Tamils in lodges, asked to leave?
Today’s papers seem to say that the police want Tamils living in lodges, without a reason to leave the city. The criteria appears to be a) they be Tamil b) they have no valid reason to be in Colombo c) not own a property/ house in Colombo – presumably, if they did own a house, they would be owners, and will not be asked to leave!
The sad part is, a terrorist would have sufficient cash to buy him-self / her-self/ it-self a house. A not-so-well off human (Tamil or otherwise) would probably have to rent a house. And that not well off fellow would be asked to go back. What if, just what if, that Tamil was running away from the LTTE? can he prove it? well, perhaps when he gets a bullet, between his eyes, he could prove that there was a reason to leave his home town.
I have heard of Tamils who come to Sri Lanka on vacation, who do not visit their home town because they don’t want to pay money to the LTTE – apperently, the LTTE charges a fee from those who have worked abroad, and want to travel to terrorist controlled areas.
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MTV News showed an interview with one of the occupants in one of these places.
He claimed that he was there for over a month and was there with his son who’s suppose to go abroad. That sounded suspicious.
Anyways the Petta OIC spoke and he said it’s a misinterpretation to say that they were asked to leave. Rather they had told owners of such lodges to make sure no one (including sinhalese and muslims) stays for extended periods without a valid reason.
All in all, it’s just SL police being stupid as usual. They just don’t know how to enforce security. When a bomb goes off they just do some thing to catch the news.
What i heard was that the lodge owners were summoned and told that they would be held responsible if any undesirables were found.
That was enough to frighten the lodge owners (who wants to get taken in under the terrorism laws and held or worse vanish in a white van ?)
The owners promptly turned out everybody in the lodges.
Also it is unlikely that the police were acting their own accord. These probably came from higher up, like the recommendation that work be stopped on all large construction sites within the high security zone.
Ballsy decision. Kotakadeniya did the same thing back then when he was the Colombo DIG.
Terrorists don’t buy houses matchang. There must be dozens of LTTE spies, suicide bombers and pistol squad assassins in Pettah living in these lodges.
This is a violation of fundamental human rights. You cannot impose a blanket decision like this on all of the people belonging to a particular community.
It is no different to subjecting innocent people to torture in order to get information on suspicion that they may have terrorist links.
We cannot afford a Guantanamo Bay in Sri Lanka. It wont work.
Hatred will only breed more hatred. We have to act within the law and allow the law to carry out their vigilance in a manner that is just and fair.
Is this the New Chinthanaya?
Yes. Freethinker, It is defiantly human rights violation.
I experienced same thing firsthand in JVP era. Pretty much worse than that.
If ever JVP succeeded back then, you won’t be here to talk about human right violations.
Every democratic country once in a while faces extraordinary situations that cannot tackle by democracy alone. Those extraordinary situations need extraordinary tactics.
In the JVP era, i would have been a target by both the JVP and the State. JVP, as i went to the University of Colombo: but would have belonged to the “Kultas”; the government, as i am in the an under graduate at a university.
With my uncle gunned down by the JVP, i turned to believe that it is okay for executions outside the court of law. But now, i believe that the correct, and better way to get through all of this is by doing it within the law; without unnecessarily harassing people.
The LTTE murderer will dress up in many ways – but will definitely not go about the city with the “Mottu”; and i am pretty sure he/she/it will be pretty well conversant with the Sinhala language. In the same way, i think the terrorists would buy their own houses/lodges. Doubt they would risk lodging in predominantly Tamil areas.
The LTTE move to ask Sinhalese and muslims is now justified since Mahinda and Brothers feel the same.
VP and Mahinda might be brothers. Both are fat.
This shows size of the brain of our politicians,We proved our selves that we discriminate tamils
[...] Posted June 9, 2008 Sometime ago, the Sri Lankan government threw Tamils out of Colombo. Now according to yesterday’s Sunday Times, Sri Lankan’s from the North who want to [...]