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JOHN AMARATUNGA, MINISTER WHO RUNS THE SRI LANKA POLICE WAS SCARED AWAY BY LTTE FROM JAFFNA AND RETURNS TO COLOMBO
John Amaratunga
(file photo)
By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles
August 11.12.00 PM:John Ameratunga, Sri Lanka’s Minister of Interior and Christian Affairs who was on an official visit to Jaffna had to depart from his itinerary , stop visiting some places and returned to Colombo due to protests of front organizations of the rebel group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, sources in Jaffna said.
Ameratunga who would not take such a move ever in the South of the country due to the notorious power of the political thugs he is alleged to use very often cancelled his visit to the District Secretarial Office avoiding the mobs a LTTE front organization had assembled and returned to Colombo after meeting Dr. Thomas Sauvundranayagam, the Catholic Bishop of Jaffna at St James Church in Guru Nagar. John Ameratunga is a Catholic.
John Ameratunga, a notorious politician who used thugs for political purposes while running Sri Lanka’s Police at the recent attack on the Government Press to illegally stop the printing of a government gazette did not do anything against mobs who were preventing some of his visits in Jaffna and simply visited places the security services provided heavy security for him to visit, avoiding crowds.
He visited the High Security Zone of Jaffna and promised to represent matters to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. Replying to the Jaffna Bishop that 300 churches had been destroyed in the recent war between the Sri Lanka Army and the troops of the LTTE, the Minister said he could give the assurance that such a war would never happen once again in the Jaffna peninsula.
Organized by a LTTE front organization, parents claiming that their children were in the custody of the security forces and people who were claiming that they had lost their houses due to the High Security Zone were assembled at the District Secretarial Office at Jaffna. They were waiting to hand over petitions to the Minister but the Minister avoided visiting the place due to the security risk. Recently, LTTE organized mobs manhandled Minister Dr. Jayalath Jayawardena and forced to cancel Lands Minister Rajitha Senarathna’s visit to Trincomalee. All three ministers had been close to the rebel group, LTTE and often expressed anti-Sinhala Buddhist sentiments. Senarathna recently said all Sinhalese should apologize the Tamils for everything happened after 1956.
Earlier, Minister Amaratunga’s itinerary included the Jaffna library, Nallur Kovil, St James Church, Jaffna prisons, District Secretarial Office and Police. But due to the protests from the LTTE he took part only in the inspection of the Police, Prisons, and the Church within the High Security Zone of Jaffna and avoided going out of it.
An LTTE front organization called, “Eelan Thamilina Marawara Mandum “ had distributed a pamphlet criticizing the Minister as a Sinhala chauvinist. That also criticized the Catholic bishop of Jaffna for providing a platform for such a chauvinist. The pamphlet said John Ameratunga came to Jaffna to gain political advantages. It was not very good idea for the Bishop to get caught in the trap. Every Tamil should be against the visit of such a Minister, the pro-LTTE pamphlet said.
IGP Anandarajah, Ministry Secretary Junaid, pro UNP member of European Parliament Devadithya, Wills Earle, an advisor to Premier Ranil Wickremesinghe were other members of the delegation that accompanied Minister John Amaratunga.
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