SINHALA GROUP OF MP’S TELL UNITED NATIONS HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR REFUGEES THAT STATISTICS ON SINHALESE REFUGEES ARE WRONG
By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles
September 02.01.30 AM:Mahajana Eksath Peramuna Leader Dinesh Gunawardena who was leading a Sinhala group of Members of Parliament told the representatives of the United Nation’s High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that the Commission’s statistics about Sri Lanka’s Internally Displaced Persons of the Provinces of North and East regarding the Sinhalese were basically wrong, indicating lower numbers than the actual figures.
A delegation of parliamentarians of the Sinhala MP’s group led by Dinesh Gunawardena told the representative of the UNHCR that in the draft report on refugees and Internally Displaced Persons of the North and East of Sri Lanka, the numbers in relation to the Sinhalese were very much lower than real figures.
Following, complaints from many Sinhalese organizations that the UNF government was giving only step motherly treatment to the Sinhalese people who were displaced due to the war the Sinhala Group of Parliamentarians decided to complain to the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees.
Dinesh Gunawardena said over 150,000 Sinhalese became refugees in the North due to the war waged by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Opposition parliamentarians, Mahipala Herath, Tissa Karaliyadda and M. K. D. S. Gunawardena, accompanied Dinesh Gunawardena in the delegation.
He said the UNHCR report on land property and housing in relation to the number of Sinhalese population and their rights in the North and the East were full of errors and misrepresentations
The delegation explained and presented facts regarding the injustices caused to the Sinhalese refugees and internally displaced persons in Sri Lanka.
Dinesh Gunawardena said the delegation that the delegation explained the demographic patterns and census of 1981 (the last census with full figures in relation to the North and East) and the Purana villages in the entire area.
He said the errors were caused mainly by overlooking reality and not hearing the views of the Sinhalese or their organizations from the area.
The permanent representative requested the delegation to submit a report on the facts presented so that it could be sent to the relevant office in the UN.
