Sri Lankan Tamils on Tuesday held demonstrations to highlight the plight of kin of disappeared persons, even as police prevented hundreds from proceeding to Colombo.
Opposition politician and Tamil activist Mano Ganesan said police in the northern town of Vavuniya blocked hundreds of persons from leaving for Colombo to protest extra-judicial killings and the disappearances of their loved ones. They were to hand over a petition to the chief administrator.
Responding to accusation of police blocking the buses to Colombo, military spokesperson Brigadier Ruwan Wanigasooriya said the police stopped an organised movement of several buses in view of complaints of stoning of buses in the area.
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The protests came even as U.S. is set to move its second resolution in as many years at the U.N. Human Rights Council calling for accountability from the Sri Lankan government.
Meanwhile, another group claiming to be victims of the LTTE marched to the U.N. compound to hand over a letter requesting the UNHRC to account for their loved ones.
The organisers of the ‘Dead and Missing Person’s Parents Front’ said “this was a demonstration of only a fraction of the reality of terrorism that we defeated in Sri Lanka”.
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The letter said to contain the names of over 3,000 people who have gone missing excluding those from the government troops.