While DAP wants the
Prime Minister to boycott CHOGM in Sri Lanka, MIC says 'no comment' on the
matter.
By Admin
GEORGE TOWN: DAP has called on
the government to boycott the Commonwealth Heads Of Government Meeting (CHOGM)
scheduled to be held in Colombo, Sri Lanka next month due to blatant human violations
committed by the island republic against ethnic Tamils there.
Party secretary general Lim
Guan Eng said the DAP central executive committee (CEC) unanimously decided, on
Wednesday, to call for the boycott as a humanitarian protest against the recalcitrant
Sri Lankan government’s stubborn refusal to account for the deaths of tens of
thousands of Tamil civilians during closing stages of the country’s civil war
in 2009.
Until today, he said, Colombo
had failed to investigate and prosecute those responsible for crimes against
innocent Tamils during the civil war.
He noted that thousands of
Tamils who disappeared during the civil war had not been accounted for by the
government, while those responsible for the rapes against Tamil women and girls
had not been brought to justice
He pointed out that
international human rights organisations including the United Nations had
warned Colombo to investigate allegations of murders, rapes and disappearances.
“However, the Sri Lankan
government had not been forthcoming with any form of investigations into these
allegations,” said Lim, the Bagan MP, in a statement here today.
The DAP also urged all Barisan
Nasional (BN) component parties to press Putrajaya to boycott CHOGM on November
15-17 as a sign of protest.
“DAP has consistently opposed
regimes that violate human rights and place constraints on democracy. In this
respect, DAP thinks that holding of CHOGM in Colombo is not an appropriate
thing to do,” said Lim, who is also Penang Chief Minister.
Recently, United Nations
Commissioner for Human Rights, Naveen Pillay, issued a serious warning to the
Sri Lanka government to address the pressing human rights concerns, failing
which the UN would order an international investigation into the conduct of the
government.
Given these gross violations of
human rights and deterioration of democracy in Sri Lanka, some countries like
Canada has expressed serious concern about Sri Lanka and whether Colombo is the
rightful venue for CHOGM.
Canada’s Prime Minister,
Stephen Harper has already announced that he would boycott the meet.
Facing intense pressure from
political parties in state of Tamil Nadu, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh
is still undecided on whether to attend the CHOGM, while Kenya is contemplating
to boycott the Colombo’s international event.
Meanwhile, MIC President G
Palanivel did not want to comment on the matter, when approached by reporters
after the party’s central working committee meeting on Friday.
His ‘no comment’ remarks has
come under fire from fellow CWC members, who feel it will have a negative
impact on the party.
Palanivel said that he would
concentrate on the largest Indian based party in the country rather than
talking about CHOGM.
Although MIC is made up of
various ethnic Indian groups, Tamils are majority in the party.
“As far as I know, people in
India staged several protest (against the Sri Lanka government). But, there was
no protest in Malaysia on this matter,” Palanivel had said at the press
conference.
A CWC members, who did not want
to be named, said most members at the meeting were shocked by Palanivel’s
answer to the media on the issue.
“Everyone knows that Sri
Lanka’s war crimes against its Tamil population was a very serious and it is a
very sensitive issue in Malaysia. People in Malaysia donated millions of
ringgit to help the Tamil population in Sri Lanka. Even, MIC itself staged
several protests in the past on this matter.
“I do
not know if he is ignorant and just plain careless,” said the CWC...FMT
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