{"id":74310,"date":"2018-02-03T10:30:09","date_gmt":"2018-02-03T16:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=74310"},"modified":"2018-02-03T03:22:37","modified_gmt":"2018-02-03T10:22:37","slug":"myopic-sirisena-dents-sri-lankas-friendship-with-russia-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2018\/02\/03\/myopic-sirisena-dents-sri-lankas-friendship-with-russia-part-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"Myopic Sirisena dents Sri Lanka\u2019s friendship with Russia \u2013 Part II"},"content":{"rendered":"

by: A.A.M.NIZAM \u2013 MATARA<\/em><\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

Focussing the attention on another direction the LEN website stated that it is a pity Sirisena who gleefully and proudly said \u2018 I am the one who was invited to Russia after 44 years and\u00a0 Putin is my friend \u2019 did not have any sense of diplomacy despite being a president of the country. It said that Sirisena who knows only to brag does\u00a0not know how to resolve matters diplomatically or give\u00a0 \u00a0diplomatic answers. The website disclosed that Sirisena \u2018s much vaunted invitation to Russia after 44 years was not an invitation extended to Sirisena by Russia, but rather an invitation extracted via inducements.\u00a0 \u00a0 It said when Sirisena was earlier invited to the G 8 conference he had occasion to meet\u00a0 the Russian president most briefly and Sirisena\u2019s translator told Putin\u00a0that our president likes to see your country as he has not seen Russia\u2019 and Putin \u2018s reply was \u2018 then pay a visit .\u2018\u00a0 After casually saying that Putin left the venue and that was a very brief meeting lasting just a few seconds. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The website said that Sirisena upon returning to <\/strong>Sri Lanka began writing letters after letters to the Russian foreign ministry saying that their president at the G8 conference extended an invitation for him to visit to Russia and several such letters were sent begging\u00a0 to make official arrangements towards the visit.\u00a0 It is only thereafter, unable to endure the pestilence that the invitation from Russia was sent .So that is how the so-called invitation after 44 years was solicited.<\/strong> Sadly, this close\u00a0 friendship flaunted by Sirisena however was\u00a0 reciprocated in a most weird way\u00a0 by president Sirisena\u2019s so called bosom pal Putin\u00a0 – he imposed\u00a0 a ban on Sri Lanka\u2018s tea and plantation product exports.\u00a0 Though this\u00a0reaction did not match the obnoxious\u00a0action taken by\u00a0 Sri Lanka in exactitude, by July 2017 itself there were signals that Russia is going to retaliate.\u00a0 It is the present minister of foreign affairs for Russia Surgey Lavrov, who speaks Sinhala fluently and\u00a0who considers Sri Lanka as his second homeland who\u00a0 has revealed\u00a0 what was in store.\u00a0 \u00a0Even Sirisena\u2019s maturity had been ignored.<\/p>\n

The website said that in November, four Inspection centers were established at\u00a0 \u00a0Russia\u2019s four Customs departments of the State to obtain quarantine certificates pertaining to imports of agricultural products.\u00a0 However Sirisena\u2019s present\u00a0ambassador in Russia,\u00a0 Saman an acolyte of Mangala had been unconcerned and had been blind\u00a0 to this\u00a0 development.<\/strong><\/p>\n

While there was no need for a quarantine certificate when Sri Lanka tea was imported into Russia after 2012 , Saman who is there after getting an extension\u00a0 had not inquired why\u00a0 these changes are\u00a0 being effected? This unconcern of his was\u00a0\u00a0natural because Saman is there to facilitate the warship deal\u00a0 engineered by Maithri-Maharaja group, and the gaze is only\u00a0 on colossal illicit commissions which are part and parcel of the deal.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0website concluded the long article by saying that the decision taken by Russia against Sri Lanka will apply to four other countries -Kazakhastan , BeloRussia , Kirgisthan and Tajikistan and Syria which is a\u00a0 close friend of Russia is also likely to abide by this decision. Since Sri Lanka exports tea to all these countries, the situation is most grave and portentous.<\/p>\n

In the long article published by the Sinhala medium website Lanka CNews under the title Russia avenges Sri Lanka over the asbestos ban \u2013 Here is the hidden story of the tea ban\u201d the former Sri Lankan Ambassadore to Russia Mr. Udayanga Weeratunga says that as per a policy of Sirisena the Sri Lankan government has taken a decision to ban asbestos roofing sheets.\u00a0 Accordingly by 2020 asbestos roofing sheets will be completely banned in Sri Lanka.\u00a0 The reason given is that asbestos cause cancer. Russia is the main country that exports asbestos to Sri Lanka. The former Russian Ambassador in Sri Lanka Alexander Kerchavo has officially expressed his bitter resentment to the Sri Lanka government against this decision taken to ban asbestos without any research report.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is not a secret that rejection of asbestos from Russia which purchases 25% of our tea exports and which was the leading tea importing country during the last 10 \u2013 15 years will make a death blow to our economy. \u00a0It was in July 2017 we got the indication that Russia may reject agricultural products from Sri Lanka.\u00a0\u00a0 Mr. Udayanga says that when Russia has Mr, Surgey Lavrov, who speaks Sinhala fluently and\u00a0who considers Sri Lanka as his second homeland as its minister of foreign affairs Sri Lanka could have resolved its problems with Russia amicably.\u00a0 He says that Sri Lanka took no action in this regard and the Sri Lankan Ambassador in Russia ignored the establishment of four Inspection centers in the customs to obtain quarantine certificates pertaining to imports of agricultural products. Since 2012 quarantine certificates pertaining to imports of agricultural products from Sri Lamka were not required earlier.but it has been decided to make it conditional now for our exports.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The former Ambassdor reminds that when Sirisena government came to power in 2015 the then foreign Minister accused that Russia has supplied arms and ammunition to Ukranian rebels through the Sri Lankan Ambassador and placed Russia in a precarious situation internationally and Russia did not respond to these allegations instantly and had been waiting for asuitable opportunity to respond to the allegations.\u00a0 He says that the Sirisena government is now receiveing response from other countries as J.R.Jayawardene government received in 1977.\u00a0 Mr. Udayanga says that relations between Russia and Sri Lanka have also affected by the non payment of the 10% advance for Jifard warship due to Rosbaron Institute by December and handing over of Russian long range intelligence officers to the United States on the sly.\u00a0 He also refers many other diplomatic mishandling that had been made by the Sirisena government.\u00a0 The former Ambaassador also points out that there are 83×40\u2019 containers belonging to Sri Lanka are being held at St. Petersberg custom and Sri\u00a0 Lanka will have to incur about Rs. 500,000 as inspection charges for each container and up to now the Sri Lanka Embassy has not taken necessary action to get these containers cleared. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Mr. Udayanga also criticizes the attempts being made by some Sri Lankan Ministers to vist Russia for a meeting with the Russian Minister of Agriculture without prior agreemet as this is a Holiday period in Russia.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

Having got exposed their folly the Cabinet met under the chairmanship of Sirisena has decided to temporarily suspend the asbestos ban wih effect from 1st<\/sup> January,\u00a0 Earlier it was decided to ban the import of asbestos raw materials frm January 1st<\/sup>, 2018 and completely ban asbestos by th year 2020. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Foreign reports indicate that Kenya which is a major tea exporter and a main competitor against Ceylon Tea in the international tea market is making extensive measures to capture the Russian tea market.\u00a0 A special team of Kenyans are due to visit Russia soon and Kenya plans to export 44 Millions kilogras of tea to Russia. Tea market sources have indicated that if the Russian ban persists for about six months Sri; Lanka will lose the entire Russian market for its tea.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

The Chairman of the National Movement for Protection of Consumer Rigjts Mr. Ranjith Vithanage has asked that if a beetle was capaabe of removing the asbestos bam what is the use of having rulers for our country?\u00a0 He says that asbestos ban was introduced saying that it causes cancer, and asks whether it will not cause cancer now.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the joint opposition points out that it is not merely for the beetle issue that Russia has suspended tea imports from Sri Lanka.\u00a0 \u00a0Addressing a media conference in Colobo,the joint opposition said that it was due to the western slavish foreign policy of the country that Russia has taken a tough stance and imposed a ban on Tea imports from Sri Lanka.\u00a0 They said that the whole world looking at Sri Lanka today as a junior partner of the West.<\/p>\n

(To be continued)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by: A.A.M.NIZAM \u2013 MATARA Focussing the attention on another direction the LEN website stated that it is a pity Sirisena who gleefully and proudly said \u2018 I am the one who was invited to Russia after 44 years and\u00a0 Putin is my friend \u2019 did not have any sense of diplomacy despite being a president […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aamnizam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74310","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=74310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}