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Retract, UNESCO told

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka on Wednesday said it had lodged a “strong protest” at the statement of UNESCO Director-General condemning the November 27 air raid on the Voice of Tigers (VOA) Radio Station near the LTTE held Kilinochchi.

In a statement to Parliament, Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said his country would not permit any international organisation to be a “vehicle for the LTTE by justifying its modes of operation in various forms and manifestations.”

He said the Foreign Ministry would exercise all means to ensure that such statements were retracted or corrections made. The Minister said in the letter of protest, it was noted that the Government was surprised that the UNESCO saw it fit to issue such a statement on an attack on a clandestine radio station directly operated by the LTTE, a terrorist organisation proscribed in a number of countries including India, US, Canada as well as the member states of European Union. The letter said only two days before the UNESCO statement, the LTTE exploded a bomb in the Colombo suburbs killing 19 civilians and that a woman suicide cadre made an attempt to assassinate a Cabinet Minister of the Tamil community.

Separately, the military claimed that at least 24 LTTE cadres and seven soldiers were killed along the Forward Defence Lines in the north.

The military said three local workers of an Indian based Non Government “De-mining” Organisation (NGO) “Savathra” were injured on Tuesday due to a mine explosion in Vavunathivu.

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