Canada Govt redefining “Reconciliation” in Sri Lanka for cheap Toronto political drama
Inspite of the reconciliation mumbo-jumbo, what is being promoted is retributive justice for a National Army & restorative justice for an internationally banned terrorist movement. When foreign govts slap sanctions on those who ended decades of terror and envoys visit terrorist linked individuals, what is the message being conveyed? It therefore comes as no surprise when successive Canadian envoys are happy to be chit chatting with those linked to either terrorism or separatism and now cultural genocide with the vandalism taking place targeting Buddhist archaeological sites. Of course, cultural genocide is a topic close at heart to Canada, having been declared guilty of mass murders of Canadian indigenous natives in residential schools run by the Church. The truth & reconciliation promoted is to forgive Canada & the Church & for the indigenous to forget, while the indigenous natives continue to suffer discriminations & inequalities. Obviously the same remedy is being peddled in Sri Lanka.
On 17 January 2005, Paul Martin the Prime Minister of Canada met the TNA & TRO at the Colombo Hilton. TNA was formed by Prabakaran in 2001. TNA requested the Canadian PM to channel funds through NGOs instead of through the GoSL. Incidentally, the TRO was banned by US in 2007 for raising funds for LTTE.
The TNA delegation included R Sampanthan, Joseph Pararajasingham (killed in Dec2005 months after meeting the Canadian PM), Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam. K P Reggie (Exec Director of TRO)
Fast forward to July 2023, the Canadian High Commissioner Eric Walsh was seeing paying courtesy calls on a controversial Northern PC Member T. Raviharan, involved in a series of mischief and propagating vandalism & violence upon Buddhist heritage archaeological sites in the North of Sri Lanka.
He has been at the forefront of protests & unruly behavior in Kurundi, Gurukanda Raja Maha Viharaya.
https://island.lk/protests-against-rebuilding-temple-in-archaeological-site/
https://srilankabrief.org/sri-lanka-kurundi-viharaya-and-thannimurippuwa-land-issue/
When questioned about the sudden visit the Canadian High Commission claims that Eric Walsh’s visit was to ‘meet people in different parts of the country, to better understand their priorities and perspectives”. The below breakdown of the Canadian High Commissioners visits should give a good idea or the people he has met & the “priorities” that Canada is giving prominence to.
It is baffling why the Canadian High Commission would want to go to Jaffna twice & in particular to meet with T. Raviharan whose name has been repeatedly appearing for causing ethno-religious tensions. It is reliably informed that the envoy is arranging a Colombo-meet of these unscrupulous elements with obviously a well-funded plan to increase the tempo of attacks on the Buddhist archaeological sites as they foresee this as one of the biggest obstacles to advancing 13th amendment & cutting the North & East out of Colombo control.
The reason to raise concern about the Canadian High Commissioner’s visits primarily centres around the decisions by the Canadian Government. It is true that outside of Sri Lanka, Canada & in particular Toronto holds the largest number of Tamils. What is also true is that these numbers are mostly asylum seekers or refugees as the numbers do not tally with the 2021 Canadian census. Be that as it may, these pro-LTTE elements are making considerable influence over Canadian Parliamentarians. Domestic politics and funding appear to be a key reason to promote a bogus genocide claim & slap sanctions when no legal court has declared anyone guilty of war crimes & even UNHRC has failed to provide evidence of even the 40,000 dead that kicked off a global tarnishing campaign. Incidentally, Serbia was accused of the same number of dead & eventually that figure ended up only 2500 or less. The war crimes/genocide hype resulted in imprisoning the Serbian President who died in jail before he was eventually exonerated & those who accused have yet to even apologize for putting a President in prison for no valid reason. This is clearly the same outcome for Sri Lanka.
It is shocking that to satisfy domestic politics, a national government like Canada is happy to mourn terrorists that died in the last phase of the conflict while agreeing to declare genocide remembrance week as well as subject Canadian children to learn about a genocide that never took place. Years down the line, Canada will end up a laughing stock. We await for the day Canada finds out to their embarrassment that they had been commemorating dead LTTE terrorists, genocide was to mourn LTTE dead and a genocide sans names of the dead/dead bodies or even skeletons. To cover up this, Canada is ranting about Mannar graves when the site is on the other end of where the conflict took place. Take a map and look at where Mannar & Mullaivaikkal is located, please.
- Canadian Parliament in 2022 declaring May 18 as Tamil Genocide Remembrance Day (the GoSL should request Canada to produce genocide figures, the names of dead at least)
- July1983 statements by even the Canadian PM Trudeau displaying ignorance of facts.
- Ontario Bill 104 in 2023 – Tamil Genocide Education Week
Are these foreign envoys here to build bridges or to break existing bridges & kickstart new turmoils?
If envoys are in Sri Lanka to help make peace, what they are presently doing is no where near this objective. An analysis of who they meet, what they discuss is testament to what they are really up to veiled by their statements that ooze out peace, reconciliation & whatnot.
It is a pity that the Sri Lanka Foreign Minister & Ministry are not keeping a tab on the diplomatic movements, interferences into internal affairs and the funding that is being channeled to lay grounds for new mischief. Nothing in the Geneva protocols covers the type of interference & incursions being committed with impunity by a handful of Western & Indian diplomats in Sri Lanka. It is a shame that the objectives & goals of diplomacy is being clouded by these actions & behaviors.
Shenali D Waduge
