Analysts question fate of Central Bank’s compulsory listing requirement plan for registered finance firms

December 17, 2016, 6:22 pm

Of the 46 licensed financial companies in Sri Lanka, 15 are presently facing liquidity issues, with six at a high level of distress with Non Performing Loans ranging from 50 to 90 percent, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) revealed in a recent report.

Releasing the much-awaited Staff Report prepared by a staff team of the IMF and completed on November 4, 2016, the IMF notes that in addition to the mismanagement and irregular practices, the rapid growth of the non-bank financial sector in Sri Lanka has often led to excessive risk taking which has led to the deterioration of the financial position of these companies.

However, the IMF said the cost of resolution is expected to be minimal as the total assets of the distressed companies are about 1 percent of GDP

“Neither the Central Bank nor the Finance Ministry has so far shed light on the names of these finance companies in trouble perhaps with the opinion that naming them might worsen the issue and lead to a run on these companies, a top financial sector analyst told The Sunday Island on the condition of anonymity.

However, the pertinent question to be asked right now is whether or not public be made more aware of the troubled licensed finance companies given the fact that 12 out of the 46 are still not listed and hence their financial statements are not readily available, he hoted.

Pointing out that while a mandated listing itself would not however guarantee credibility to the firms in question, the analyst noted that the silence of the authorities in pronouncing a clear policy direction with

regard to the compulsory listing requirement for registered finance companies introduced by the previous administration, is a concern.

“The new Central Bank administration announced it had scrapped the consolidation plan adopted by the former administration. But it is not yet clear whether the plan for a compulsory listing requirement is in place or not,” the analyst said.

According to the IMF report, the authorities are preparing a resolution plan of the15 distressed non-bank finance companies using a special purpose vehicle, and CBSL’s Monetary Board approved in mid-October a resolution mechanism for the repayment to depositors of 4 insolvent non-bank financial institutions. The authorities had earlier announced actions are being taken by the government and the CBSL to restructure them through establishment of a Financial Asset Management Company (FAMA).

The Central Bank in a press release issued in October said that the regulation and supervision by the Bank do not mean a guarantee for each and every deposit and investment made by the public in banks and financial institutions. It noted that the responsibility of the Central Bank is only to provide an external safeguard through regulation and supervision to the extent permitted in law while facilitating institutions to carry on their businesses essential for the economy and general public in a safe and sound manner in a stable financial system.

“Those who make such deposits and investments and those who undertake businesses based on these funds are primarily responsible for their business decisions regarding prudent management of their funds”, it said.

In fact, almost all funds placed in the above distressed companies have been mobilized through unauthorized financial products. Even large depositors and investors have been negligent in not undertaking the normal due diligence on risks and return, despite being sufficiently knowledgeable and skillful to do so,” the regulator said in a statement announcing the resolution of four insolvent financial institutions “to protect depositors and promote the financial system stability”.

It has to be noted that the Central Bank has however mandated all Registered Finance Companies (and licensed commercial banks, both local and foreign) in Sri Lanka to publish their summarised financial statements each quarter in a national newspaper.

“This disclosure will however only be noted by the most alert of persons as only a very few would read/buy all relevant newspapers in any case and the average person would be unaware of the financials of unlisted financial companies and banks,” another analyst who also did not wish to be quoted argued.

The analyst further pointed out that the Central Bank should arguably make arrangements to host financials of non-listed finance companies and banks on its own website.

The 12 finance companies not listed on the Colombo Stock Exchange but operating at present are City Finance Corporation Ltd, ETI Finance Ltd., HNB Grameen Finance Ltd., Ideal Finance Ltd., Kanrich Finance Ltd, Melsta Regal Finance Ltd, Richard Pieris Finance Ltd., Sarvodaya Development Finance Co. Ltd., Serandib Finance Ltd., (formerly Indra Finance), The Standard Credit Finance Ltd., TKS Finance Ltd., and U. B. Finance Co. Ltd.

It has to be, however, understood that the 15 finance companies which the IMF has indicated to be suffering from liquidity issues could be both a mix of listed and unlisted firms as a listing will only give the much-needed transparency for the public with regard to the health of individual finance companies.

“Being listed is in itself not a guarantee that a finance company is doing well. It only means that the particular firm is more transparent as it is bound by Stock Exchange rules and regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission,” the analysts explained.

Of the 12, the management of HNB Grameen has indicated intent to list in the near term, while Richard Pieris Finance is in the process of amalgamating with 90% owned and listed Chilaw Finance (CFL) where the surviving entity may get listed.

Sarvodaya Development Finance controls 76% of listed Summit Finance (GSF) while Serandib Finance was fully acquired by Commercial Bank (COMB). There have also been many reports in the past regarding plans to list U B Finance, analysts said.

Shenali D Waduge

There are many similarities in the liberation of Aleppo by its armed forces and the liberation of Sri Lanka from LTTE terrorists. Both nations and their national army were eliminating terrorists who were assets of other nations. Both nations had to deal with onslaughts on the battlefield and onslaughts diplomatically as well as a barrage of lies manufactured by the mainstream media, human rights activists and their so-called ‘unidentified sources, witnesses and victims’ their arguments were strengthened by relaying fake news, videos, documentaries all paid by the nations that were either supplying the terrorists or nations who did not wish the terrorists to be vanquished. Syria’s ordeal lasted 5 years but Sri Lanka’s went on for 3 decades but in both cases the terror remains camouflaged still.

Eva Bartlett, a Canadian journalist says that western mainstream media’s coverage of the Syrian war is ‘compromised’ as their local sources are ‘not credible’. She goes on to say BBC, Guardian, the New York Times etc. – on Aleppo is also the opposite of reality,” – Sri Lanka’s case was no different. These were the very entities quoting dead figures in Sri Lanka’s war and creating arguments for war crimes tribunals! When Bartlett says that the media misled the public about what is really happening in Syria by demonizing President Assads’ government and altering the facts of Russia’s support for Damascus, we can recall how Sri Lanka’s then government suffered the same demonizing.

She sites how a bogus NGO (White Helmets) are projected as the humanitarian heroes but in actual fact they had been using the same girl to boast themselves as rescuers. These fake images and false news again call to mind the Channel4 documentary on Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields

The ridiculousness of this news item – why would any country wish to switch of its lights to be in solidarity with terrorists when the Syrian army were fighting the terrorists to liberate its citizens? Was this no different to the manner that these very same countries went on a tangent about civilians being killed by the Sri Lankan army when they brought to safety close to 300,000 Tamils among whom were LTTE cadres dressed in civilian clothing! Is the international community happy to have ‘civilians’ with terrorists or have them freed by the national army. Before the intervention of the West there were no cases of any Syrian civilians being attacked by its army so why should media give a wrong impression?

Exactly who is this ‘international community’? We know that the US, the US, EU, Turkey, Saudi, Qatar, Israel are all helping the terrorist ‘rebels’ to oust the Syrian President and take over a part of Syria for which the EU has publicly offered money to Assad. Democrat Hawaii Congresswoman, Tulsi Gabbard has even accused US of arming and funding terrorists in Syria and has even brought a Bill ‘Stop Arming Terrorists Act’. This is no different to the carrot of USD5billion given to the Sri Lankan Government to accept the LTTE proposal ISGA.

The height of hypocrisy comes when the US, UK, France, EU, Turkey, Saudi, Qatar etc can openly arm, train and support the terrorists and when Russia goes to help Syria eliminate the terrorists, the Russians and Syrians become the war criminals!! J

http://21stcenturywire.com/2016/09/20/exclusive-aleppo-media-centre-funded-by-french-foreign-office-eu-and-us/

To add glamour the Hollywood joins in. Actress taking a break from her accesses that has her landing in hospices all the time has issued a grave warning to Syria!

The doctors came to the scene too – http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/aleppo-siege-doctors-syria-starvation-assad-forces-russian-airstrikes-humanitarian-crisis-a7183281.html

C4 introduced its star witness one vany kumar who claims that the doctors had mixed water with blood to give patients! (anyone would know that any doctor mixing blood with water would end up killing the patient!) However these lies were flogged enough.  http://transcurrents.com/tc/2009/09/post_426.html

http://www.sinhalanet.net/ltte-member-vany-kumar-how-many-ltte-terrorists-have-become-witnesses

Lets not forget the role of the activists – we know how much they laboured in Sri Lanka!

Their payment was to promote the ‘genocide’ story.

The sensationalism of exaggeration is just amazing!

The statements by UNSG/UNHRC can be compared to the same UN statements during the final stage of Sri Lanka’s conflict. UNSG went so far as to even appoint a 3 member panel (a personal appointment). It is anyone’s guess why he did not do the same when Iraq and other countries were illegally invaded on manufactured lies. However this panel used as its source propaganda channels of the terrorists, the panel described Sri Lanka’s terrorists as ‘disciplined’ and went on to say ’40,000 civilians may have been killed’ – what the media did was to turn the ‘may have been killed’ to claim Sri Lanka had killed 40,000 civilians and some hysterical others kept picking numbers from the sky quoting them as dead as if they had stood infront of the dead bodies to count! Such was the hypocrisy that Sri Lanka had to deal with and which Syria is now dealing with.

http://www.sinhalanet.net/framing-bogus-war-crime-charges-who-are-the-civilians-who-died-in-sri-lankas-final-war (a breakdown of various figures quoted as dead in Sri Lanka is given)

http://www.onlanka.com/news/how-media-and-hr-groups-purposely-misinterpreted-ban-ki-moons-panel-of-expert-report.html (the purpose misinterpretation of Ban Ki Moons panel report is shown with examples)

The same is currently happening to Syria. The UNHRC’s statements against Sri Lanka are now no different to what the Syrian government and troops are being accused of with just a passing reference to the crimes commited by the rebels.

The Syrians owe much to Russia and particularly President Putin. Several Russian military personnel died helping the Syrians. We must salute these fallen heroes for their valour.

Thankfully alternative media and the Russians have given mainstream media the embarasment of their lives exposing their lies, exposing the fake videos and even disclosing child actors used by the Norwegian government to fix blame on the Syrians (pl refer ED.TV productions for their documentaries https://web.facebook.com/EDTVProductions?_rdr )

http://www.globalresearch.ca/aleppo-liberated-washington-post-finally-admits-rebels-invaded-syria-it-was-not-an-uprising/5562379

Sri Lanka too suffered a terrorist problem but it is lucrative to claim the terrorists were ‘rebels’ and we suffered an ‘ethnic’ problem because then only the agenda can be rolled out as we now see happening before. We are warning Syria to learn from Sri Lanka.

Notice the manner the UN is building up an argument for war crimes against Syria. They will follow the same method used against Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka did not listen to the ‘international community’ to stop the offensive and give their darling rebels/freedom fighters to live to fight another day.  The email scandals associated with Hillary Clinton revealed she did  not want LTTE to be defeated and had even influenced IMF and World Bank against giving loans to Sri Lanka. http://www.asiantribune.com/node/89009

The media, the NGOs, activists and UN statements will all now be used via the UNHRC to bring resolutions against Syria for war crimes most of these resolutions are unprecedented, vicioius and brought with the desire to seek revenge. Sri Lanka suffered a series of illegal, unethical and punitive resolutions by the UNHRC and if those that are now defending Syria were to go through the resolutions against the legalities they would realize how vicious the entire UN system had been to a small country whose army had square and fair defeated a terrorist organization described by the FBI as the world’s worst! Syria be warned, UNHRC will bring resolutions, recommend war crimes tribunals and look for other ways to depose President Assad.

You can bet that the next step will be to use the UNHRC to strike Syria with war crimes – already there are allegations of using chemical weapons, sarin, bombing hospitals, killing civilians, no access to humanitarian aid – these were the very stores used against Sri Lanka. Plenty of reports will be coming out sponsored by western governments. There will be Syrian soldiers emerging claiming to be vomiting versions of Syrian army being ordered by Assad to kill civilians. There will be ‘witnesses’ speaking on anonymity and given witness protection for 20 years so that the lies can be sealed for that time span! We in Sri Lanka know the drill very well and we are warning the Syrians to prepare for whats to come.

As Eva Bartlett says ‘If they had told the truth about Syria from the beginning, we wouldn’t be here now. We wouldn’t have seen so many people killed.’ If we had the assistance that Syria has received from Russia on the battleground as well as to counter the mainstream media/UN/diplomatic lies and false news that has recommended war crimes tribunals and hybrid courts against the valiant soldiers who defeated the terrorists – Sri Lanka’s tale would have also been written differently. However, we continue to believe the truth will prevail and one day these liars and lies will get exposed.

Shenali D Waduge

Reference:

• http://presstv.com/Detail/2016/12/14/497844/Syria-President-Bashar-alAssad-Aleppo-Palmyra-Western-governments-Daesh

• https://www.rt.com/op-edge/369886-fake-news-nobody-west-media/

• ‘If they had told the truth about Syria from the beginning, we wouldn’t be here now. We wouldn’t have seen so many people killed.’ Proof fake news https://youtu.be/y7Kjp9N4mlo

Canadian Journalist on lies about Syria https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjHniRRgOao&feature=share

ආචාර්ය චන්දන ජයලත්

නීතිය කා හටත් එක හා සමානව බලපාන බවත් නීතිය වනාහි ලෝකයේ උසම මිනිසාගේ උසටත් තවත් අඟලක් උසින් පවතින බවත් අපි අසා ඇත්තෙමු. මීටත් වඩා සැලෝලයිට් කියමනක් තවත් නැතිය. ලෝකයේ ලොකුම බොරුවත් එයමය. එය පරමාදර්ශි වුවත් කිසිදා ලඟා කරගත නොහැකි වාස්තවික නොවූ සමාජ අනුභූතියකි. නීතිය හදන තැනම නීතිය කඩති. තවත් පැත්තකින් නීතිය යාන්ත‍්‍රිකව ක‍්‍රියාත්මක කරති. ඊට හොදම උදාහරණය සපයන්නේ මාර්ග නීති උල්ලංඝණය වූ විට පොලිස් නිලධාරින් විසින් දඩ කොල ලියන ආකාරයයි. රථ පෙලක හූ හඩ දීගෙන නොනවත්වා කෙරෙන අධික හෝන් හඬද ඇතිව පොලිසියද ඉස්සර කර ගෙන යන වී.අයි.පී. වශයෙන් හුවා දක්වන ‘වැදගත් ප‍්‍රභූ’ මහතුන්ට දඩ කොළ නැත. සියතින්ම මාර්ග නීති මහ දවල් අමු අමුවේ උල්ලංඝණය කරන මැති ඇමතිවරුන් ඉදිරියේ පොලිස් නිල ඇඳුම බල්ලටම ගොසින්ය. තනි ඉරි, ඩබල් ඉරි, කහ ඉරි අදාල නැති වී.අයි.පී. ස්කොඞ් නිසා රටේ සාමාන්‍ය පුරවැසියන්ට යන්නට සිදුව ඇත්තේ කාණුපල්ලේය. යුද්ධය නිමාවීමත් සමග ඇතිවූ ජයග‍්‍රාහී ප‍්‍රබෝධයෙන් කුල්මත් වූ දේශපාලූවන් නීතිය අතට ගෙන මහම`ග නාඩගම් නැටූ හැටි අපි දනිමු. එය දැන් තරමක් දුරට සමනය වී ඇති නමුදු සම්පූර්ණයෙන්ම ඊට තිත තැබිය යුතුමය. ඒ සදහා ජනතාවට කළ හැකි වන්නේ එවන් තත්වයකට මහමඟ හැකි පමණින් ඉඩ නොදී සිටිමත් සමාජ තොරතුරු ජාල හරහා එම නීති කඩන්නන්ගේ නිරුවත රටට හෙළිකොට සිටිමත්ය.

මාර්ග නීති ගැන කොතෙක් කතා කළද ඒවා සියල්ල ගඟට කැපූ ඉනි මෙන්ය. නීතිය ක‍්‍රියාත්මක කරන්නේ පොඩි එකාටය. ගසකට මුවා වී හිටි අඩියේ පාරට පනින පොලිසිය අත දමන්නේ වාහනයේ ටයරය බැරි වෙලාවත්් මෝටර් සයිකලයක් ඉස්සර කරන්නට තනි ඉරක් කැපූ සැනෙකින්ය. නීතිය ඒ තරම්ම ‘අකුරට’ ක‍්‍රියාත්මක කරන පොලිසියක් ලෝකයේ කොහෙවත් නැත. ලංකාවේ එකම අපරාධයත් තනි ඉර උඩින් රෝදයක් යාම පමණක්ය. තෝරු මෝරු යහතින් ඉන්නැද්දී හාල් කෑලි දහස් ගණනක් අද සිර ගෙවල්වලය. නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යයක තරම ඉන් පැහැදිලිය. ඒ හා සමානවම උසාවි පද්ධතියක්ද අපට ඇත. අවුරුදු ගණන් නඩු කල් යන යුක්තිය පසිදලීමේ ඉතා ‘වේගවත්්’ ක‍්‍රමවේදයකට ජාතියක් හැටියට අපි උරුමකම් කියමු. දස දහස් ගණනින් උසාවිවල නඩු ගොඩ ගැසී ඇති අතර නීතියේ පිහිට පැතීම පසෙකලා කෙටි ක‍්‍රමවේදවලට ජනතාව හුරුවී තිබේ. ඇතැම්විට නීතිය අතට ගැනීමට ජනතාවට සිදුවන්නේ යුක්තිය පසිදලීමේ සමස්ථ යාන්ත‍්‍රණය එහෙම පිටින්ම බිදවැටී තිබියදීය. ශිෂ්ඨ සම්පන්න ජන සමාජයක පිලිගත් සම්මුතීන් බිදවැටීමත් සමග නීතිය වල් වැදෙන අතර කැලෑ නීතිය රජයීම නොවැලැක්විය හැකිය. එනිසා කළ යුත්තේ උසාවිවල ගොඩ ගැසී ඇති නඩු ඉක්මනින්ම අහවර කළ හැකි වේගවත් ක‍්‍රමවේදයකට යාමයි. එය හදිසි ජාතික අවශ්‍යතාවයක් ලෙස සලකා රජයේ ඉහල ප‍්‍රමුඛතාවයක් ලබා දිය යුතුව ඇත. ලෙඩා ඒ තරමටම අසාධ්‍ය තත්වයෙන් පසුවන්නේය. නීතියේ ස්වාධිපත්‍යය රැුකිය හැක්කේ එවිටය. ජනතා විශ්වාසනීත්වය බිඳුන තැන නීතියේ ස්වාධිපත්‍යයක් නැත.

තවත් කාරණයක් මෙහාලා පසක් කල යුතු යැයි මම සිතමි. එනම් උසාවි පරිශ‍්‍රය තුල චූදිතයන්, වැරදිකරුවන්, පැමිණිලිකරුවන් හෝ සාක්ෂිකරුවන් සමග කෙරෙන මාධ්‍ය සම්මුඛ සාකච්ජා සම්බන්ධයෙනි. විවිධ දේශපාලන චරිත වටා එක්රොක්වන මාධ්‍යකරුවන් තම අදහස් ප‍්‍රකාශ කිරිමට අනර්ඝ අවස්ථාවක් ලබා දීමෙන් ඇතැම්විට සිදුවන්නේ උසාවියට අපහාස කිරිමක්ය. උසාවි තීන්දුවලට අභියෝග කිරිමත්ය. ඇතැම් පුද්ගලයින් ‘චරිත’ බවට පත්වන මාධ්‍ය ආවරණ හමුවේ නීතිය හෑල්ලූවට ලක්වීම නොවැලැක්විය හැකි වන්නේ හුදු දේශපාලන පලිගැනීමක ප‍්‍රථිඵලයක් වශයෙන් තමන්ට උසාවියට ඒමට සිදුවන බව ප‍්‍රසිද්ධියේ කියා පෑමෙන්ය. මින් වක‍්‍රව අදහස් වන්නේ උසාවිය හා එහි විනිසුරුවරුන් හුදු දේශපාලන අතකොලූ පමණක් බවත් රටේ පාලකයින්ගේ උප කොන්ත‍්‍රාත්තුවක් ගත් පිරිසක් බවත්ය. එය නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යයට එල්ල කළ හැකි දරුණුතම පහරක් බව නොතේරෙන අධිකරණය ගැනද මට ඇත්තේ කණගාටුවකි. කරුනු එසේ හෙයින් නීතියේ ස්වාධිපත්‍යය රැුක ගනු වස් ජනසමාජයට ඇති පරම වගකීම එහි කොටස්කරුවන් ලෙස මාධ්‍යයටත්, දේශපාලකයින් වගේම පොලිසියටත් අවසානයේ ගරු වින්සුරුතුමන්ලාටත් ඇති බව අවධාරණය කරමු.
යහපාලනයේ හැව ප‍්‍රසිද්ධියේම හුනාලූ පොලිස්පතිතුමා කෙරෙහි මට ඇත්තේ අනුකම්පාවකි. කනේ වැලි ගෑවෙන තරමටම නීතිය නැමූ ඔහු දැන හෝ නොදැන නීතියේ ස්වාධිපත්‍යයට මරු පහරක් එල්ලකර අවසන්ය. ඒ පසුගිය රාජ්‍ය සමයේ නිලමේ නමින් හදුන්වනු ලැබු තවත් කම්බා සොරෙකු අත්අඩංගුවට ගැනීම වලක්වාලමින්ය. ඔව් සර් හා සර් යන් සර්, රයිට් සර් යන්න අප රාජ්‍ය සේවයේ මූලික යතුරු පදය බවට පත්වූයේ අද ඊයේ නොවේ. එනිසා මෙය යහපාලන රජයේ නිර්මාණයක් ලෙස හුවා දැක්වීම ද අපි අපිටම කරගන්නා ආත්ම වංචාවකි. මේ රටේ සුද්දාගේ දැවැද්දක් වන සිවිල් පරිපාලනයේ භෂ්මාවශේෂ හරහා වැළදගත් දිසාපති, දිස්ත‍්‍රික් ලේකම් හා ප‍්‍රාදේශිය ලේකම් සුදු අලි, නාඩගම් දේශපාලකයින් හමුවේ හූ මිටි තැබීමම ස්වාධිපතෘයේ ඛේදවාචකය ජාතික තලයේ ඉස්මතු කොට තබන හොදම නිදසුනක් බව කිවයුතුමය.

විමල් වීරවංශ හිටපු ඇමතිවරයා මහා ජන ගගක් මැද ජෞෂ්ඨ නියෝජ්‍ය පොලිස්පතිවරයෙකුට තරවටු කළ අන්දම අපි දැක්කෙමු. මර්වින් සිල්වා කැලණියේ පොලිස් ස්ථානාධිපතිවරයාට සැරවටු කළ අන්දම අපි දැක්කෙමු. අපි යුග ගණනාවක් පසු කළෙමු. සාගරයක් මැද චිත‍්‍රපටිය ඒ බැව් මනාව පිලිබිබු කරයි. ජේ.ආර්.ජයවර්ධන හා ඔහුගේ අනුගාමිකයින් රටටම දුන් එක් ආදර්ශයක් වන්නේ නීතිය අතට ගෙන හැසිරීමේ දේශපාලන විද්‍යාවයි. අනතුරුව චන්ද්‍රිකා යුගයද ඒ හා සමාන නොවුවත් කීමට බොහෝ දේ ශේෂ කර අවසන් කළේ චෞර රැුජින පොතට කරුණු සැපයීමෙන්ය. රතුපස්වල මහින්ද යුගයේ ඉතාමත් දුර්දාන්තම ඛේදනීය උදාහරණයයි. හිටපු අගවිනිසුරු ශිරානි බණ්ඩාරනායක මහත්මියට කළ අපරාදය හොදටම ඇතිය. පාර්ලිමේන්තුව උත්තරීතර යැයිද අගවිනිසුරු හා විගණකාධිපති ඇතුළු අන් සියලූ තනතුරු හුදු රජයේ සේවකයින් යැයි හිටපු කතානායක පවා අර්ථ කථන සැපයීය. විමල් වීරවංශ ඇතුලූ මැති ඇමතිවරු කිහිප පලක් තාවකාලික නඩුකාරයින් බවට පත්කළ එම නඩු විභාගය මේ රටේ නීතිය සමච්චලයට පත්කළ කදිම නිදසුනකි. අරලිය ගහ මැදුරේ සිට ශ්‍රේෂ්ඨාධිකරණයට එන දුරකතන ඔස්සේ නීතිය ගණිකාවක තත්තවයට ඇද වැටුණි. හොරු අල්ලන්නට ආ යහපාලන රජයද හොරු සමග හෙලූවෙන් ය. එසේ නම් මේ දෙක දෙකක් නොව එකකි. නැතිනම් එකම කාසියක දෙපැත්තකි. මොවුන්ගෙන් මින් මතුවට බලාපොරොත්තු විය හැකි කිසිවක් නොමැත.

නීතියේ අවභාවිතාවය නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යයට කරන තවත් විදිහේ කම්මුල් පහරකි. මධ්‍යම අධිවේගය හමුවේ විෂය භාර ඇමතිවරයාගේ හැසිරිම ඊට උදාහරණයකි. මධ්‍යම අධිවේගය විශේෂ ව්‍යාපෘතියක් ලෙස ගැසට් කර විතැන්වීමට නියමිත අයවලූන්ට හිමි වන්දි මුදල් ගෙවීමේ ක‍්‍රමෝපාය කණපිට පෙරලා ඇත. ස්වභාවික ව්‍යවසනයකදී ඉඩම් අත්පත් කර ගැනීමට ඇති හදිසි අවශ්‍යතාව කරණ කොටගෙන වන්දි ගෙවීමට පෙර එසේ ඉඩම් අත්පත් කර ගැනීමට විෂය භාර ඇමතිවරයාට නීතිමය වශයෙන් ලැබී ඇති බලතලවලට මුවා වී මෙම මංකොල්ලකෑම ක‍්‍රියාත්මක කර තිබේ. මධ්‍යම අධිවේගය වනාහි සැලසුම් කරන ලද ව්‍යාපෘතියකි. කිහිපවතාවක් සැලසුමද සංශෝධිත ව්‍යාපෘතියකි. වන්දි ගෙවීමට අදාල සියලූ වගන්ති පරයමින් සෘජුවම ඉඩම් අත්පත් කර ගැනීමේදී වන්දි ගෙවීමේ ක‍්‍රමවේදයේ පවතින අඩුලූහුඩුකම් ගැන කථා කිරිමට ජනතාවට ඇති අවකාශය සීමාවනු නොඅනුමානය. නීතියේ අවභාවිතාවක සමාජ බලපෑම මින් පැහැදිලිය.

දැක්ක දුටු තැන වැරදි නිවැරදි කර ගැනීම ඉතා වැදගත්ය. එහෙත් වැරදි කිරිම් හමුවේ මුනිවත රැුකීම තුල තව දුරටත් එම වැරැුද්දම සිදුවිම හරහා කාලයක් යද්දී හරි වැරැුද්ද සොයා ගැනීම අසීරු වෙයි. මන්ද, අවසානයේ එය සමාජයට සම්මුතියක් බවට පත්වන හෙයිනි. තවද නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය මෙන්ම රටේ සමගිය සදහා ජාතිවාදයට හා ආගම්වාදයට උඩ ගෙඩි දෙන සියළු සංවිධාන තහනම් කළයුතු අතර එම පුද්ගලයින්ගේ ක‍්‍රියාකාරකම් පිලිබදව බුද්ධි අංශ නිරන්තර විමසිල්ලෙන් සිටිය යුතුය. ජාතිවාදය හා ආගම්වාදය මතින් බලයට ඒමට කැස කවන බංකොලොත් දේශපාලකයින්ට ජනතාව සියලූ තැන්හි පාඩම් ඉගැන්විය යුතුය. නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය රැුක ගනු වස් රජය විසින් ඇතැම් ඉහල තනතුරු පිරිපහදුවකට ලක්කළ මුත් එය ක‍්‍රියාත්මක තලයට ගෙන ඒමේදි ඇති වී ඇති දෝෂ ම`ග හරවා ගැනීමට නොහැකි වීම ගැන කම්පාවිමු.

නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය රදාපවතින තවත් වැදගත් කාරණයක් වන්නේ සමාජ ප‍්‍රගමණයත් සමග අවශ්‍ය සංශෝධන ඇති කර ලීමයි. සයිබර් අපරාධ හොදම උදාහරණයයි. කූට බුද්ධිය හා තාක්ෂණයට සමගාමීව නීති රාමුවේද සංශෝධන හා ප‍්‍රති සංශෝධන අත්‍යවශ්‍යය. නැත්නම් සහන මිලට නීතිය අමු අමුවේ උල්ලංඝණය කිරිමට අවසර ඉල්ලති. වර්ජන කරති. අපේ රටේ බොහොමයක් නීති යල් පැනගිය ඒවාය. නීතිය පිලිබදව ජනතාවට ඇති අවබෝධය ද ඉතා අඩුය. නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය රැුක ගැනීමට නම් නීතියට බිය සමාජ වටපිටාවක් ඇති කර ගත යුතුය. මන්ද හොද නිතියක් යනු ප‍්‍රායෝගිකව ක‍්‍රියාත්මක කළ හැකි නිතියක් පමණි. නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය රැුක ගනු වස් මාධ්‍යකරුවන්ගේ කාර්යභාරය ද අති මහත්ය. ඒ අතර සියලූ ආකාරයේ අපරාධ දුෂණ වංචා නාස්තිය පිටුපස ඇති කළු චරිත නොවලහා හෙලි කිරිම මෙන්ම නීතිය ඉදිරියට පමුණුවාලීම පමණක් ප‍්‍රමාණවත් නොවේ. උසාවි නියෝග හරහා ඔවුන්ට අත්වන අවසාන ඉරනම ගැනද රපෝර්තු විය යුතුය. දඩුවමක් නැති තැන නීතියට බිය නැතිවා මෙන්ම සමාජයේ පිලිගත් සාරධර්ම පද්ධතිය ද කඩා වැටෙනු ඇත.

ඉහල නිලධාරින්ගේ හැසිරීම හා ඔවුන් විසින් දෙනු ලැබුවාවූූ පූර්වාදර්ශය සෘජුවම පහල නිලධාරින්ට බලපාන අතර මේ වන විට සමස්ථ පොලිසිය මෙන්ම හමුදාවද එහි ප‍්‍රධානීන්ගේ හැසිරීම කරණ කොට ගෙන නීතියේ ආධිපත්‍යය අභියෝගයකට ලක් වෙමින් පවතී. මාධ්‍යය ඉදිරියේ මොවුන්ගේ බයාදුකම හා චණ්ඩිකම පිලිවෙලින් පොලිස්පති සහ නාවුක හමුදාපති ඔප්පු කර ඇත. මොවුන් දෙදෙනාම නීතියේ හා සදාචාරයේ නාමයෙන් ඉල්ලා අස්විය යුතුව ඇත.

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

Editorial Courtesy The Island 

December 16, 2016, 9:50 pm

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and Opposition Leader R. Sampanthan have, with the blessings of President Maithripala Sirisena, sought former President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s support for the government’s constitutional efforts, according to a recent Hindu report.

Why is the government so keen to involve Rajapaksa in its constitution making process? PM Wickremesinghe has provided the answer in an interview with The Hindu: The government is confident of mustering the required numbers in Parliament to ensure the passage of the Constitution to be made, but Rajapaksa’s supporters will be crucial to a favourable vote in a countrywide referendum.

The existing Constitution is seriously flawed and the need for a robust supreme law cannot be overemphasised. But, devolution, or any other single issue, must not be the be-all and end-all of a constitution if it is to have a wider application and be acceptable to all stakeholders. Regrettably, those who have undertaken to write a new constitution are manically focused only on devolution.

Following the conclusion of the war, international pressure was ratcheted up on the Rajapaksa government to set up the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) in keeping with the 13th Amendment to solve the problems of the northern people. Has the NPC been of any help to the people struggling to rebuild their lives? The raison d’être of that provincial administration is to clash with the centre, pass resolutions against the state and demand more and more powers. Shouldn’t the NPC prove that the powers it is already vested with can be used to help improve the people’s lot before asking for more? Regrettably, the conduct of the ruling NPC members, some of whom are also involved in commemorating dead Tigers, bolsters their critics’ view that they are trying to achieve the LTTE’s goal politically by using the 13th Amendment as a launching pad for federalism with a view to achieving autonomy later on.

Let the SLFP, the UNP, the TNA, and the SLMC reveal their constitutional proposals before urging others to do so. If the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe coalition together with its partners in progress such as the TNA, present a set of constitutional proposals acceptable to all stakeholders, then the need for seeking the Rajapaksa’s help to implement the new Constitution won’t simply arise. The Joint Opposition will have to fall in line in such an eventuality. How the 19th Amendment was implemented is a case in point.

The Sirisena-Wickremesinghe administration vilifies the Rajapaksas at every turn as a bunch of thieves who have ruined this country, and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe has, in his interview with The Hindu, written off former President Rajapaksa as a spent force. So, why should the government go behind him seeking his backing for its constitution making project? Doesn’t it think its dependence on Rajapaksa will not be to the liking of its western masters and the Tamil Diaspora?

It boggles one’s mind why the government should go behind the Rajapaksas. It has within its ranks former war winning Army Commander Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, who the UNP says, would have defeated the LTTE with or without the Rajapaksas’ political leadership for the war effort and Minister Champika Ranawaka, an ardent champion of the Sinhala Buddhist cause; it also has the backing of the civil society outfit founded by the late Ven. Maduluwawe Sobitha Thera, whose patriotism was never in question. So, the government headed by President Maithripala Sirisena, who takes pride in having served as the acting Defence Minister at the height of the war, should be able to secure the support of the majority community for the constitution to be made. After all, PM Wickremesinghe has declared in his interview with The Hindu: “We’re all patriots, we’re all nationalists … What we will decide on the nature of the state and other issues will be acceptable to everyone.”

One of the present government’s main election promises was to bring the Rajapaksas to justice for what it called the plunder of public property, abuse of power and various corrupt deals. Therefore, shouldn’t the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe administration do everything in its power to fulfil that pledge instead of trying to enlist the Rajapaksas’ support for its constitution making project?

A. Patabendige Courtesy The Island

December 16, 2016, 9:50 pm

Navy Commander Vice Admiral Ravi Wijayagunaratne and his men manhandling The Island correspondent Roshan Gunasekera at the Hambantota Port. Pic by Dilip N Jayasekera

‘The first duty of a serviceman is to his country, then to his countrymen, and last to himself’

Everyone saw or knows what happened at the Hambantota harbour last week. The Tri Forces in 2009 had been proclaimed the greatest heroes of the country since Independence. The world applauded their brilliance in defeating the LTTE terrorists after 30 years of war and 100,000 deaths. They were probably the only SL organizations that were world class. Sadly however they have recently been under threat, not only by white eyes but also by their own (new) government that has co-sponsored an international resolution to try some of the Army for war crimes. Is there a conspiracy to demean them to achieve goals that are diametrically opposed to what they gave their lives for?

It must be asked among other things, why the Navy Commander, whose retirement is due soon, himself, took over point man duties with his sailors in confrontations with protesting workers at the Hambantota harbour? Would any other Service Commander have done that during an industrial action? Was he expected to or had he been ordered to do so? Did he decide to be on the spot to inspire the sailors and ensure the ‘operation’ went off well by his presence? (If that was the case it was a dramatic failure?). Where was the immediate commander of the deployed troops? Was the Southern Commander present? What was his role in the presence of the Navy Commander as point man? Was there an overlap of command?

Was the Navy Commander ordered to be physically present? If so, by whom and why? Did the existence of the International Ship and Port Security Facility Code, a post 9/11 development, that has been freely quoted, require it? The SLN is the competent authority to act if needed in terms of that Code. In India and the USA it is the Coast Guard. In others it could be the Harbour Police. On board a ship it could be one of many in charge, like a Chief Security Officer.

Could the SLN been confused by the PM who last year in a rush of blood, quoting irrelevant law, stated that he would order the Navy to shoot Indian fishermen who cross the maritime border? Was the Navy overwhelmed when the PM said the SLN would take its place with the USN (that has a distasteful long history to make ‘America great’ by meddling with non-white countries) to secure the Pacific and Indian Ocean sea routes, even while China and Pakistan, our staunchest friends, were being side lined to say the least? The follow up visits by so many high profile visits by USN ships, including an Aircraft carrier and even a USN Maritime Reconnaissance plane and the elite US Marines, not to forget the INS ships must have rocked their minds. The Indian Navy collaborated. SL remembers that not so longer ago the latter dropped anchor opposite the Presidential Secretariat Office in Colombo (1987) in a ‘show the flag support’ of the criminal invasion of the IPKF and to give warning to any SL citizen who opposed the ‘Agreement’. This did not prevent a SL sailor from trying to hit the unlucky Indian PM Rajiv Gandhi’s head for a six when the latter was inspecting a guard of honour.

The SLN has suddenly been portrayed as a national bully. Who is to blame? Most of the country wants the Navy Commander taken to task. He was, however been loyally defended by the popular State Minister of Defence. The latter went overboard and declared that what was happening was piracy. He elaborated that by doing so the strikers were no longer civilians but pirates. He added that the Navy was entitled to shoot at them. (Shooting unarmed people do not bring credit to any organization or individual). He over looked a vital fact, that piracy is defined as an act of robbery committed by pirates on the high seas. By some quirk of imagination he may have believed the harbour was in the high seas and unarmed strikers and journalists had become pirates. The PM as usual did not commit himself.

Media Secretary Kalanasuriya, not to be overdone, took over. But becoming progressively hysterical, he waxed eloquent that ‘journalists should maintain ethics’ for the sake of mutual ‘security’. He warned that otherwise journalists risked being ’assaulted or killed’. It would appear that he then unintentionally contradicted what he had already stated, when he condemned the action of the Navy Commander saying ‘no one has an authority to assault others…’ What about ‘killing’? He is apparently merrily conducting an inquiry into the affair by questioning four other ‘journalists’ who had all unsurprisingly said that the journalist who was assaulted had breached a naval perimeter defence line. It boggles one’s imagination to believe that rural journalists can breach perimeter defence lines manned by SLN sailors, who not so longer ago demolished the feared Sea Tigers. His faulting the Navy Commander, however, was bereft of any inquiry and a contradiction.

Did all these ideas confuse the Navy Commander as to the role of the Navy and himself that day? It certainly could have influenced him. Politicians are also fond of getting the Forces to pull their chestnuts out of the fire. Some made it an art for 26 years of the 30 year conflict. When it goes wrong, it is the servicemen who are left holding the baby with no known parents.

The Commander of the Navy should never have appeared at the head of his sailors in an industrial dispute, even more so incognito in shorts and T shirt. (This has been defended as the dress of a harbor pilot)! He should not have at any point taken on a journalist (half his size) physically and opened himself to charge of causing simple hurt and acting like a bully. Was he, after a lifelong admirable service in a gallant Navy that inspired the Nation, exposed by some congenital weakness of character that made him go berserk and seek to impress not his subordinates but his cunning political masters? What a terrible descent.

It is hoped that this incident will discourage others who may have been swayed by unprofessional ideas. Will the politicians, true to form, leave him to sink or will they offer him an almost expired life jacket? We live in trepidation.

Was this an act of Royally misguided loyalty to the ‘Hearts of Oak’ traditions? Oak trees do not grow in SL so why does the SL Navy march to that tune and old boys of a certain school sing of it? Hambantota should not have been the Navy Commander’s Peterloo. Will it be a defining act of the age?

By Dr Upul Wijayawardhana Courtesy The Island

December 16, 2016, 9:53 pm
Serving the political masters of Yahapalanaya, which has rapidly degenerated at an alarming pace to a Yama-Palanaya, seem to be the only consideration for some public servants holding high office. I do not wish to be disrespectful, in any way, to honourable public servants like Gamini Wijesinghe, the Auditor General,whose firm stand against political pressure led to the exposure of the ‘day-light’ robbery in the Central Bank, which the UNP, unashamedly, tried to cover up. But, unfortunately, he is among the minority.

Our politicians, in turn, seem to be serving foreign masters, as is patently obvious from the way our foreign policy is executed. We seem to be venerating ‘Uncle Sam’ at every juncture encouraging megalomaniacs in the Obama administration to behave in the most ludicrous manner. Samantha Power, Obama’s representative to the United Nations, according to many respected commentators behaved like a school bully when she did her “shame” bit in the Security Council: “Is there no act of barbarism against civilians, no execution of a child that gets under your skin, that just creeps you out a little bit?” When she asked the Russians, Syrians and Iranians this question she had temporary amnesia about the atrocities committed in the name of USA, in Iraq, Libya and Palestine. At least she speaks for her country but our Foreign Minister seems to have forgotten what his role is.

Dr Mathias Keitel, from Germany, starts an interesting piece in the Asian Tribune titled “Foreign Minister Samaraweera Must Go” with the comment “My recent visit to Sri Lanka, the country that I love most, fills me with dark foreboding as its vital interests are being systematically compromised by its buccaneering Foreign Minister.” He gives a detailed analysis of the Geneva resolution and points out the uniqueness (foolishness) of Sri Lanka to agree to co-sponsor the resolution against us and comments: “The Foreign Minister has not learned the fundamental rule of being the chief representative of the country overseas. I.e. to represent the country’s best interests with fortitude, dignity and quiet pride.” Few would disagree with his concluding remarks:

“It is also be difficult not to draw the conclusion that the UNHRC resolution was not really an attempt to consolidate human rights and restore good governance but a thinly disguised endeavour to destroy the iconic super hero status, especially of the victorious Sri Lankan soldier, and reduce it to the level of a common criminal. The Foreign Minister’s solicitous and breathless anxiety to comply with the demands of the West and the Tamil expatriate groups may well have contributed to realizing this goal.

When the country needs volunteers the next time, they may not be there!”

When Ministers behave like this, it is not surprising that senior Public Servants follow suit, there being many examples of it lately. The Inspector General of Police, who attributed his promotion to the ‘Poojas’ he conducted at Gangaramaya, was caught on camera giving undertakings to a politician to defend a corrupt ‘Nilame’. Navy Commander joins the fray by attacking a journalist and the Director General of Information jumps to defend this action and blames the journalist! What a comic circus!!

The Island (15 December} reports that Minister Sarath Fonseka (Yes, he is a minister and a member of the UNP, the very party, which not so long ago stated in the Parliament that he is involved in the killing of a famous journalist) defended the action of the Navy Commander saying that “He only pushed the journalist”. Dear Minister, perhaps, you are unaware that pushing or manhandling someone is termed ‘assault’, legally. Why, oh why did you not retire with flying colours and be eternally remembered as a war hero, joining the ranks of joker politicians instead?

In the superb editorial titled ‘A Yahapalana snafu’ (The Island, December 15) there were two paragraphs that got me thinking:

“Director General of Government Information Ranga Kalansooriya has sought to apportion the blame for Saturday’s incident to the journalist manhandled by the Navy. He says the victim violated media ethics by entering a restricted area, provoking the attack. His argument makes one wonder whether Bovine King Kekille actually lived here and his descendants have got into high posts under the present government. For, no one with an iota of common sense will demand that journalists obey the dictates of military and police officers.

The yahapalana Goebbels who have secured high posts thanks to their boot-licking skills mastered while they were members of the kept press are apparently trying to promote embedded journalism in peacetime as well. Journalists have to gain access to even restricted areas, at times, in the line of duty as is common knowledge. No one has a right to assault or kill such enterprising scribes for doing that.”

Director of Information was a post held by a senior Civil Servant in the past. I am sure Dr Kalansooriya is well qualified as he must be holding a Ph D. What has made somebody like him to be a mouth piece for the government than an independent public servant? It goes back to JR. As I have stated many a time, I have great respects for the President J. R. Jayewardene. No one can deny he turned Sri Lanka towards a path of prosperity from the quagmire of the economic mess Mrs. B got us into thanks to the ill-advised ‘socialist’ policies. But JR brought about fundamental changes that tore our national fabric even before he introduced the ‘Presidential Constitution’

The Ceylon Civil Service was mighty once. The cream of the University output was diverted, at a very early stage following a highly competitive examination,to the Civil Service; to be trained to be the backbone of the administrative structure, culminating in being Permanent Secretaries. I know a lot about this because my father wanted me to be one but am sure he was not disappointed at what I turned out to be! The Permanent Secretaries were powerful enough to stop wrongdoings of Ministers. They could advice Ministers in formulating policy. Perhaps, JR felt threatened and when he was made the Minister of State in the Dudley Senanayaka Government of 1965, he broke tradition and appointed Anadatissa de Alwis as Secretary to the Ministry. Perhaps, this was a calculated move to launch the Tourism Industry. I remember the protests then which would have been even more vigorous had it not been Anandatissa, who was an amicable, efficient, honest communicator, a rarity in the private sector, who turned out to be an outstanding politician later. However, that does not justify the series of catastrophic events that followed.

Gradually, Permanent Secretaries became Secretaries and Ministers became permanent! In no time Secretaries became political henchmen and boot-licking, as stated in the Editorial, turned out to be an art form. Ceylon Civil Service was enlarged to engulf the entire administrative service which some may claim is an end to elitism but, in my humble opinion, was the beginning of erosion of good governance. Politicians ruled supreme and everything needed a ‘chit’ from them. In contrast, India kept on its’ Civil Service’ and it is this administrative backbone that kept India going even when urine-drinkers held helm!

When J R won with a landslide in 1977, my wife’s uncle, S De S Jayasinghe, a strict vegetarian, was appointed the Minister of Fisheries and his Secretary, chosen by JR, was a former DRO. Following the untimely death of S De S, his daughter Sunethra was elected and was later made the Minister of Teaching Hospitals. Her Secretary, hand-picked by JR, was a doctor who taught Anatomy to nurses in New Zealand. He had no administrative experience and was far removed from hospital medicine but was appointed Secretary, may be because his father was once the Treasurer of the UNP. This is what I know from first-hand experience and am sure there were many more. The rot started and we have been on a downward slope since. Though, in a way, I have some sympathy for public servants as they are forced to boot-lick to protect their positions, unless public servants, in droves, join the likes of the Auditor General, there is no hope.

My heart bleeds for you, Mother Lanka!

by Maheesha Mudugamuwa Courtesy The Island

The Joint Opposition (JO) yesterday slammed the government for handing over a majority of shares of the Hambantota port to a Chinese company and its decision to lease out 15,000 acres in Hambantota to another Chinese company to set up a trade zone without following the proper tender procedure.

Former Cabinet Minister Dullas Alahapperuma told the media at the N. M Perera Centre in Borella that the value of the Hambantota Port and the land to be leased out was far in excess of the government valuation.

The government valuation of the port was only USD 1.1 billion, but its actual value was more than USD 2.5 billion, he stressed.

The government had not followed proper tender procedure as regards other projects as well and they included highways, Alahapperuma said.

Meanwhile, former Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, UPFA MP, asked the government whether it was going to use the full amount of the money received from the Chinese company to settle the loans drawn by the previous government for the construction of the Hambantota Port.

“Now, the government says it is not selling the Hambantota port but giving it on a 99-year lease. That means the port will be controlled by China till 2116,” he said, adding that now it was crystal clear who was trying to turn Sri Lanka into Chinese colony.

By C. A. Chandraprema Courtesy The Island

December 16, 2016, 9:46 pm
The Victory of Donald Trump or ‘Thurumpuwage Vickramaya’ is an astrological treatise written by Lake House journalist K. C. J. Ratnayake, who began his foray into astrology through his association with astrologers providing articles on astrology to Lake House newspapers; he ended up becoming an avid student of astrology himself. An avowed fan of western astrology as against Vedic astrology, Ratnayake posits Saturn and Uranus as the two planets most responsible for political upheavals and makes ominous predictions in this regard for 2017. On Jan. 26, 2017 Saturn will move out of the Vrschika rasi, which it entered in November 2014. Just a couple of months later will come an even more powerful planetary transit – that of Uranus completing its 84 year transit around the sun.

Saturn entering the Vrischika rasi is a 30-year-cycle which up to now has unfailingly acted true to form. The last time this planetary constellation was seen was after the mid 1980s and we know where things ended up with the Indo-Lanka Accord and the JVP insurrection and all that. The aftershocks of this earth shattering planetary transit continues for a few years afterwards and, in fact, the denouement of the transit comes only in the period following which includes the sweeping away of those in power. Before the 1980s Saturn entered Vrischika rasi in the mid to late 1950s and brought S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike into power resulting in all the mayhem and confusion of the 1956 and 1958 ethnic riots; it finally ended with Bandaranaike getting assassinated. In the aftermath of this planetary transit, the entire edifice built by Bandaranaike was shattered.

W. Dahanayake’s interim government fell amidst internal bickering, virtually all of Bandaranaike’s closest confidantes who spearheaded the 1956 electoral revolution fell by the wayside and those who finally took over the control of the SLFP were people like Sirima Bandaranaike and Felix Dias Banadaranaike and Mrs B’s brothers who had not been in the vanguard earlier. The mayhem in the 1980s was followed by the death of Rohana Wijeweera, and the assassination of President Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1993 and a complete change of power in both the UNP and the country. This was the planetary transit relied on by all the astrologers who predicted Mahinda Rajapaksa’s defeat at the 2015 January presidential elections. This planetary transit always portends change and mayhem.

The well known astrologer P. D. Perera of Nattandiya, who predicted Mahinda Rajapaksa’s defeat said in a TV appearance ‘minissu grahayo wehila gihilla chandaya danne’ i. e. the planets make the people vote in a certain way. Since that change of government, we have never had stability or peace. What is remarkable is that the UNP, which is in power today, was in power in 2001 as well. But, back then, it was the UNP that doused the flames that had been ignited by Chandrika Kumaratunga by not launching reprisals for the seven years of political terror that CBK had presided over. It was the UNP that started the 15 years of political peace that this country experienced till early 2015. Today, the UNP victimises their political opponents in a manner that would make even CBK flinch and that in a situation where the previous government had never persecuted or harassed the UNP the way CBK did. Furthermore back in 2001, this same UNP was cautious to a fault with the economy. It was they who started nursing the economy back to normalcy after the CBK years.

Today, the IMF says about the UNP’s economic management that the debt to GDP ratio was 70% when the Rajapaksas left at the end of 2014 and that it had gone up to 80% by the end of 2015 in just one year and they have put this government on a programme to bring the debt to GDP ratio back to 70% by 2021. So, all these taxes and exactions are all meant just to bring us back to where the Rajapaksas left us! That is the kind of effect that Saturn has. It is under the influence of Saturn that the UNP also thinks of imposing Rs. 25,000 traffic fines and brings upon itself work stoppages for no reason. All the astrologers who predicted Mahinda Rajapaksa’s defeat now explain what happens next in the gloomiest terms. Vijitha Rohana Vijayamuni, who was the first to predict that MR would lose, says that President Sirisena will have an extremely bad period after 26 January 2017. Visually impaired astrologer Indika Totawatte has predicted that Sarath Fonseka will not even be in the country after that date.

K. C. J. Ratnayake also predicts sweeping changes and a crumbling of the existing power edifice after 26 January 2017 as is the wont in Saturn’s 30 year cycle. Unlike the other astrologers however Ratnayake, who is a student of Western astrology, has also brought the 84 year Uranus cycle into the picture, which makes the political changes of 2017 all the more momentous. The completion of Uranus’ transit around the sun takes place on 9 April 2017. Uranus is the great upender of the existing order on a global scale. The last time Uranus completed its cycle the stage was set to the second world war which completely changed the world. On the occasion before that, the Uranus transit brought the Crimean War, the Opium War in China, the Taiping rebellion, the great Mutiny in India, the Kandyan rebellion of 1948, the Italian War of independence and many such epoch-making events.

In the Uransus transit, which preceded that came the French Revolution and the American War of Independence. The American civil war fell into a Saturn in Vrishchika rasi cycle. (Abraham Lincoln was assassinated at the end of it.) It is only the World War I that did not come within either a Saturn transit or a Uranus transit. Now, in 2017, we have a Saturn transit and a Uranus transit coming within weeks of one another, which means that serious upheavals and change are in the air. Ratnayake says that the victory of Donald Trump in the USA and Brexit in the UK were influenced by the impending Uranus transit because it heralds a complete change in the way the world works and thinks. The inexplicable difference in the behaviour of the UNP between 2001 and now should convince us that some things cannot be explained in the usual terms that we are accustomed to.

ලංකා සී නිවුස්

එළැඹෙන ජනවාරි 08 වැනිදායින් පසු දේශපාලන පෙරළියක් සිදුවන බවත් ඊට සූදානමින් සිටින ලෙසත් ජනාධිපති මෛත‍්‍රිපාල සිරිසේන මහතා විසින් ආණ්ඩුවේ ශ‍්‍රීලනිප මැති ඇමති පිරිසක් සමග පවසා ඇත.

එහෙත් සිදුවන්නේ කුමන දේශපාලන වෙනසක්දැයි ජනාධිපතිවරයා කිසිදු සදහනක් පල කර නැති අතර තමන් මේ දිනවල ඒ පිලිබදව තව දරටත් කල්පනා කරමින් සිටින බව පමණක් සදහන් කර ඇත.

මෙම පෙරලිය සිදු වන තෙක් ශ‍්‍රීලනිපයේ බල මණ්ඩල කැදවීමක් හෝ කිසිදු නිල දේශපාලන කටයුත්තක් සිදු නොකරන ලෙසද ඔහු දන්වා ඇත.

ජනාධිපතවරයාගේ මෙම ප‍්‍රකාශය හේතුවෙන් මෙරට පිහිටි බටහිර තානාපති කාර්යාල දැඩි කලබලයකට පත්ව සිය ඔත්තු සේවා තවත් තීව‍්‍ර කර ඇතැයිද වාර්තා වෙයි.

ලංකා සී නිවුස්

රණසිංහ ප්‍රේමදාස මහතා 1993 දක්වා රටේ ජනාධිපතිවරයා වී සිටියද ඔහු දේශපාලනයට පැමිණිමට පෙර රැකියාව ලෙස කලේ පදික වේදිකාවේ ලැවරිය විකිණීම වුවත් ඔහුගේ පුත් සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාසට අද වන විට පියාගේ මිය යෑමේන් පසු කෝටි ගන්නක දේපල මෙන්ම මුදල් ලැබුනේ කෙසේදැයි සැක සහිත බව අල්ලස් හා දූෂණ විමර්ශන කොමිෂමට පැමිණිල්ලක් ඉදිරිපත් කිරීමට නියමිත බව සඳහන් වෙයි.

පසුගිය මැතිවරණය දක්වා දිවයිනේ සෑම ප්‍රදේශයකම ඇමති සජිත් ප්‍රේමදාස විසින් අත දිග හැර විශාල වශයෙන් මුදල් පරිත්‍යාග කල බවට තොරතුරු එම පෙත්සමට ඇතුලත් කර ඇතැයිද සදහන්ය.

මූලාශ‍්‍රය මෙතනින් Full report

A.Abdul Aziz

Dear Pakistan,

Ahmadis in your country lots of love for you. You raised their parents, taught them what it meant to work hard and provided them with shelter. You didn’t however, provide them with religious freedom. And that’s why many left.

The Ahmadi story of persecution in your country has a rich history. In 1974 you introduced the second amendment in the Pakistani Constitution and declared Ahmadis as non-Muslims, denying their basic and fundamental rights as human beings.

In 1984, your President and dictator Zia-ul-Haq added Ordinance XX to the Constitution, making it a crime for Ahmadis to profess their faith. Since then, Ahmadis have been subject to state-sponsored hate, violence and gruesome persecution.

This persecution has affected millions of Ahmadis throughout the world and continues to cause them great pain, grief and sorrow. Even then, I’d like to fall in love with Pakistan as a nation in the region, but something holds me back. It seems to be fear of continuing to lose those that I love most as a child born from a single mother.

And so, I have to ask, O Pakistan, when will you stop?

To name a few: on May 28, 2010, you killed our beloved 94 Ahmadis for their faith.

On May 4, 2014, you killed Dr. Mehdi Ali Qamar, who visited Pakistan to selflessly serve the less fortunate as a practitioner. What crime did he commit by going back to his country to help the less fortunate?

On June 21, 2016, you killed a homeopathic doctor in your country, serving your people.

O Pakistan, when will you stop?

The unfortunate fact of the matter is that this persecution has not only resulted in brutal and unjust behavior towards Ahmadis, but has resulted to affect in your limited growth as a country.

You failed to recognize a Pakistani jurist and diplomat who served as 1st Foreign Minister of Pakistan and was the first Muslim, Asian and the only Pakistani to preside over the UN General Assembly and the International Court of Justice – Sir Zafarullah Khan. He was an Ahmadi, but he was also a Pakistani. He was a source of motivation for youth aspiring to make a positive change in our world today, but you tried to suppress his achievement.

You failed to recognize the first Muslim Nobel Laureate that your country produced, Dr. Abdus Salam. He was ignored for 30 years while you questioned your baseless morals and had no answer to: Can we recognize an Ahmadi Pakistani Nobel Laureate?”

Finally, 37 years later your Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif approved a plan to rename the Quaid-e-Azam University’s Physics Department to the Dr. Abdus Salam Centre for Physics, even this victory was bittersweet. While you now recognize Dr. Abdus Salam as a scientist, when will you recognize him as a Muslim? On the same day of this achievement, the Headquarters of the Ahmadiyya Community were attacked in Rabwah, Pakistan.

On December 5, 2016, police authorities forcefully broke into the headquarters of the Ahmadiyya community without any warrants or justification. The contingent of roughly 28 armed and masked unidentified police officers then assaulted the Ahmadi employees. Two Ahmadi Imams and an administrative staffer from the publisher’s office were arrested and taken into custody without charges. 

The irony of this attack was that it was done under the guise of terrorism charges, when Ahmadis are known throughout the world as the most peaceful and law abiding citizens. Had Ahmadis even remotely endorsed terrorism, at the very least they would’ve fought back against the police. But they didn’t.

 And again, on December 12 you crossed the line. Thousands of your citizens attacked our ‘place of worship’ in Chakwal, Pakistan ironically claiming to be lovers of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Was this what the Prophet of Islam (PBUH) taught? 

And yet again, it is Ahmadis in Pakistan who will respond with patience and steadfastness. They are responding with love, not hate. For our community to progress and become the predominant voice of Islam in the world, Ahmadis, not only in Pakistan but Ahmadis in world-wide will make all sorts of sacrifices, and they’re ready.

In the wise words of Hazrat Mirza Tahir Ahmad – The Fourth Successor of the Ahmadiyya Community, Swords can win territories, but not hearts. Force can bend heads, but not minds.” 

Your persecution has backfired. Ahmadis may be hated by the Government in Pakistan, but they are loved across the world.

LOVE FOR ALL: HATRED FOR NONE.

පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත‍්‍රීනී හිරුණිකා පේ‍්‍රමචන්ද්‍රට වාෂණ කෝෂ සම්බන්ධයෙන් හසල දැනුමක් ඇති බවට අභියෝග නොකරන්නට තමන් ආසා ඇති කතන්දර අනුව තීරණය කල බව ජාතික නිදහස් පෙරමුණු මාධ්‍ය ප‍්‍රකාශක හිටපු පාර්ලිමේන්තු මන්ත‍්‍රී මොහොමඞ් මුසම්මිල් මහතා එම පක්‍ෂ මූලස්ථානයේදී පැවති මාධ්‍ය හමුවකදී කියා සිටියේය.

රංජිත් විතානගේ සභාපති පාරිභෝගික අයිතීන් සුරැකීමේ ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරය

අගමැතිවරයා විසින් දිගින් දිගටම මාධ්‍ය යවෙත කරනු ලබන බලපෑම් හමුවේ රාජ්‍ය නිළධාරීන් ඒ මග ඔස්සේ ගමන් කරන ආකාරයක් දැකගත හැකි යයි පාරිභෝගික අයිතීන් සුරැකීමේ ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරය පවසයි.

මේ බව සදහන් කරමින් එම සංවිධානය විසින් නිකුත් කරනු ලැබූ මාධ්‍ය නිවේදනය මෙසේය.

පාර්ලිමේන්තුව ජනතා ගැටළු  පිළිබදව කථා කරන තැනක් බවට පත්කර මාධ්‍යවේදීන්ගේ නිදහස තහවුරු  කරන්න

ජනතා ඡන්දයෙන් පාර්ලිමේන්තුවට ගොස් විශාල වරපසාද ලබා ජනතා ගැටළු පිළිබදව කතා නොකර හුදු පුද්ගලික මතවාද වෙනුවෙනු පමණක් පෙනී සිටින ජනතා නියෝජිතයින්ට අපගේ විරෝධය ප්‍රකාශ කරන්නෙමු. උත්තරීතර පාර්ලිමේන්තුව   තුළ මෙරට ජනතාව මුහුණදෙන ගැටළු පිළිබදව කතා කිරීමට ජනතා නියෝජිතයින්ට වගකීමක් ඇත. එසේම මෙරට මාධ්‍ය භාවිතය මගින් ජනතාව තමන්ගේ තොරතුරු දැන ගැනීමේ අයිතිය තහවුරු කරන අතර රජය මාධ්‍යවේදීන්ට  ‍ වාචිකව හා අතින් පයින් පහරදීමෙන්  පෙන්නුම් කරන්නේ  ජනතාවගේ තොරතුරු දැන ගැනීමේ අයිතියට රජය ගරු නොකරන බව පමණක් නොව රජයේ මුග්ධ භාවයයි. තවද අගමැතිවරයා දිගින් දිගටම මාධ්‍යවෙත කරනු ලබන බලපෑම් හමුවේ රාජ්‍ය නිළධාරීන් ඒමග ඔස්සේ ගමන් කරන ආකාරයක් දැකගත හැක.

පාර්ලිමේන්තුව තුළ වෘෂණ කෝෂ ගැන පමණක් කථා කරන මන්ද මානසික ජනතා නියෝජිතයින් ජනතා අයිතීන් වෙනුවෙන් පෙනී නොසිටීම කණගාටුදායක වන අතර මෙරට ජනතාව මුහුණදෙන ආර්ථික හා සමාජයීය ගැටළු පිළිබදව ජනතා නියෝජිතයින් මීට වඩා සංවේදී  වියයුතුය.

ජනතාවට තොරතරු ලබාදෙන මාධ්‍යවේදීන්ට නිදහසේ තම කටයුතු කරගෙන යාමට අවශ්‍ය පරිසරයක් නිර්මාණය කරන ලෙස අප රජයෙන් ඉල්ලා සිටින අතර මාධ්‍යවේදීන්ට කෲර ලෙස සළකන රජයේ නිළධාරීන්ට තරාතිරම නොබලා දඩුවම් කරන ලෙසද අප රජයෙන් ඉල්ලා සිටිමු.

රංජිත් විතානගේ
සභාපති
පාරිභෝගික අයිතීන් සුරැකීමේ ජාතික ව්‍යාපාරය

Courtesy The Daily Mirror

– See more at: http://www.dailymirror.lk/article/Was-the-Navy-called-in-to-tarnish-its-image-MR-120782.html#sthash.wwlZa73H.dpuf