Ex-LTTEers demanding war cemeteries will be arrested – Gota

By Ravi Ladduwahetty--Sunday, 27 Oct 2013

Any living ex-LTTE cadres, who demand for the setting up of cemeteries to serve as memorials for their dead in the 30-year war, will be arrested, Defence Secretary, Retired Colonel Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, told Ceylon Today. He was responding to a question from this newspaper as to what the reaction of the government would be to the demand of the ex-LTTE cadres that such a war cemetery be erected to remember the LTTE cadres, who were killed in the war, amid a resolution passed by the Chavakachcheri Pradeshiya Sabha towards this end.

"The LTTE is a banned organization, both locally and internationally and they have no legitimacy in the first place.

They have no right whatsoever to ask for war cemeteries to commemorate the dead. Anyone who does that, will be arrested," Rajapaksa said.

"We will do the same thing that we did to the other ex-LTTE cadres, by arresting them and rehabilitating them as they are misguided youth, who were a part of a banned organization and who wreaked havoc over three decades," the Defence Secretary said.

He also said the cemeteries could not be located and constructed at anyone's will but they were located in certain specific areas.

Responding to a question as to what the reaction of the government was, on the statement made by recently-appointed Chief Minister of the Northern Province, C.V. Wigneswaran, that he and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Councillors of the Northern Provincial Council (NPC), were working towards getting land and police powers to the North, Rajapaksa said that it was not possible.

He said the fact that there was a Supreme Court Judgment given to the effect that there would not be land powers devolved to the Provinces, should make the Chief Minister and the Council realize the impossibility of the NPC having land powers to themselves.

Commenting in police powers, he asked why the NPC should be given special police powers when all the other Provincial Councils did not have separate police powers. He also reminded that President Mahinda Rajapaksa too had spelt out the government would not be devolving police powers to the NPC.

"Why should the NPC have special privileges on police powers?" the Defence Secretary queried and added, "The core function of the police is to maintain law and order and that is the function of the Central Government and the mandate of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who is also the Defence Minister and Commander-in- Chief of the Armed Forces.

"What the NPC should do is to help the police to maintain law and order and they could assist the police in the prevention of crime. There could be a system of community policing where the politicians – the Members of Parliament and the Provincial Councillors, the business community and the members of the public could assist in the prevention of crime.

"Therefore, there was no need for a separate police force for the NPC. All the stakeholders could cooperate with the police and that is what they should be doing," he said.

Asked how he sees the development and the administration of the North in the light of the NPC being dominated by the TNA, he said the TNA will have to cooperate with the government in terms of decisions taken to develop the North.

"The TNA can utter their rhetoric on election platforms, but they will have to consult the government on key issues. That is because the North is not some other country, but it is a part of Sri Lanka. The North also comes under the aegis of the government and Sri Lanka too," he quipped.

If they do not cooperate with the government and engage in development work that the people and the voters expect of them, the Northerners will undoubtedly reject them, Rajapaksa added.