Comments on: Fear: A Personal Experience in Sri Lanka

By: sham2

sham2 — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 11:50:36 +0000

‘Ambush’ that left SAS trooper dead
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7337873.stm

please read this article and note the similiarties and and effectiveness of other wars being carried out. i hope the editor of groundviews is able to publish the full article as it would be a eye opener to most people here,

By: ange

ange — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 04:05:04 +0000

Thank you Benita for voicing what many of us are unable/unwilling to say. It helps when people from outside Sri Lanka articulate the reality here.

By: sham2

sham2 — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 03:57:36 +0000

this is like saying after 9/11 ney yorkers should be not blaming the Al queda but be scared of their own government?

which country are u from benita?

by the way, if you take a walk on the NY tube or London underground you will also see and hear such statements. cant u remember the killing of a running man in the london underground? wasn’t that state terror?

By: Uccai Siravas

Uccai Siravas — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 17:36:38 +0000

Sri Lanka and journalism have been at odds for a long time. Sri Lanka had kicked out very experienced journalists such as Paul Watson of Toronto Star (now Los Angeles Times), in the 80’s. Now, the only international journalists are bunch of Sinhalese journalists working for news agencies such as AP, AFP, Reuters. These guys (and gals) live comfortably in Colombo, simply cut and paste government handouts and do zero investigative journalism.

During the time of Ranjan Wijeratna, there was a programme of forcibly removing the eyes of Tamil prisoners and exporting them. It is not surprising that it took a Janpanese journalist to investigate and reveal this information. The Japanese journalist got suspicious when Sri Lanka was supplying large number of eyes to Japan.

[Edited out - if you do want to point to the incident you mention, please bring out the media stories you refer to. Comments that are potentially libelous will not be published here]. AFAIK, only the local Tamil media covered this cruelty.

Sri Lanka is a failed state. It will continue to be a failed state as long as the Sinhala people remain a bunch of asses — proud asses. Proud that Buddha has chosen them to preserve the true form of Buddhism (Theravada Buddhism) and gifted them the island to do their mission.

As long as they believe in this myth, they will not agree to any rational solution to the ethnic problem.

By: Justin

Justin — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:31:32 +0000

What the state does is propaganda against the LTTE. It is done in a subtle way.

When the lady announces that it is not enough to be cautious but alert for possible packages that could be bombs and asks people to inform authorities of anyone who seems suspicious, they mean that anyone could be dangerous in Sri Lanka.

The state carries out state terror, oppression and subjugation of people in the North East and conveys to the visitors “we are good guys look for bad guys” !

The lady should truthfully say “we all are bad guys please be careful”.” We love war and we are dangerously ugly warriors thirsting for human blood ” .”Please tighten your belts while in Sri Lanka”.

By: PeaceLover

PeaceLover — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:17:59 +0000

I agree with Kamal. TERRORISTs ARE TERRORISTs - there is no good TERRORIST in this world.

In my books, a person who kills un-armed civilians is a terrorist, regardless of the medium of killing, whether it is using a gun, using arial bombing, or using a suicide bomb.

In Sri Lanka, there were more than 50 to 60 thousand “civilians” were killed and most of them were Tamils. Of those, most of them were killed by the state forces for the Sri Lankan state. Now you decide who made a good terrorist in Sri Lanka. I agree with you Kamal. TERRORISTs ARE TERRORISTs, regardless of who they are even if they are an elected government.

Hope and Prey for peace for this wonderful island.

By: dravphile

dravphile — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:05:55 +0000

I believe Benita has missed out in understanding the bigoted Sinhala racism of false-history tutored Sinhalese, which is main reason for people acquiescing silently with current Stalinist government!

By: Kamalan

Kamalan — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 12:59:24 +0000

Kamal above sounds like Rajapakse and Brothers. Yes Terrorism is a big problem all over the world. I could not find any better discription for terrorism. Whats happning in world now how many people know Bin laden or al qida. before 9/11. but situation is diffrent now Means it just got worse. same in srilanka we just got worse off than ever before. Pls tell me if anybody have an idea how to deal with it other than killing innocent people (mainly Tamils), aid workers and school children? Proof is there that the both parties the state and the Ltte are in breach of human rights. Should we call them both are terrorists ? Then the both needs to be dealt by any means like Un forces or Un.

By: Exiled

Exiled — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 12:34:29 +0000

Kamal, you seemed to be too dismissive of our government. Benita Sumita has given a very true insight into the situation plaguing our country, through the eyes of an outsider. You talk about terrorists and that no terrorist is a good terrorist. This is quite an obvious fact. So what do you call a Government that is collaborating with a break-away terrorist group, namely the Pillyan Group and responsible for the daily abductions and extortions happening in SL today? I would call it a ‘Terrorist Government’. I hope you understand this clearly, because it is because of people like you that the rest cannot break free from fear and start a people’s movement which this country so badly needs.

By: Shy

Shy — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 11:16:43 +0000

just wondering what makes a terrorist, first of all. terrorism has many faces, which many people are not aware of. One which is most unaware of is, state terorism.