Human Rights
Anderson Cooper and M.I.A. get in heated twitter feud over Sri Lanka
As M.I.A. tuned in to watch Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished, a film about the country’s war ending against the Tamil Tigers in 2009, on Wednesday, she was engaging in a different battle herself.
MIA (L) and Anderson Cooper
Starting what would become a multi-tweet feud with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, the Sri Lankan singer tweeted, “Anderson Cooper called me a terrorist for speaking out, and expressed support for the SLgov [Sri Lankan] when this was happening. Someone should make Anderson Cooper watch it/film it and show the world what happens when respected journos get it wrong.”
Cooper took to his Twitter to defend himself, saying, “M.I.A., you are mistaken. I never called you a terrorist. I don’t even know who you are other than the lady who sang at Super Bowl. By the way, I defended your finger pointing at the Super Bowl, so check your facts. I’ve no idea what you’re tweeting about.”
“YOU CALLED ME A LADY TAMIL TIGER when I talked about Tamil civilians dying, and u printed a retraction,” M.I.A. fired back. “In 2009 you linked to a article that was written about me with false info. There was a rebuttal on your 360 site.”
“M.I.A. you’ve gone from saying ‘I wrote,’ ‘I called you,’ to saying my CNN show blog had a link to an article. Big difference,” the esteemed journalist responded. “M.I.A. we link to many articles with different viewpoints, and we gave you an opportunity to respond.”
“Two months later once every Tamil had been silenced including me, the SLGOV carried out the killing of 40, 000 civilians,” M.I.A. tweeted.
To wrap things up, Cooper posted, “I can understand your frustration if someone wrote untrue things about you, and I’m glad you were able to respond,” which got a retweet from M.I.A.
“I’m glad you understand but please watch #killingfields because this is what I was trying to say,” adding, “P.S thank you for defending my finger, please watch Channel4 #killingfields.”
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