Mass held at killing field, Mannaar Bishop demands international investigation

[TamilNet, Thursday, 13 February 2014, 10:43 GMT]
We should never give up the struggle seeking the truth, said Bishop of Mannaar, Dr. Rayappu Joseph, attending a special mass and prayer service held on Wednesday at the St Lourde’s church at Maanthai, just across the spot where excavations of a killing field have so far brought out 61 skeletons. The mass was dedicated to the disappeared. Speaking at the mass, the Bishop demanded international investigation on the disappearance of people in the war and he was specific about the Maanthai killing field. He also reminded the crowd on the number of the disappeared [146, 678], which he had earlier brought out at the LLRC. Intelligence sleuths of Colombo were present at the mass, recording the Bishop’s speech.

The government can’t go on with producing lies. We have lost faith in any local mechanism that investigates the killings. Instead, we need independent international investigation that has no political affiliation, and we should witness the investigation, the Bishop demanded.

The local mechanism is like the perpetrators investigating what happened, knowing fully well that they did it. The government can’t fool us. It is our right to know what happened to our kith and kin.

We should not keep our mouths shut, the Bishop said, quoting Fr Jeyabala Croos, who in turn had quoted a poem of Martin Niemoller that there would be no one if we all keep our mouths in the face of what happened and what is happening in our land.

Families of the disappeared and some NPC members were among the attendees of the mass.

Continuation of the exhumation of skeletons in the mass grave, takes place for the 24th time on Thursday.

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