Human Rights
Denial is not just a river in Egypt: Beleaguered by accusations of war crimes Gota to release his own report on the ‘humanitarian’ operation at a five star hotel in Colombo
July 31: On the heels of a damning UN report that says there is credible evidence of war crimes in the last stages of Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war, Secretary Ministry of Defence and Presidential sibling Gotabaya Rajapakse has sent out invitations to media and other organisations to attend the launch of his own report.
The launch will take place Monday August 1 at 10am at the Grand Ballroom of the Hilton Hotel in Colombo. The report titled Humanitarian Operation – Factual analysis will be an attempt to
discredit the UN panel report and the evidence of alleged war crimes depicted in the Channel 4 documentary.
Channel 4 came out with new evidence of alleged war crimes last week actually naming Gotabaya Rajapakse and Major General Shavendra Silva of having massacred surrendering rebel cadre in what has now become known as the infamous white flag massacre. Shavendra Silva is seen in the video vehemently denying the charges and blaming LTTE sympathisers and apologists for the accusations.
Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse is likely to hold steadfast to the government stance that the entire war was a humanitarian operation with zero civilian casualties.
Last week top sources in the US congress told Lanka Independent it is precisely this approach and the total lack of sympathy shown by the government of Sri Lanka that pushed its Committee on Foreign Affairs to pass a bill slicing aid to Sri Lanka.
Capitol Hill sources also said they had stopped believing the statements made by the Sri Lanka Embassy in Washington DC due to its habit of issuing blanket denials of any wrongdoing rather than engaging with victims and having a dialogue at public forums.
Indeed foreign affairs experts say it is the inane denials of credible reports such as the UN panel report rather than intelligent engagement on key issues that are making it more difficult for humanitarian organisations, the UN agencies and the international community to believe anything that emanates from the propaganda machines of the Defense Secretary.
9 Comments to “Denial is not just a river in Egypt: Beleaguered by accusations of war crimes Gota to release his own report on the ‘humanitarian’ operation at a five star hotel in Colombo”
October 8, 2011 at 3:26 pm
I could read a book about this without findnig such real-world approaches!
August 2, 2011 at 6:50 am
Hi Sonali ,
Do not pay too much attention to this Ruwan F , he is a person who was openly supporting 18 th Amendment , basically a Rrajapakse sycophant!
if you carefully read/watch the Gota’s comment , he never denies the white flag saga , what he says is , “no body contacted me “, it is true no body contacted GR , only MR & BR were the persons whom W. Nambiar and other Norwegian authorities telephoned.
earlier Nambiar was quoting ” it was LTTE carders who shot at those surrenders ” but now with these new 47 odd photographic evidence , which Jonathan Miller possess are stark contrast to Nambiar’s statement , it shows scores of LTTE carders bodies lying on the ground , who shot at them and who took those photographs , i have never seen those photographs before in any of pro LTTE web sites (Tamilnet, genocidesrilanka.blogspot.com etc )either , which means , if the photographs are genuine there was a person to take photo shots at the scene ! lanka Enews carries an interesting story of the culprit , it is really worth checking this out Sonali.
Regards
Srilal
August 2, 2011 at 3:36 am
Hi Sonali,
your prediction that ‘Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse is likely to hold steadfast to the government stance that the entire war was a humanitarian operation with zero civilian casualties’ did not hold out to be true.
This report ultimately admitted that, in fact, there were civilian casualties. Do be careful in the future in making unguarded predictions as this impacts on your own credibility.
I am a in total opposition to the Rajapaksa government but do feel that much of this blame for what Sri Lanka is now is due to an unprofessional media. For example, many of the journalists who have fled abroad (NOT including YOU, noyahr and some others) have not put pen to paper or held any position in electronic media except be office bearers in dubious free media organisations. Some of those who contribute to this website belong to this category. Sri Lanka needs to build its own fearless media community up.
Pandukabaya
August 1, 2011 at 6:56 am
THE SITUATION SHOULD BE FACED DIRECTLY ,THE ISSUE NEED BE INVESTIGATED,GOTA CAN SHOW HIS PART OF WHAT HAPPENED? DENYING ALONE MAKE THE SITUATION WORSE,I AM A PROUD SRI LANKAN N PROVEN INNOCENT AFTER INVESTIGATION.SHAVENDRA SILVAN GOTA R SHOULD CALM DOWN AND FOLLOW THE PROCESS.
July 31, 2011 at 10:50 pm
Hi Ruwan F
The US bill does not envisage banning humanitarian aid. Please read my article on the subject of the Bill
http://www.lankastandard.com/2011/07/us-congressional-hearing-on-accountability-in-sri-lanka-to-follow-ban-on-development-aid/
Also I have not claimed the channel 4 documentary as credible. But I believe that allegations such as these deserve to be investigated independently. I also believe that what is now in the open is prima facie evidence.
In the above article I say that credible reports such as the UN panel report need to be engaged with rather than denied wholesale. And yes I do believe that the UN panel of experts report was a credible process over time and was a sincere effort by those involved as a fact finding mission. It may not have been perfect but it needs further investigation and engagement not blanket denial.
July 31, 2011 at 3:21 pm
Wonder if Gota will have a question/answer period, guess he will be happy that Sonali is not here to raise the right questions? lets hope who does go to this show, does raise the right questions. Gota seems to fold under questioning
October 8, 2011 at 9:15 pm
gota will not be able to deny when evidence is trotted out
October 10, 2011 at 12:30 pm
Hey, that’s powferul. Thanks for the news.
July 31, 2011 at 2:28 pm
Sonali, Sonali, Sonali, What is wrong with you? What evidence did Channel 4 gave in this weekly episode for you to call it “credible”? My foot. The problem with Channel 4 is this, you may already know but let me elaborate for anybody who wouldn’t know. Of the mainstream British TV, the BBC has a long running soap called Eastenders and the ITV has Coronation Street, running even longer. These soaps quite often show murder, thuggery, incest and drug use as the ordinary life of Britain and the viewers seem to accept it, the soaps are popular immensely. Channel 4 tried things like Brookside those days but they failed miserably to catch the audience. Therefore they commissioned this “Channel 4 news” company to produce, fact-like stories and that is exactly what is happennning. Channel 4 will stop this when the people realise oneday that these are fictions. In fact, they are mini-movies made by putting together a few clips of a war situation and their own creations. The two guys who identified themselves as Fernando and Sasrutha in that movie were never soldiers but Sinhala assylum seekers. They’ll stop fooling around if you could kindly suggest another way to claim the citizenship of one of these big countries.There is at least a third person willing to speak to Channel 4. This guy used to travel on buses in 1980s in Sri Lanka carrying a fake AirForce ID.He is in hiding in Britain but looking at avenues to claim assylum. So don’t be too excited.
The Humanitarian organisation as you call them, are not quite humanitarian are they? Why would they want the western governments to ban Aid to Sri Lanka to starve the poor people in the country off for whatever the reason? Not quite humnitarian are they? During the war, while helping the LTTE, these organisations continually campaigned against Sri Lanka. yet they are in your eyes humanitarians, yes my foot in deed.