Dr. Nimalka Fernando (NF) in his letter to The Island of 21 March titled, 'A tale of two cities: Chennai & Mullivakal' had said, 'When Mullivakal was under seige why did Karunanidhi not send a ship? At least the late Hon. Rajiv Gandhi sent parippu...' When Prabhakaran was cornered at Vedamarachchi in 1989, Rajiv sent Jets over Sri Lanka, a signal exposing India's role in the conflict. Otherwise, the war would not have dragged on till 2009. After the 'Parippu expedition', Rajiv sent the Indian Peace Keeping Force, which was a disaster for India. The end result was his own demise. So India, has already burnt its fingers once.

It was during Indira Gandhi's regime that Tamil Nadu became a safe haven for the LTTE which destabilised Sri Lanka. So obviously, India had to take the responsibility in sheltering refugees. NF had also said that, 'For years, HR defenders of Sri Lanka worked hard with INGO's'. The claim that NGO's and INGO's did development work is a fallacy. All their funds, machinery etc went to the LTTE to strengthen their activities. Human Rights allegations are only to countries like Sri Lanka and terrorists are immune from them. They also do not apply to countries in the so called 'international community' which use drones against civilians as in Afghanistan and Iraq. NF had referred to children who disappeared from Beach Rd. What about the thousands who disappeared on their way to school ending up as child combatants and children who had to be 'donated' to the LTTE?

Both Karunanidhi and Jayalalithaa are playing for Tamil Nadu votes. And The Congress is depending on them to stay in power. Externally sponsored terror brought misery to the Sri Lankan people for 30 years and not to those who live in greener pastures. It was India which created a 'Frankenstein'. Therefore, in contrast to what NF had said it is debatable whether Colombo should comply to New Delhi.

P. A. Samaraweera

island.lk