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The National Geographic magazine in a special feature on World Heritage sites published three photographs of Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura and said in 1985 the terrorists of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam attacked Anuradhapura and massacred nearly two hundred people. Asking how to prevent these crimes against culture the magazine said Unesco officials say that the World Heritage treaty needed legal muscle including economic sanctions. Publishing a full page aerial photograph of Ruwanweliseya shrouded beautifully in jungle mist the October 2002 issue of the magazine under the photograph of the greatest monument built by the epic king of the Sinhalese who was also their foremost hero Dutugemunu said, “Jungle mist flows like incense smoke over the Ruwanweli stupa a Buddhist pilgrimage site in the sacred city of Anuradhapura. Shrines and religious statues (left) rise throughout the 2500-year-old center. A World Heritage designation could not shield the site from political violence in 1985 as Tamil separatists attacked the city and massacred nearly 200 people. The destruction last year of the Bamian Buddhas in Afganistan has fired a debate about how to prevent these “crimes against culture” Unesco officials say the World Heritage treaty needs legal muscle, including the use of economic sanction.” The magzine listed, the sacred city of Anuradhapura, ancient city of Polonnruwa, ancient city of Sigiriya , Sinharaja Forest Reserve, sacred city of Kandy, old town of Galle and its fortifications, and Golden Temple of Dambulla as World Heritage sites in Sri Lanka. In one of the most notorious terrorist attacks in May 1985, Tamil Tigers dressed as government soldiers in a hijacked bus entered Anuradhapura and went on a killing spree. They attacked the Sri Maha Bodhi Tree shrine, grown from sapling of the tree under which Siddhartha Gautama attained Buddhahood and brought to Sri lanka more than a thousand years ago, and then rampaged through the town. Nearly 200 civilians including Buddhist nuns and monks , women and children among the pilgrims died in the hour-long attack. (EOM) (02/10/01 go2lanka.com) |