COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s military stopped scores of ethnic Tamils protesters from entering the capital yesterday ahead of a Commonwealth summit as a British TV crew was barred from a former warzone.
Sri Lanka had hoped the three-day Commonwealth summit, due to start Friday. It would showcase its post-war revival after security forces crushed the decades-long Tamil separatist conflict in 2009. But it is turning into a major public relations disaster as some of the Commonwealth bloc’s 53 members and rights groups focus attention on the island’s human rights record.
The government also ordered Britain’s Channel 4 TV crew not to travel to the former conflict area of Vavuniya after pro-government activists staged a protest and prevented their train from leaving north-central Anuradhapura town. Callum Macrae, director of Channel 4’s award-winning documentary: “No Fire Zone: Sri Lanka Killing Fields”, said police told them to return to Colombo.
Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella said the TV crew were asked to turn back for their own safety. Visiting British Foreign Secretary William Hague said he raised the issue with his Sri Lankan counterpart, Gamini Lakshman Peiris, during ministerial talks ahead of the Colombo Commonwealth summit.
“We (Britain) are much disturbed,” Hague said at the British High Commission (embassy). “Free access is very important, to go anywhere they wish.” “It is natural for any country hosting an international event to come under focus. We believe in freedom of expression and expect them to uphold it,” Hague said.
In another development, hundreds of pro-government activists blocked opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe from entering his party headquarters where members and guests discussed Sri Lanka’s human rights record ahead of the summit.
“Protesters tried to pull the opposition leader from his car but his driver managed to lock the doors and take him to safety,” his spokesman Saman Athaudahetti said.
The Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) was hit by a new pullout Tuesday as the premier of Mauritius joined those of India and Canada in boycotting the event.
British Premier David Cameron has also been under pressure to boycott the event, but he has promised to hold “tough conversations” with President Mahinda Rajapakse about “accountability” issues. AFP
