{"id":66224,"date":"2017-05-17T16:06:40","date_gmt":"2017-05-17T23:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=66224"},"modified":"2017-05-17T16:06:40","modified_gmt":"2017-05-17T23:06:40","slug":"screening-of-tamil-stories-at-roxy-cinema-miramar-friday-19th-of-may","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2017\/05\/17\/screening-of-tamil-stories-at-roxy-cinema-miramar-friday-19th-of-may\/","title":{"rendered":"Screening of “Tamil Stories” At Roxy Cinema Miramar Friday 19th of May"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr. Chula Rajapakse MNZM\u00a0Spokesperson,United Sri Lanka Assn.<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

TO:Dan Shanon
\nDoc Edge.<\/p>\n

Dear Dan,<\/p>\n

Captions From Internet \u00a0Trailer<\/strong> For Documentary To Be Screened at The Roxy Cinema Miramar, Friday 20th May<\/p>\n

Film documenting the controversial treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka\u00a0\u2026.. refugee, asylum seekers in New Zealand \u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2026.. Sri Lankan civil war and the continuing abuses against Tamil people. Loved ones disappearing bombs exploding,intimidation and kidnapping are common experiences\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

I write to convey the shock , horror and consternation of much of the Sri Lankan community, especially the Sinhalese in Wellington, at the totally distorted impression given by the above trailer caption, of the ..continuing .. common experiences\u201d \u00a0, in Sri Lanka, today.<\/p>\n

Nothing is further from the truth \u00a0than to say \u00a0that continuing\u201d \u00a0abuses against Tamil people , loved ones disappearing , bombs exploding , intimidation and kidnapping are common experiences \u00a0in Sri Lanka, \u00a0even today as implied by the use of the word continuing\u201d. What is also implied is that the blame for this lies at the feet of the Sri Lankan state , and so it\u2019s people, the majority of whom are Sinhalese like many of us . What is cleverly concealed is that when these abuses did \u00a0happen for three decades \u00a0, before the end of the \u00a0Sri Lankan civil war on the 19th of May \u00a02009, the perpetrators of these crimes were the “Tamil Tiger Terrorists\u201d. It is very likely that it is the Tiger Terrorist \u00a0international diaspora with their billion dollar war chest who are now the funders of \u00a0this caption and film. Cunningly they are turning it around to blame their bloody\u201d \u00a0crimes on the Sri Lankan state as they have done , is very much a hall \u00a0mark of \u00a0Tamil Tiger Distortion.<\/p>\n

Kidnapping \u00a0and conscripting \u00a0children even as young as \u00a0seven years, exploding bombs to cause maximum carnage, introducing suicide bombings to the world to have maximum carnage,kidnapping and intimidating tamil youths to forcefully join the Tigers, \u00a0referred to in the caption above, \u00a0are very much the way Tamil Tigers\u201d were formed and acted. The reality is that since the Tiger\u2019s were silenced on 19\/5\/2009 , not a single terrorist bomb has been detonated in Sri Lanka, unlike all of it\u2019s neighbours. Today, more than sixty percent of Sri Lanka\u2019s Tamil population live in and around Colombo among the Sinhalese and other communities in Sri Lanka. Would they do so if the \u00a0alleged Tamil abuses referred to in your caption above was true.<\/p>\n

If this caption is anything to go by, this film, like many similar documentaries\u201d before \u00a0this \u00a0would be fifteen minutes of clever distortion misleading the unsuspecting viewer regarding the realities of Sri Lanka, to discredit it and to build the case for more refugees & asylum seekers\u201d from Sri Lanka . These more than likely would be queue \u00a0jumping \u00a0economic migrants seeking a better life in the west, \u00a0who have paid large sums of money to people smugglers with connections to the Tiger Diaspora. Sadly, local political groups who see them as fattening their voting block would also lend a helping hand to this distortion.<\/p>\n

The extent of distortion refugees\u201d seeking asylum would go to was shown recently in the UK, where the courts rejected an asylum application supported by physical evidence of torture ,with multiple burn marks in the most private of parts \u00a0and \u00a0marks \u00a0of \u00a0multiple lashings \u00a0on the back, claimed to have been inflicted by security forces back in Sri Lanka. It was later established that all of these marks of torture could be acquired in the UK, by having them inflicted under anaesthesia on the payment of a fee. There have been more than one such case going through and being thrown out by the UK courts<\/p>\n

Dear Dan, many of us came to New Zealand , fleeing Tiger Terror in Sri Lanka, for a quiet and peaceful life in New Zealand living as law abiding citizen contributing to it\u2019s economy and other facets of NZ life . We did not come hear to face barbs brickbats \u00a0like this especially \u00a0when we least expect them. Do not permit unsuspecting Doc Edge to be used to throw these at us. Do not permit Doc Edge to be used to help subvert the law of the land in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Dan, might I also add that by design or otherwise, the screening of this film on the 19th of May , is on the eighth anniversary of the liberation of Sri Lanka from three decades of Tiger Terror and and precisely at the time when we in Wellington would be meeting to remember and record our respectful gratitude to those who sacrificed life and limb to achieve this for all of us Sinhalese, Tamil and all. We do this \u00a0just as New Zealanders remember the ANZAC\u2019s annually for they sacrifices. The timing of this screening \u00a0to us is more than a coincidence.<\/p>\n

Sadly and very significantly \u00a0films such as these only serve to be offensive, provocative & \u00a0to re-open healing wounds and undermine the delicate reconciliation process ongoing now, between the Sinhalese and Tamil peoples , all over the world.<\/p>\n

You would help this \u00a0reconciliation immensely, if you were able to suspend the planned \u00a0screening on the 19th.<\/p>\n

Thank You.<\/p>\n

Yours Sincerely,,<\/p>\n

Dr. Chula Rajapakse MNZM<\/p>\n

Spokesperson,<\/p>\n

United Sri Lanka Assn.<\/p>\n

141 Knights Rd.,<\/p>\n

Lower Hutt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr. Chula Rajapakse MNZM\u00a0Spokesperson,United Sri Lanka Assn. TO:Dan Shanon Doc Edge. Dear Dan, Captions From Internet \u00a0Trailer For Documentary To Be Screened at The Roxy Cinema Miramar, Friday 20th May Film documenting the controversial treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka\u00a0\u2026.. refugee, asylum seekers in New Zealand \u201d \u2026.. Sri Lankan civil war and the continuing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66224\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}