SRI LANKA UNITED NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF CANADA

Box 55292, 300 Borough Drive, Toronto, Ontario M1P 4Z7 Canada

Website:   www.sluna.org                         E-mail:   sluna@idirect.com

 

 

 

By E-mail                                                                                June 20, 2006

 

 

The Editor

Aftenposten

Oslo, Norway

 

 

Dear Editor,

 

Norway is a Biased and Failed Peace Facilitator

 

Norway has utterly failed as a peace facilitator due to her dishonesty and clear partiality towards the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which has been proven by her actions from the very start of her involvement in the Sri Lanka Peace Process.

 

To begin with, the Norwegians came up with a lopsided Memorandum of Understanding and a Ceasefire Agreement (CFA) which had been jointly drafted with input from the Tamil Tiger advisor, Anton Balasingham living in London, England.  The Norwegians had these documents signed first by the Tiger Terrorist leader Velupillai Prabhakaran in the northern jungles of the Vanni, and thereafter presented it to the then Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremasinghe by-passing the country’s head of state, Madam Chandrika Kumaratunge, and made him understand that he had to accept the terms or miss the only opportunity to seek a negotiated settlement of the ongoing conflict.

 

First and foremost, the terms and conditions included therein violated the Constitution of Sri Lanka which did not recognize any part of her sovereign territory illegally held by a proscribed terrorist group as a territory of a defacto region under any authority, which lacked any legitimacy in accordance with any laws whatsoever.  Furthermore, the LTTE cadres who were part of the terrorist outfit which was still at war with the Government and people of Sri Lanka in pursuit of a separate mono-ethnic racist Tamil state to be forcibly carved out of Sri Lanka’s sovereign terrain, were to be permitted to enter into all areas which were under the control of the Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL), whereas unarmed representatives of the government and other ordinary citizens resident outside the un-cleared areas held by the LTTE were barred from entering the region illegally controlled by these terrorists in terms of the Ceasefire Agreement.  The height of absurdity is that even the members of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) made up of Nordic observers were debarred from entry into the same un-cleared areas.

                                                                                                (Contd./2)

 

- 2 -

 

Some of the most glaring examples of partisan conduct on the part of the Norwegian peace facilitator which could be construed as collusion on their part with the UN designated Tamil Tiger Terrorists are as follows:

 

  1. Supply of high powered transmission equipment imported as diplomatic cargo thereby avoiding customs duty, for delivery to the LTTE.  This equipment is today being used by the Tamil Tigers to track down dissidents and carry out murderous strikes in all parts of the country.  Refer to the taped conversation of Norway’s ambassador, Jon Westborg with a senior LTTE official which could be accessed at page 20 of the website, i.e. www.senter.no/norway.pdf .

 

  1. General Furuhovde, head of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) tipping off the LTTE about the Sri Lankan Security Forces taking steps to apprehend a ship used for smuggling weapons for the Tamil Tigers, of which the SLMM had been confidentially appraised by the Sri Lanka authorities.

 

  1. The head of the SLMM deliberately clears the LTTE of any wrong doing in the case of the sinking of the Chinese owned cargo vessel on contract to the GOSL, by inventing the presence of an unknown third party that had carried out the attack in mid-ocean taking the lives of the entire crew.  It was obviously a concocted story, as his conversation with a Tiger leader on tape (refer page 11 of the report in the website www.svik.org/PDF/norway.pdf ) which showed that he invented a story to whitewash the LTTE and divert blame for this terrorist act.

 

  1. The support earlier lent by Norway to the LTTE to have legal access for their Sea Tiger Naval Unit to operate in Sri Lanka’s sovereign territorial waters which was outside the scope of the CFA, to establish sea lanes for movement of Tiger vessels that engage in hostile actions against the Sri Lankan Navy, while the latter alone had authority to police the ocean surrounding the island nation.  The SLMM recently reprimanded the LTTE only after the Tamil Tigers attacked Sri Lankan Naval craft on May 11, 2006, when the monitoring mission observers were also on board the Navy vessels.

 

  1. Norway has been granting large sums of money to the LTTE, permitting the the raising of funds within Norway together with banking facilities in complete violation of the UN Security Council Resolution Number 1373, which forbids the financing of designated terrorist groups.

 

  1. Norway provided a visit by a LTTE delegation to a Norwegian Special Forces Training camp in Rena.  Norwegian Special Forces also provided training to Tamil Tiger frogman in the seas off Thailand where a partly built submarine was also discovered.

                                                                                    (Contd./3)

 

- 3 -

 

  1. Norway attempted to force the hand of Sri Lanka’s Government to transfer power to the LTTE to manage the donor funds pledged for tsunami rehabilitation work, by giving the Tigers a bigger hand in the administrative structure to be based in Kilinochchi which falls within the region illegally controlled by these terrorists, in order to qualify to receive the promised international aid.  Fortunately for Sri Lanka, the Supreme Court struck down the unconstitutional provisions in this arrangement foisted on the GOSL, which was an attempt to subordinate Sri Lanka’s sovereignty to an internationally designated terrorist group.

 

  1. Norway used her diplomatic efforts to block the European Union from proscribing the LTTE which was blatantly violating the CFA, extorting, forcibly recruiting child soldiers, and killing dissidents and political leaders in Sri Lanka.

 

  1. Norway’s actions as the Chairperson of the first round of talks held in Geneva in February 2006 clearly showed their partiality to the LTTE, in seeking to provide the opening address and right of reply to the LTTE when it was in fact due to the GOSL based on the procedure established in the Norwegian brokered peace process.  Furthermore, Norway’s invitation to the LTTE delegation to visit Oslo for a post-talks reception was unethical to say the least.

 

  1. Norway’s apparent duplicity in seeking the Sri Lankan Government’s participation at the talks to be held in Oslo on June 8, 2006, to discuss the composition of the SLMM which included EU members that had earlier taken steps to proscribe the LTTE as a terrorist group was obviously a diplomatic misadventure or a deliberate attempt to humiliate Sri Lanka, as they probably were aware that the LTTE would pull out from these talks just as they did one hour before its start – even though they had declared their intention to participate prior to their leaving Sri Lanka for Oslo.  This assessment gains currency, as Norway was definitely aware that the LTTE’s main intention was to gather with other LTTE representatives from around the globe in Oslo, to make plans to further their attempts to carve out a separate state on Sri Lanka’s sovereign terrain?

 

The farcical peace process where Norway’s naked partisanship has been exposed is yet another example of international interference in developing nations with ulterior motives aimed at weakening and breaking up the existing state, in order to continue the colonial mindset of exploiting the weak and economically less developed countries.  Yet another illogical trend is the attempt to balance the legally and democratically elected sovereign state with an armed band of thugs engaged in violence and terrorism, in pursuit of political goals.  Also the absurd notion of balancing one’s condemnation when one of the parties has committed an offence without having the courage to fault the offending party, is a misguided principle followed by members of the international community.

                                                                                                            (Contd./4)

 

- 4 -

 

How much longer should Sri Lanka kow-tow with the so called peace facilitator, when Norway shamelessly acts as a duplicitous referee who openly collaborates with their terrorist protégé, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.  If Norway is to gain any credibility, she should at least now realise that as a peace facilitator she should adopt an even handed diplomatic approach and move away from her biased stance, which makes her a terrorist collaborator trying to prop up the destructive Tiger Terrorists who want to break up Sri Lanka, which will result in greater chaos within the island and destabilize the Indian sub-continent region as well.  Norway should forget about any two state solution that she would like to engineer in the capacity of the facilitator and allow the solution to come from within Sri Lanka, as in the final analysis, it has to be acceptable to the people of Sri Lanka. 

 

 

Yours very truly,

 

 

 

Mahinda Gunasekera

Honorary President