Travel to post Civil War Sri Lanka helps everyone
Travel to post Civil War Sri Lanka helps everyone
It is easy to forget that Australia has been very much isolated and protected from the deeply divisive mass radicalizations that Sri Lanka has suffered in the past. Save for a few horrific incidents, like the Bali bombing, the reality of terrorism does not really affect the domestic lives of ordinary Australians. As such the churn of hardcore propaganda can sometimes be mistaken for hard hitting, ground breaking journalism. It is not the fault of the reader that they have been handed splatter images and horror stories dreamed up in the think tanks of terrorist front organizations. It is not the viewers fault that they suffer from emotional overload when confronted with extreme emotional manipulations by people who willingly lie to achieve their ends. Yet it is the fault of the media organizations that mindlessly and uncritically act as the cheer squad for the terrorist fronts and representatives.
Ignorance in itself is not necessarily the fault of the ignorant because people’s lives have so many conflicting priorities. Who really has time to be an expert on every international issue on the planet? It is an impossible task and made harder when filtered through news sources that have their own agendas and world views to peddle. Experts on Sri Lanka, I know many, but experts on Sri Lanka in mainstream news reports are few and far between. As best many appear to regurgitate second hand news stories and activist websites. Media ignorance is harmless until they try to lash out in their ignorance and seek to enforce retribution in the name of justice. Turning to activist and terrorist front organizations to define the terms of justice is like turning to Animal Liberation to define a butcher. Yet this is precisely what is going on when a signed up member of a terrorist organization are given space to write their propaganda on the ABC Drum blog site. Worse still is their blind refusal to ask the hard question: Would they permit a member of Al Qaeda do the same. I deeply suspect that there would be a public outcry if the happened and the writer would be removed. Not so if it is an LTTE member. In place of critical thinking, wilful ignorance wins the day.
As a result Australians are being fed a warped and distorted view of Sri Lanka. A view that is often passed through ideological filters long before it is expressed. The real problem is that few people have been to Sri Lanka to compare the views expressed by our local self appointed experts with reality. Instead the whole island of Sri Lanka is being diagnosed and explained through a bunch of undergraduate style emotional rants. The grievances of the noisy minority are treated as if they cannot be wrong because aggrieved minorities are never wrong. Terrorists are viewed from the lens that anything that opposes George Bush’s ‘War on Terror’ is a good thing. As a result terrorists are white washed victims whilst those who oppose them are obviously oppressive ‘Neocons’. If ‘wilful ignorance’ could be expressed in a single word that word would be, ‘Partisan’. Domestic partisan issues like ‘boat people’, hatred of the Bush era and minority rights are using exaggerated anecdotes about Sri Lanka to make their unconnected cases. It is as if a cat having kittens in Sri Lanka proves that our migrant policies are wrong. The sad fact is that this cherry picking attitude is playing into the hands of terrorist fronts that have little regard for our domestic problems. Instead the terrorist fronts are using our angst to sell their agenda and justify their fundraising activities on our soil. This is precisely the situation that led to the LTTE being able to raise over 300 million dollars a year right under the noses of western governments. This revelation is a sad reflection that points directly to the complacency of our governments to prevent this and by our negligence we are complicit in the terrorist activities.
The blindness to the suffering caused by terrorism is not cured by running a dishonest propaganda campaign in the opposite direction. However there needs to be far more balance and forethought when using so called experts. Signed members of a terrorist organization are not a reliable source of truth. Fundraisers for terrorist organizations are criminals and should be treated with utmost caution. Horror stories from anonymous sources could very well be propaganda cooked up by a terrorist front organization. What effort if any was there to check the sources of these allegations? Or did they just get the sensation headline story out in blind ignorance, hoping to be vindicated later?
The only cure to ignorance in any subject is direct knowledge. My advice for those that seek to know more than the questionable headline or the shock journalism is to travel to Sri Lanka and see for yourself. Away from the glossy government rhetoric and the grungy anti government rhetoric there is much to learn. Why waste time believing charge sheets drawn up by those that have no real knowledge when you can actually go there? Talk to ordinary people and listen to what they have to say. Go to places that just a few years ago were too dangerous to go to. Spend time and look. See whether the war that lasted for over 25 years is over. Then come home and decide how many people in the Australian media actually know what they talking about.
Travel to Sri Lanka and become informed.
Now that Christopher Hitchens has passed is all forgiven?
Now that Christopher Hitchens has passed is all forgiven?
There is website called Christopher Hitchens Watch which basically pours scorn all over Hitches for everything that he has done, said and failed to do. It is not that Hitchens should be held up to scrutiny but the way in which the ‘Watch’ site conducts itself is to go for the cheap shot, the nasty remark or the hollow polemic. In short, it mimics the worst elements of their subject in order to criticize him. For me, such shallow efforts to tear someone down and denigrate them are pointless and counterproductive. All they managed to do was offer Hitchens the ‘cloak of the martyr’ where he can claim moral ascendancy as the victim of so many falsehoods. Now that Christopher Hitchens has passed away I am yet to see any comment from the ‘Watch’ site. Only time will tell how they will handle the death and the eventually fading of its importance.
There is a tendency across the public sphere to not speak ill of the dead. Particularly when it is so close to someone passing away and the family are still grieving. Few families would like to read about a hidden scandal before the body is even cold. Fewer would welcome a blistering attack upon the reputation of their loved one or respect friend who is now unable to defend themselves. This kind of attack is rightly seen as being underhanded and cowardly. It is the kind of attack we have seen from people like Germaine Greer after the death of Steve Irwin and by Derrin Hinch after the death of almost anyone. It is also the kind of attack that Christopher Hitchens made after Mother Teresa died.
No doubt, that amongst certain sectors of the socialist mindset this made Hitchens a hero. His lifelong obsession with anti catholic rants would have had many of them punching the sky with triumph. His unsourced, unreferenced book attacking mother Teresa was just icing on the cake to feed their deeply held prejudices against her. Yet for an encore he would return and put out another polemic called “God is Not Great – How religion poisons everything”. In this way he managed to maintain his credentials with the most vitriolic and radical of the secularists. Later adopted as one of the so called “Four Horsemen” of the “New Atheist Movement” he found himself on the lecture and debating circuit doing what he does best: polemics.
Despite being extremely well read and boasting a professorship, Hitchens is rarely remembered for any major intellectual achievement. I would be very surprised if anyone could point to any scholastic contribution he has made. Instead his life appears to have been taken up with tearing down his enemies with longwinded emotionally charged insults. It seems a waste that such wit lacked the wits to understand that had contributed nothing of any lasting value to the world.
No doubt there will be a line up people who want to remember Hitchens as some kind of hero for attacking their ideological enemies with such relentless vitriol. There will also be those that applaud when he attacked good and decent people like Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa. There will be those that thought his idea of arresting the Pope as he visited England was brilliant. Such attitudes speak volumes about the type of groupies that Hitchens attracted more than those he attacked. Unfortunately for the rest of the world, those that do have a grip on reality, it was viewed little more that attention seeking and self promotion by playing the controversy card.
In assessing what Hitchens means to history I am left with deep suspicion that he means very little. The lack of scrutiny that his books had whilst he was alive and surrounded by groupies will be replaced with a clinical and forensic analysis of his writings. I doubt that many of them will stand up to the light of day. In time even Hitchens’ name will fade from memory. And in long distant future when people mention Mother Teresa there only mention of Hitchens hatchet job will be “Christopher who?”
It may be easy to forgive Christopher Hitchens for his failings as a human being but it is far easier to forget that he ever existed.
Regarding the Sri Lankan Campaign for Peace and Justice – Follow the money
The ‘Sri Lankan Campaign for Peace’ and Justice touts itself as a legitimate charity whose concern for Sri Lanka is primarily human rights. As such they demand to be given recognition as honest voices and informed observers of Sri Lanka. Their slick website has quotes from Desmond Tutu, Brad Adams of Human rights watch and Jan Egeland from the UN. This is dispersed between rolling images of children behind barbed wire, broken buildings, sad faced children with black pottus on their foreheads. They have a blogroll, Twitter feed and a Facebook page.
According to their own description:
The Sri Lanka Campaign is a global non-partisan movement calling for:
- Effective humanitarian relief
- An end to human rights abuses
- Repeal of anti-terror regulations
- A credible war crimes enquiry
Featured on the
Sri Lanka Campaign website. Non-partisan huh?
You can almost be led to believe that the Sri Lanka Campaign resides in and is directly connected to Sri Lanka. In fact the organization is located in England. Grayston House, Charles Square, London, N1 6HT, UNITED KINGDOM.
You could even assume that because they are quoting Desmond Tutu, Brad Adams and Jan Egeland that these people were endorsing the website. Unfortunately a quick scan of their website puts that false assumption to bed. The quotes are just there as window dressing to make their site look credible by association.
Are they are really a ‘global non-partisan movement’? I suppose if the internet is ‘global’ then by the same token all websites are ‘global’.
But non-partisan? I seriously doubt that can pass that test.
The error filled and biased Channel 4 documentary called ‘Sri Lanka Killing fields’ is called a ‘groundbreaking documentary’ that is linked to their site. Readers are urged to click on their automated petition collector in order to automatically petition UN Secretary Ban ki Moon to set up an international process to investigate so called ‘credible allegations’ from the Darusman Report. On the automated ‘Tell Others’ page you can add a list of other people so you can automatically spam 10 others about this website. The blogroll is filled with continuous streams of attacks against the government of Sri Lanka and very little criticism of the LTTE. Secretary of Defence Gotabaya Rajapaksa has been particularly singled out as a ‘brutal autocrat’ who is portrayed as dishonest and sneaky. Sri Lanka is portrayed as a hell hole where one of the most important problems is gang of criminals called ‘Grease Devils’. More concerning is the wild and unsubstantiated accusation that the Sri Lankan Armed forces were raping their male captives.
Despite what people think about the validity of their blogs there is no way that they called non-partisan. To be fair they describe the LTTE as ruthless. Yet calling the LTTE a terrorist organization appears to an anathema. However they are indignant about reports of the dead LTTE leader Prabhakaran’s house being bulldozed. The Sri Lankan Campaign may not side with LTTE but being absolutely and dedicated against everything that they Sri Lankan Government do is still, by definition, ‘partisan’.
People in Glass Houses
We must be aware that the Sri Lankan Campaign is not without its own negative baggage and associations. Like all organization that use the banner of ‘human rights’ there needs to be evidence that they are legitimately working toward the lofty ideals that they claim to support. Anyone with a website and PayPal account can set up a bogus human rights charity and call for donations. Where the money goes is anybody’s guess.
The list of names on the advisory council looks impressive at first glance. That is until you realized who many of these people are. Some do have very checked backgrounds and have engaged in some very odd behaviour.
Beate Arnestad the filmmaker of ‘My Daughter the Terrorist’.
Professor Chellaney who wrote the editorial ‘Behind The Sri Lankan Bloodbath’ where he praises the concept of Eelamand condemns India for helping Sri Lanka defeat the LTTE.
Noam Chomsky the leftist activist who appears to have scant direct knowledge of Sri Lanka.
Charles Glass the former Hezbollah hostage.
Bruce Haigh the renown critic of Sri Lanka who believes that ex-LTTE fighters would pose no security threat in Australia.
Bianca Jagger the ex-wife of the Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger. Surely this is a joke. When has she ever set foot in Sri Lanka?
Antony Loewenstein who is a rabid serial critic of Sri Lanka and apologist for the LTTE. He also appears to have a Zionist fixation of some kind. If you really want to be freaked out, start reading his blogs.
Professor Emeritus Stuart Rees, the director of the controversial Sydney Peace Prize (foundation). (Noam Chomski won the prize this year.)
Teesta Setalvad who was found to have fabricated evidence of atrocities after the Godhra riots in 2002. Surely you would want to run a mile from this person.
Teestsa the evidence fabricator.
And many more….
Where did they come from?
The random selection of what can be described as ‘celebrity activists’ may be questionable but who is financially supporting this ‘Campaign’?
There are appeals for donation on their website but there is little information about their finances.
The Sri Lankan Campaign does stipulate on its own website that:
“Our start-up funding has come from the Network for Social Change, the Tinsley Foundation, and members of the Council of Advisors”
The ‘Network for Social Change’ is not a charity but a funding source for starting project that have a desire to make some kind of social change. They appear to be a generic cash cow for organizations that apply for grants. There is a lot of platitudes about the environment, fixing the causes of social problems and population on their site.
According to the ‘Network for Social Change’ financial report:
‘Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice’ received £12,606 in 2011 as ‘Start-up funding’.
The objectives of the grant were stated as a:
“Campaign to draw attention to ongoing human rights abuses in Sri Lanka and to encourage foreign governments to press for monitoring.”
The ‘Tinsley Foundation’ is a much less benign and has some very specific conditions for funding.
Objectives and activities
The purpose of the charity is to apply its capital and income to a number of specific charities, and more generally to:
- Charities which promote human rights and democratisation and/or which educate against racism, discrimination and oppression.
- Charities which promote self-help in fighting poverty and homelessness.
- Charities which provide reproductive health education in underdeveloped countries, but specifically excluding charities whose policy is against abortion or birth control. (emphasis added)
The Tinsley Foundation openly declares its pro abortion agenda that targets developing nations. This revelation may not sit well with many in Sri Lanka where abortion is considered socially repulsive and is illegal.
The size of the grant made to the Sri Lankan Campaign is not directly stipulated in their financial for 2009 report. However they do say that:
“During the year the charity made 17 grants and donations totalling £101,500.”
We may reasonably assume any figure from £5,000 to £10,000 as being worth the effort of filling in the application.
Cha Ching, instant Human Rights Organization
The bazaar world of activist funding through agenda driven organizations like the ‘Tinsley Foundation’ and the ‘trust anyone’ approach of the ‘Network for Social Change’ is a recipe for abuse. There is always a possibility of extremists using the money to fund partisan campaigns whilst claiming to be ‘non-partisan’. In the case of the ‘Sri Lankan Campaign’ any pretence of being ‘non-partisan’ is blown away as soon as you read their blog, campaign sheet, press released, twits and Facebook. Not only do they have the most vulgar exploitation of half truths and falsehoods they willingly associate themselves with some very shadowy characters; such as: Teesta Setalvad and Antony Loewenstein. Yet the true measure of any campaign should be based up its successes more than its noisy indignation. In this regard the website has listed it greatest successes as:
1. Lobbying for trade agreements to be dependent on good behavior
2. Using people power
3. Subverting the government’s grip on the media
4. Working with religious leaders in Sri Lanka
5. Naming and shaming the international community
6. Supporting local human rights defenders
7. Challenging those who remain silent
8. Being a truly independent, non-partisan forum
9. Building a global network of experts
Even if we are to assume that they were responsible for the first two points (which looks very doubtful) the remaining seven points are little more than fluff. “Subverting the government’s grip on the media” in the age of YouTube? You have to be kidding. Any temptation to donate to this self important group is easy to resist.
If this is the measure of success then you are better off burning the money instead.
The Dr Sam Pari scandal gets worse – alias Sampavi – alias Sham
The Dr Sam Pari scandal gets worse – alias Sampavi – alias Sham
Sam Pari’s profile image from ABC Drum
The Sri Lankan Government must have grown tired of continually accused of war crimes by people claiming to be human rights advocates. They could have sat it out waiting for the well organized critics to become tired but seems to be no indication of this happening soon. Meanwhile the controversy is played out across the media in Australia.
Below is a partial scan of a document that Sam Pari filled in for the LTTE. I have covered over personal details, such as phone number and home address for privacy reason. The first red arrow shows that this is an official LTTE document. The second red arrow shows Dr Sam Pari’s photograph. Reader will also note that this has been filled in by hand and signed.
The complete document can be found on this link.
Below is the English translation of the above scan:
Below is another partial scan of the same document where Sam Pari explains what she has been doing for the LTTE.
English translation of the same document.
The gray boxes are there for privacy reasons only. I have also underlined the important details.
As the documents indicate they were recovered from the Wanna district after the Sri Lankan Forces took control from the LTTE.
Near the end of the war the Sri Lankan government recovered a huge amount of LTTE produced documents and photographs. This was because the LTTE often had to retreat before they had time to destroy the evidence.
Here is a copy of the last page signed by Sam Pari using her alias Sampavi
A closer look. Dated 29-12-2004
As I said in a previous post Dr Sam Pari has a lot of explaining to do.
Is that Dr Sam Pari?
Is that Dr Sam Pari?
Yes it is.
Here she is in Martin Place Sydney in July 2009. That must be the biggest poster of the LTTE leader Prabhakaran in Australia. We remember Prabhakaran don’t we? Conscripts child soldiers, over 200 suicide bombers and a cyanide necklace for every cadre. A ruthless terrorist by every description.
Why is the so called defender of human rights and writer for the ABC Drum Sam Pari in photos with uniformed terrorists?
She has a lot of explaining to do.
From the Drum Website
Sam Pari
Dr Sam Pari is the spokesperson of the Australian Tamil Congress. She is also a panelist at the International Peace Research Association Conference 2010. She has previously volunteered in war and tsunami ravaged regions of Sri Lanka.
Stories by Sam Pari
- 5 November 2010: If Zimbabwe, why not Sri Lanka?
- 7 July 2010: Asylum seekers set sail in a sea of silence
Update:
Additional information about Dr Sam Pari has come through. Read about it here
Sri Lanka hammers the ABC network over its reporting
Sri Lanka hammers the ABC network over its reporting
Following a report by the 7.30 program on the ABC in Australia the Sri Lankan government has used the video below as a response.
Sri Lankan Civil War History: Last Rebel Base falls
Sri Lankan Civil War History: Last Rebel Base falls
First published March 3rd 2009 12:10
Sri Lankan Civil War: Last Rebel Base falls
Soldiers on the main road into the last LTTE base.
The last base is taken
March 3 2009
Breaking News
The LTTE (Tamil Tigers) are now confined to small villages and the jungles in an area of less than 50 Km/sq. The map of the war zone has already been redrawn by the Sri Lankan Military and published on their website. Such is the confidence of the army that are willing boast of this victory in such a short period of time.
The crucial fall came after an intense street by street gun fight in the town of PUTHUKKUDIYIRUPPU. Now that the army control the PUTHUKKUDIYIRUPPU Junction the LTTE no longer have any base of operation.
The intensity of the fighting is evident.
Signs of a Crumbling Empire
4 senior LTTE cadres are scheduled for execution in front of a firing squad by the LTTE themselves. They were accused of trying to escape to government controlled areas.
The LTTE Intelligence Chief Pottu Amman has been taken from his normal duties and told to fight with the regular soldiers.
In the last few days a group of LTTE cadres came into the Demarcated Safe Zone and tried to abduct several children to use as soldiers. One the civilian refugees in the Safe Zone wrestled a gun off one of the cadres and killed four of them. The LTTE left without the children. This incident is said to have taken place in front of NGO’s and the UN.
There have also been reports that the LTTE is trying to recruit children in large numbers to replenish their dwindling numbers.
A female suicide bomber aged somewhere between 16-26 blew herself up near army troops west of the combat area.
The LTTE satellite Television Broadcast ground station was captured. In it were found videos of a well known Indian politician Vaiko associating in a friendly manner with the LTTE chief Prabhakaran.
Indian politician here conversing with LTTE leader Prabhakaran
Here they are from another angle. Vaiko has a lot explaining to do. He is currently on bail from prison in India.
Prabhakaran is reported to be still in the area but his son is running the command.
The LTTE calls for a ceasefire have fallen on deaf ears.
What Next?
The civilians still stuck in the war zone are under enormous strain. The UN reports that sending food and supplies into the war zone is being thwarted by both sides.
It does appear as though it is just a matter of time before the LTTE either implodes or are forced back into the jungle to act as guerrilla fighters once more. However their command structure appears to have been decimated and their leader once called the ‘Sun God’ is now on the run.
One thing that is unlikely is the LTTE heeding any calls to surrender or lay down their arm. The Sri Lankan President has promised amnesty to lower ranked cadres who surrender. However the LTTE leader Prabhakaran has been made no such offer. He has nothing to lose by continuing to fight on desperately or planning a climatic protest like a mass suicide.
More News will be passed on as it comes through.
Proof of where they are.
