The move taken by present regime to appoint serving and ex-military personal at our diplomatic missions was roundly criticized many an anti-Sri Lanka sections here and abroad. But the move has paid dividends with some spectacular successes scored by those officials against the propaganda juggernaut and the activities of the LTTE in the Western countries. This decision was taken at the backdrop of stupendous challenges faced by the country posed by the LTTE propaganda machine hell bent to punish Sri Lanka, angered by LTTE's destruction. The move was basically arrived at considering the fact the successful military officials are fully focused in achieving the given task however difficult their goal may be. The lethargic and opportunistic attitudes of some of the civilian officials appointed at the missions cost the country dearly leaving the LTTE propagandist a field day over the years.
Major General Shavendra Silva, Sri Lanka's Deputy Representative to the UN is a brilliant case in point. He has succeeded in educating and showing the true picture of what has really been happening in our country to the Western audience misled by the well-oiled LTTE propaganda machine. The latest achievement scored by De. Silva has been of a similar effort. Major General Silva has been able to show how fraudulent the latest Chanel-04 video named "Sri Lanka's Killing Field" has been to a section of Western audience in New York, attended by the Channel 4 Director Callum Macrae himself. (You can see Major. Genral Shavendra Silva's explanations and responses in this link). The responses and explanations by the military officer at the event attended by some NGOs comprising Crime group Society, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and some ambassadors make the Director of the Cannel-04 embarrassed and dumb funded.
He proves in his responses that
(1) Thamilvani Gnanakumar appearing in the video was in fact an ex-LTTE carder back in January in 2008. She was using three names in different places and was later serving in an LTTE hospital having come to Sri Lanka from the UK on a 06 months visa.
(2) The group of people who were shouting inside a bunker were in fact telling in Tamil not to film them while in the video clip what they said has been distorted
(3) The footage shown as taken by the UN satellites showing bombing on a jungle had in fact been taken by the Sri Lankan Air Force (SLAF) which indicated on the footage's background.
(4) The doctor who was talking in the video had been forced to do so by the LTTE. This has been revealed by this particular doctor later.
This blog site also shows that the shooting scene in the video alleged to have been carried out by SL security forces had in fact been carried out by the LTTE carders in SL army uniforms. The victims were the SL security forces persons captured by the LTTE. The original sound track was in Tamil and later had been changed in a bizarre Sinhala language.
Many other spectacular successes achieved by military officials appointed at out foreign missions recently have helped Sri Lanka to salvage the situation at least to a certain extent. Arresting of KP in Malaysia in August in 2009 was also as result of a great deal of efforts made by the then deputy high commissioner, a senior military officer of our mission in that country.
As I said earlier one of the reasons for the LTTE's propaganda machine's spectacular success over the years have been the inaction, ignorance, incompetence and the opportunistic attitudes on the part of the officials of our foreign missions. Most of those who were posted (and many still serving) in the missions were engaging merely in their personal matters leaving aside the great responsibilities they were expected to carry out on behalf of the country. Most of them have been spending their time in the foreign missions merely to educate their children. Foreign affaires of our country made a rapid downward spiral with the start of appointing political stooges to the missions from mid 1970s. This move was followed by the subsequent regimes that came to power making the matters bad to worst setting in motion a circle of disastrous consequences to the country.
1 comment:
Your implication is that political stooges are now not appointed to diplomatic posts. In fact the level of political stooges currently being appointed to these posts are at a record high, and the latest batch is mind numbingly political.
While I agree there was much in the C4 video that is incorrect and partial to the LTTE, there is nevertheless some footage which just on their own is incontrovertible evidence of HR abuses. It is not to say that it was any worse than what the LTTE did but the govt. must be held to a higher standard than terrorists.
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