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ELLE GUNAWANSA THERO CHARGES CHRIS PATTEN’S VISIT TO PRABHAKARAN’S BIRTHDAY SHOWS BRITAIN’S RE-COLONIZATION PLANS OVER SRI LANKA

Venerable Elle Gunawansa flanked by MEP’s Dinesh Gunawardena and JVP’s Wimal Weerawansa at a recent rally.

By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles

November 25, 10.25 AM:Venerable Elle Gunawansa Thero of Patriotic National Movement charged that the visit of Chris Patten , the External Relations Commissioner of the European Union to Kilinochchi in Sri Lanka to take part in terrorist leader Velupillai Prabhakaran’s birthday clearly indicated Britain’s re-colonization plans over Sri Lanka.

An avowed imperialist, Chris Patten was the governor of the last British colony of Hong Kong before it was handed over to the People’s Republic of China.

Venerable Gunawansa charged that by visiting a separatist leader especially on his birthday, Britain and the European Union was attempting to white wash Prabhakaran , a Fascist leader who killed the former Prime Minister of India , Rajiv Gandhi, and who was also responsible of the massacres of Muslim worshippers in mosques, and Buddhist worshippers at the Jayasri Maha Bodhi in Anuradhapura .He said this Pol Pot of South Asia was responsible for the deaths of more than 60,000 people in Sri Lanka.

Venerable Gunawansa said it was difficult to find out who invited Chris Patten to Sri Lanka and his visit was tantamount to an invasion by Britain to the sovereign territory of Sri Lanka.

Venerable Elle Gunawansa Thero, who is a leader of the newly formed Patriotic National Movement that aligned numerous nationalist groups with the country’s second largest opposition party , the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna is closely connected with sections of the main opposition party the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the other member of the People’s Alliance , the Mahajana Eksath Peramuna.

He charged that Chris Patten was making this trip while Britain and the United States had declared Velupillai Prabhakaran’s LTTE as an international terrorist group and while the terrorist leader was a wanted man by the Interpol for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi.

The Venerable Elle Gunawansa charged that the Sri Lanka government was spending money for the transportation of Chris Patten by government helicopters to celebrate the birthday of the biggest enemy of the nation. He said Sri Lanka has deteriorated to an “ambalama” where anybody could walk in without any hindrance.

He said the leaderless nature of Sri Lanka was quite evident when a reply could not be obtained from any government authority as to who invited Chris Patten to this country.

The Venerable Thero said the Patriotic National Movement would protest and condemn Britain and European Union in the strongest possible terms over Christ Patten’s Sri Lanka visit

(25/11/03 go2lanka.com)