Tigers walk out in protest against JVP

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 January 2005, 10:04 GMT]
Liberation Tigers Monday walked out of a meeting for setting up a committee for assisting Tsunami victims at the Thirukkovil Divisional Secretary’s (DS) office in protest against a JVP Parliamentarian who had come uninvited for the conference. “We welcome everyone who comes to help our people. But this JVP politician used Tsunami assistance as a pretext to sow political hatred and Sinhala chauvinism. We walked out, objecting to his cheap political tactics”, said Mr. E. Kousalyan, head of the LTTE’s political division for the Batticaloa-Amparai district.

Civil society groups, community leaders, representatives of the Special Task Force and Sri Lanka army and the Liberation Tigers took part in the meeting to discuss the setting up of a special committee for assisting Tsunami affected people in the Thirukkovil DS division.

The LTTE delegation walked out when Mr. Wasantha Piyatissa, JVP MP for the Digamadulla electoral district tried to take part in the meeting.

“The JVP is very much part of President Kumaratunga’s United People’s Freedom Alliance government. So they should see that Sri Lankan government aid is equitably distributed in the parts. Instead they have set up offices purportedly for Tsunami relief under the JVP banner. Tsunami devastation is not the place to advertise or promote one’s political party”, Mr. Kousalyan said.

“The Sinhala chauvinist JVP is trying to exploit this disaster to gain a foothold in our areas. The party has been spewing hatred against the Tamils. It refuses to recognize even their basic rights as a people. It is obvious that they saw the Tsunami devastation as a window of opportunity to insinuate themselves into our areas. We will expose their insidious tactics”, said Mr. Pathmanathan, Tamil National Alliance MP for the area.