{"id":84065,"date":"2018-12-10T16:20:42","date_gmt":"2018-12-10T23:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=84065"},"modified":"2018-12-10T16:20:42","modified_gmt":"2018-12-10T23:20:42","slug":"my-observations-and-concerns-of-your-meeting-the-former-ltte-fighters-in-mullaitivu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2018\/12\/10\/my-observations-and-concerns-of-your-meeting-the-former-ltte-fighters-in-mullaitivu\/","title":{"rendered":"My observations and concerns of your meeting the former LTTE fighters in Mullaitivu,"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0Asoka Weerasinghe\u00a0 Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario . Canada<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

December 10, 2018<\/p>\n

High Commissioner David McKinnon
\nCanadian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka
\n33A, 5th Lane
\nColpetty, Colombo 3
\nSri Lanka.<\/p>\n

Dear High Commissioner David McKinnon:<\/p>\n

I was a bit chafed to see your photo with former LTTE fighters in Mullaitivu in the latest TAMIL GUARDIAN.\u00a0 The text below the photo read:<\/p>\n

The former NPC member, T.Ravikaran met with Canada\u2019s High Commissioner to Sri Lanka today and urged action on ongoing Tamil concerns.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The continued occupation of land, the Buddhisation of the North-East (that got my goat. I am a Buddhist and former President of Ottawa Buddhist Association,\u00a0 and will comment on it later), the disappeared and political prisoners were discussed during the meeting.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

So the photo is proof-positive that you are one more Canadian diplomat who is pushing the Canadian envelope to get involved in the internal affairs of this little sovereign nation.\u00a0 Sri Lanka, which happens to be my Motherland,\u00a0 is not even a colony of ours,\u00a0 So what the heck is this all about?\u00a0 Canadian Tamil votes for your employer?\u00a0 Phew! Man, this is not right…this isn’t kosher…this is not cricket!<\/p>\n

Mr. High Commissioner, can you imagine one of Sri Lanka\u2019s High Commissioners meeting with the First Nation people\u2019s Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence who was on a hunger strike, protesting\u00a0 that their human rights had been violated by the Canadian Government.\u00a0 Just wondered what your comments would be if that had<\/p>\n

happened.\u00a0 Well, I suppose our Secretary to the Foreign Minister would have summoned the Sri Lanka High Commisioner to rap him\/her knuckles and admonish the diplomat for poking his\/her nose into Canada\u2019s internal affairs and shown our displeasure and give the diplomat the third degree and that if it happened again would be declared\u00a0 a persona-non grata<\/em> and put the Sri Lanka High Commissioner on the first plane to the coconut palm fringed Katunayake International Airport.\u00a0 Ha! What disingenuous double-standard by Canada.\u00a0 Not Canadian, is it!<\/p>\n

I for one, a Sri Lankan-Sinhalese-Canadian\u00a0 who has stomached and endured the arrogance, bullying, attitude of We-are-holier-than-Thou, <\/em><\/strong>and lying through our teeth, to secure the mono-ethnic separate, racist Tamil State, Eelam for the Tamil\u2019s,\u00a0 and resent all of this.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s not kid us and pull wool ov<\/strong>er our eyes.\u00a0 Please don\u2019t challenge Sri Lanka\u2019s Sinhalese men and women\u2019s intelligence.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Permit me to elaborate my observations of our Politicians of all three major political parties, the Liberal, Conservatives and NDP.\u00a0 Here are some incidents that have got my goat,<\/p>\n

1:\u00a0 Arrogance<\/strong> – Judy Sgro, the Liberal Minister of Immigration and Citizenship\u00a0\u00a0announced in Parliament, that she doesn\u2019t need to get permission from the Sri\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Lankan Government to set up an Immigration Office in Jaffna to siphon Tamils\u00a0\u00a0who were affected by the Tsunami and bring them over to Canada and not the\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Sinhalese who were the most affected.<\/p>\n

Damn arrogance I thought and in a letter told her not to embarrass Canada as\u00a0 Sri Lanka Government had every right to close that Canadian Immigration\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Councillor office in Jaffna and kick her out of the island.\u00a0 Remember how\u00a0\u00a0we treated France\u2019s General De Gaulle?<\/p>\n

I advised her in a letter to go back to college and take the\u00a0 Introductory Course\u00a0on\u00a0 International Diplomacy 101<\/em><\/strong>, which will do her and Canada a lot of good;<\/p>\n

2: Bullying<\/strong> –\u00a0 After Prime Minister Stephen Harper got into a hissy-fit and boycotted\u00a0 the Commonwealth Conference held in Colombo, as he was\u00a0 concerned about alleged Human Rights violations in Sri Lanka.\u00a0 So he sends his emissary Minister Deepak Obhrai to\u00a0 represent him and Canada\u00a0\u00a0 And he had a Mission to garner every federal Tamil vote in the Greater Toronto Area for his Conservative Party at the next Federal election.<\/p>\n

So what did he do?\u00a0 He flies into Jaffna, I believe accompanied by our\u00a0Canadian High Commissioner, and then got back to Colombo by land transport.\u00a0The reason we were told was\u00a0 because the plane that they were going to be\u00a0brought back let them down.\u00a0 But when asked from the Canadian Mission the\u00a0name of the Company that they had contracted to provide the return flight, I\u00a0did not get an answer.<\/p>\n

But here is what killed\u00a0 Canada\u2019s slimy-truth.\u00a0 Deepak Obhrai had an entourage with Him on the return by land transport, and among them was a photographer and a wreath with a printed sign of sympathy for the Tamil Eelamist Terrorists who died in battle\u00a0 with the Sri Lankan Government soldiers at Elephant Pass, Obhrai deliberately ignored the fact that there were two armies at war, the Tamil Tiger terrorists\u00a0 and Sri Lanka\u2019s Armed Forces who were defending the Island\u2019s sovereignty and its territorial integrity, and the other soldiers who died at battle were Sri Lankan, mainly Sinhalese soldiers. That\u2019s how the Canadian Government\u00a0 was so disingenuous with this public act. It was a case of vomiting-sick.<\/p>\n

When he was requested by a Sri Lankan Government Officer not to lay the wreath, Deepak Obhrai\u00a0 put on a cloak\u00a0 of a \u00a0Canadian High\u00a0<\/strong>School Bully<\/strong>, and laid\u00a0 the wreath anyway. and the photographer clicked his Camera to show proof what he did for the GTA Tamil-separatists when he returned\u00a0 saying See what I did for you all, now give us, Conservatives your<\/em>\u00a0Vote at the next federal election!.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>When Obhrai was questioned why he did it, his explanation was that Elephant Pass\u00a0 was a neutral spot to lay the wreath.\u00a0 That was not only foolish, he was asinine. I pointed out to him in a letter that Elephant Pass was the Eelam War Theatre where three major battles were fought and the Sri Lankan Army got a good pounding in one of them..\u00a0 Damn! Western Pinocchio-Bullies, I say, who wants to hurt my Motherland, unfairly. O!\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0No, no<\/em><\/strong>..don\u2019t even try it.\u00a0 If you do\u00a0 you will hear my voice loud and<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0clearly like the Westminster\u2019s BIG BEN\u2019s noon hour ding-dong chime\u201d<\/em><\/strong> I say to the\u00a0 Canadian politician-bullies.<\/p>\n

3. We are Holier than Thou <\/strong>– Conservative Minister Jason Kenney, after a stint in Sri Lanka on January 7, 2013, meeting the Sri Lankan Government Officials to discuss how to curb Tamil human smuggling, switched his mask to, I am the son of an Anglo-Saxon Evangelical\u00a0 Preacher Man, preaching to Sri Lankans about Human Rights violations during a 27 year long bloody Tamil Tiger Terrorist Eelam War which Canada aided and abetted,\u00a0And that We are Holier than Thou\u201d, all that Evangelical Blarney BS when\u00a0Amnesty International had already pinned Canada onto their Human Rights\u00a0Violator Rogues Gallery,was despicable, uncouth and sick.\u00a0 Especially, when\u00a0on that very day when the First Nations Peoples Attawapiskat Chief\u00a0<\/strong>Theresa Spence<\/strong> was on a hunger strike on Victoria Island, a stone’s throw\u00a0away from Kenney\u2019s parliament office, for the very reason that\u00a0Canada has violated their human rights.\u201d\u00a0 What nonsense is all this High Commissioner, McKinnon?\u00a0 I am not impressed, not a bit.<\/p>\n

If I was the President\u00a0 of Sri Lanka then, I would have told Minister Jason Kenney;<\/p>\n

\u00a0Listen, my son, why don\u2019t you take the first flight\u00a0 home to Canada,<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 and help eradicate your Government\u2019s Human Rights violations of\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0the peoples of the First\u00a0 Nations, like Chief Theresa Spence.\u00a0 They\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0need you more than my people.\u00a0 We can look after ours.\u00a0 Once you\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 solve your Country’s Human Rights violations, then come to me and I<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 \u00a0will listen to you.\u00a0 Until then, please keep off your feet from my<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0island\u2019s kabook soil.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0You can now take my leave and hurry back home to Canada. Those<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 First Nations peoples of yours need you.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

4; Lying through our Teeth: <\/strong>\u00a0It was during the Tamil Blarney Gong Show\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>that\u00a0 took place in the Parliament’s chambers on the evening of 4 February\u00a02009,\u00a0 called by Jack Layton, the leader of the NDP.\u00a0 It was supposed to be an Emergency Meeting on Sri Lanka, <\/em><\/strong>with a packed Gallery of Sri Lankan Tamils.\u00a0 What a stupid hoot.\u00a0\u00a0 I watched it on CPAC.<\/p>\n

It was on this afternoon that Liberal\u2019s Terrible Lying Five,<\/em><\/strong> Robert Oliphant, Jim Karygiannis, Derek Lee, Judy Sgro and Albina Guarnieri, charged\u00a0 Sri Lanka of Genocide\u201d.<\/strong>\u00a0 What tosh, what garbage, what poppycock, what buckets of dead capelin from the shores of\u00a0Newfoundland\u2019s Middle Cove Beach, what strings of baloney hanging from Deli stalls in Byward\u00a0 Market.<\/p>\n

They were off the mark by lying miles as they were not capable even of gathering Nuts in May…Nuts in May, even though they were taken to a field to harvest nuts, as they couldn\u2019t distinguish a nut from a stone.\u00a0 The Word Genocide<\/strong> has no place in Sri Lanka as this stupid five wouldn\u2019t be able to reconcile the fact that on 19 May 2009, when the Tamil Tiger Terrorists were annihilated\u00a0 militarily, how come the Sri Lankan, mainly\u00a0Sinhalese\u00a0 soldiers, rescued 295,873 Tamils from the clutches of the Tamil\u00a0Tigers who marched them from the west coast to the east coast for 30\u00a0Month under the Jaffna-Killinochchi scorching sun like unwashed cattle.<\/p>\n

They were not shot dead by the Sri Lankan soldiers, as that would have been easy.\u00a0 But they didn\u2019t. Genocide\u201d my foot.\u00a0 Nor were they starved to death when they were housed in\u00a0 temporary refugee camps and the Government of Sri lanka prepared a million meals a day to feed the Tamil\u00a0Refugees hearty breakfasts, lunches and dinners.<\/p>\n

Do you know what High Commissioner, a good percent of the cooks were army soldiers.\u00a0 Genocide\u201d my foot.\u00a0 The Liberals Terrible Five<\/strong> were a\u00a0nasty bunch.<\/p>\n

Do you know what Mr. High Commissioner, if my late Mother was alive, it wouldn\u2019t have mattered to her whether the Liberals Terrible Lying Five were Canadian parliamentarians, she would have marched every one of them by their ears to the Parliament’s kitchen sink and forced them to wash\u00a0 their\u00a0 lying mouths with Carbolic soap.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t liked liars.<\/p>\n

And now to deal with the Northern separatist Tamils\u00a0 complaining to\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0you about Buddhisation of the North and East.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>If you have any inclination to get involved with this comment, my advise to you is don\u2019t even touch it with a barge pole.\u00a0 If you do you will be skating\u00a0 on thin ice. Here is why!.<\/p>\n

I suppose Ravikaran did not brief you that in ancient\u00a0 times the\u00a0 north\u00a0and east of Sri Lanka were spotted with Buddhist temples\u00a0 When I say\u00a0ancient\u201d, I mean Sinhalese-Buddhist culture goes back for over\u00a02,500 years,\u00a0 Canadians might have difficulty to comprehend it when\u00a0Canada is only 151 years old since Confederation, and we have a\u00a0Department of Heritage to preserve our 151 year old heritage,\u00a0 So let\u2019s\u00a0not get involved in tinkering with Sri Lanka\u2019s over 2,500 year old\u00a0Heritage, when we have absolutely no business there.<\/p>\n

So what is Ravikaran belly aching about!<\/p>\n

Among scores of ancient Buddhist shrines and sites did he not brief\u00a0you about the Muhudu Maha Viharaya<\/em><\/strong> which is over 2000 years old in\u00a0Pottuvil, in the Ampara District and built by King Kavan Tissa?<\/p>\n

Ravikaran\u2019s Tamils are trying to claim that the North and East is\u00a0theirs.\u00a0 And that’s hog wash.\u00a0 There were 74 ancient Buddhist shrines\u00a0and Archeological sites in the Trincomalee District, and 55 such ancient\u00a0Buddhist\u00a0 shrines in the Batticaloa and Ampara Districts<\/p>\n

Didn\u2019t Ravikaran brief you that the Seruwila Mangala\u00a0 Raja Maha Viha<\/strong>raya<\/strong> in the Trincomalee District was built in the 2nd century BC by King Kavan Tissa.\u00a0\u00a0 So what were the Tamils belly aching about asking you to stop Buddhisation<\/strong>\u201d which got my goat.<\/p>\n

Well, if I were you, High Commissioner David McKinnon, I would\u00a0keep your nose out of this nonsense as you might feel the simmering\u00a0winds of the unnatural Sinhalese Buddhist wrath wafting within the walls\u00a0of your offices in Colombo.\u00a0 Their anger will be visceral.<\/p>\n

And they will charge you with cultural genocide<\/strong> as we in Canada have been accused of\u00a0 by the indigenous peoples\u00a0 with the forced Residential\u00a0Schools policy.\u00a0 And the cultural genocide <\/strong>by the white-man of the\u00a0Beothuks in Newfoundland when by 1829, with the death of\u00a0Shanawdithit\u00a0 the Beothuks were officially declared extinct after\u00a0suffering epidemics, starvation, loss of access to food sources and\u00a0the slaughter by white English and French fishermen and traders.<\/p>\n

Remember Mr. High Commissioner that the Tamils have a Motherland to return to. It\u2019s India\u2019s Tamil Nadu just 18 salt water miles from the northern tip of Jaffna peninsula of Sri Lanka where 80 million Dravidian kith and kin of theirs live.\u00a0 And the Sinhalese Buddhists as well as\u00a0Christians are indigenous to Sri Lanka which is their Motherland..<\/p>\n

So High Commissioner David McKinnon, as a diplomat, you have a\u00a0choice of either to get involved in the internal affairs of Sri Lanka\u00a0which is high-hypocrisy and\u00a0 an act\u00a0 of colonial like condescension\u00a0which is none of your business to act like a pseudo-viceroy.<\/p>\n

The active involvement like going and meeting former Tamil Tiger\u00a0terrorists in Mullaitivu and discussing\u00a0 ongoing Tamil concerns\u00a0 that\u00a0cannot be justified in any manner. The eagerness of Canada to get\u00a0involved in the internal affairs of Sri Lanka is explicable.\u00a0 Or keep your\u00a0nose out of trouble, and not expose yourself to a possible embarrassing event like the David Gladstone syndrome of 1991.<\/p>\n

May be that you will be troubled by my frank discussion here, and\u00a0want to reject all what I had to say.\u00a0 But I pray, that you will\u00a0 not open a\u00a0window for me to tell you\u201dDidn\u2019t I tell you so!\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

And, by the way, my enthusiasm for the heritage and culture of Canada was recognized by the Mayor of Ottawa and was the recipient\u00a0of the Annual prestigious\u00a0 City of Ottawa, Appreciation Award for\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Arts and Culture in\u00a0 2003.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

And my resentment of a Fundamentalist Christian decapitating\u00a0the large Buddha Statue on the front lawn of my Buddhist\u00a0Monastery, Hilda Jayewardenaramaya at 1481 Heron Road, is\u00a0documented in the Ottawa Citizen<\/em><\/strong> of. May 1, 2018. He is been\u00a0charged by the Ottawa Police.\u00a0 Little wonder why and how I reacted to\u00a0the former Tamil Tiger T. Ravikaran\u2019s belly aching to you about\u00a0Buddhist sites in the North and East.\u00a0 You bet, it will be so in the future\u00a0too.<\/p>\n

Have a magical holiday season and hope that Santa will be good to you and keep well.<\/p>\n

Sincerely,<\/p>\n

Asoka Weerasinghe (Mr.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0Asoka Weerasinghe\u00a0 Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario . Canada December 10, 2018 High Commissioner David McKinnon Canadian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka 33A, 5th Lane Colpetty, Colombo 3 Sri Lanka. Dear High Commissioner David McKinnon: I was a bit chafed to see your photo with former LTTE fighters in Mullaitivu in the latest […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asoka-weerasinghe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84065","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=84065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84065\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}