Red Cross workers' killings
- effort to discredit President and Government, and tarnish Sri Lanka
[Monday, June 04, 2007 - 16.30 GMT]    

The timing of the abduction and later killing of the two Red Cross volunteer workers last weekend seems to be clearly aimed at discrediting both President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Government on the issue of Human Rights violations, and tarnishing the image of Sri Lanka abroad a spokesman for the Presidential Secretariat said.  

This appears to be part of the general propaganda and disinformation build-up against the President and the Government ahead of the forthcoming Public Hearing on Tsunami Reconstruction and Human Rights by the European Parliament in Brussels; and President Rajapaksa’s scheduled visit to Geneva, where the ICRC has its headquarters, to address the annual sessions of the International Labour Organization (ILO).
 
It was significant that the abduction of the two Red Cross workers at Colombo Fort, who were later found killed near Ratnapura, took place almost concurrent in time with the President’s meeting with the wives and family members of the disappeared persons last Friday evening.
 
At this meeting the President sought to allay the fears of the next of kin of disappeared persons, made arrangements for their welfare and explained to them that many of those said to have been abducted had re-appeared, often without record; and that investigations into actual cases of disappearances and abductions were largely hampered by false complaints of such incidents.
 
The President has also ordered an immediate and thorough inquiry into these two abductions and killings.
 
Whoever that carried last Friday’s abduction of the Red Cross workers in Colombo Fort seemed to be keen on drawing the attention of the public, and more importantly human rights organizations and the international community, to the constant propaganda barrage against the President and the Government on alleged human violations; and away from the President’s explanation about the actual situation regarding the disappeared or abducted persons, based on official statistics that did not bear out the large numbers of allegedly disappeared or abducted as reported in the media and stated by human rights organizations.  

Another aspect of this propaganda build up is the wide publicity given to the alleged order by the Police for all Tamils resident in lodges in Colombo and its suburbs to leave the city within 24 hours, with the Police providing transport for immediate evacuation. Some sections of the media even described this as ethnic cleansing of Tamils in Colombo. The Police had never issued such orders. What the Police had wanted, as explained by the IGP, was for persons staying in lodges for long periods to establish their identity and explain the reasons for such stay after the business they had come to transact in the city had been concluded, the medical attention they sought had been obtained, or any other reason. This is again a bid to bring discredit to the Government, particularly among the Tamil people, in an alleged move to show its lack of concern for human rights.  

President Mahinda Rajapaksa today paid his last respects to the two Red Cross workers who were killed at the Colombo funeral parlour where their remains are lying.

The Presidential Secretariat regrets these dangerous, concerted and cowardly efforts to discredit the President and the Government, and tarnish the image of Sri Lanka, vis-à-vis human rights.  

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Last Updated Date: June 04, 2007 - 16.30 GMT