EDITORIAL : THE DAILY MIRROR, SRILANKA

Wake up to the real agenda behind the UN threat

Our Opinion page carries some interesting facts on the three members of the controversial expert panel appointed to advice the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban ki-moon on how our war was won. The legitimacy of the very appointment of the panel aside, the biases by the Indonesian member of the panel Marzuki Darusman, NGO activist Yasmin Sooka, Steven Ratner who long before his appointment had recommended action against Sri Lanka in a book he has authored, stand exposed.

From Sooka’s history of being funded by the European Union and her close relationship to Human Rights Commissioner Navanitham Pillai whose own agenda against Sri Lanka is not new, to Darusman’s own US$ loaded NGO; it is increasingly difficult to negate their agenda against countries like Sri Lanka.

With their dubious track records bringing serious questions on the validity of their ‘findings’; the Sri Lankan government is duty-bound to bring these concerns before the United Nations. These are in fact questions that should have been raised by our representatives enjoying the comforts of the West at state expense, as and when these appointments were made.

The credentials of the three members show a clear bias that should have warned our Foreign Office of the depths to which their ‘findings’ would stoop to. Such diplomatic bungling will continue to bring disrepute to the men who died on the battlefield vanquishing the most ruthless terror organization the world had seen. Our men who believe their only job to play subservient slave to western agendas must be made accountable for the unfortunate predicament the country faces today.

Until the country wakes up to the real agendas behind the threat and the serious consequences thereon, much will remain undone. The longer the country waits on hope the harder its ability to overcome the many battles along its path of real peace and much needed development; both conditions that do not serve the economic plans the West has for ‘struggling economies’ like Sri Lanka.