2ND LEAD (Corrections)

Eelaventhan meets Harper, U.S. officials

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 November 2007, 13:32 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian, Mr Eelaventhan, currently visiting Canada and United States met with Canada's ruling Conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, and politicians from other parties during the early part of November, and also met with United States State Department officials on the 14th of November, briefing them on the worsening humanitarian conditions in Tamil areas of North East of Sri Lanka, and the deteriorating ground situation that is leading towards large scale confrontation between Sri Lanka Security forces and Liberation Tigers.

Eelaventhan urged the Canadian Prime Minister to “exert political and moral pressure on the Sri Lankan government to re-think and re-shape its policy towards the Tamils, and to consider offering the Canadian constitution as a model for talks between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan government."

Eelaventhan also met with U.S. State Department officials and briefed them on the ground situation in Vanni where he had visited prior to his trip to Canada.

The parliamentarian is planning to meet several expatriate groups before returning to Colombo early December.

Prior to his visit to Canada, Eelaventhan spent several weeks in South Africa and in Mauritius. He told TamilNet he was impressed by the enthusiasm of the expatriate Tamils from Tamil Nadu domiciled in Mauritius towards Eelam Tamils. He said he met with the Mauritius Foreign Minister and attended an elaborate reception for him held at the Mauritius Amman Koayil.

In South Africa, he was interviewed by several Radio Stations, and met with Tamil expatriates in Durban, Eelaventhan told TamilNet.

Eelaventhan said he regretted missing voting against Sri Lanka's budget, but said his vote would not have impacted the outcome. Despite speculations to the contrary, budget passed with a majority of 16 votes. TNA MP for Batticaloa district, Mr. Kanagasabai, abstained from voting due to death threats and kidnapping of his son-in-law by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) backed paramilitaries.