PM skips Commonwealth talks
Wednesday, November 13, 2013
Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is among several Commonwealth leaders who are not attending this week’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka but staff at her office insist she was not boycotting the meeting. Originally, Persad-Bissessar had planned to lead the T&T delegation to the meeting after an official visit to China, during which she would have presided over the official opening of T&T’s embassy in Beijing.
The trip to China last week was cancelled by mutual agreement of T&T and China because it coincided with the November 4 by-election in St Joseph, said the Prime Minister’s spokesman, Francis Joseph. Joseph said: “There were two trips on for November. The dates proposed for the official visit to China clashed with the by-election in St Joseph and therefore she could not go at that time. “As a result both countries will now look for new dates in 2014.
“The reason for not going to CHOGM is because of matters she has to deal with in Trinidad. As a result, Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Dookeran will be attending the meeting and the Permanent Secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister, Reynold Cooper, who is also head of the public service, is already there attending the Commonwealth Business Forum.”
The Prime Minister’s spokesman did not specify the matters that Persad-Bissessar had to deal with that prevented her attendance at CHOGM but other sources referred to the back-to-back local government elections and by-election. Asked directly whether Persad-Bissessar was boycotting CHOGM to draw attention to Sri Lanka’s human rights record, Joseph said:
“I have not been told of any boycott by the PM. I am aware that other countries are doing that but that is not the case with Mrs Persad-Bissessar.”
“I have not been told of any boycott by the PM. I am aware that other countries are doing that but that is not the case with Mrs Persad-Bissessar.”
In an e-mailed response to questions submitted by the T&T Guardian, the Prime Minister’s special adviser Shem Baldeosingh said there could be no inference of a boycott because T&T was being represented by its Foreign Minister. He said the President of Sri Lanka and the Commonwealth Secretary General were informed of the Prime Minister’s inability to travel to Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka, where CHOGM is being held.
The Prime Ministers of India and Canada—Manmohan Singh and Stephen Harper—have both decided against attending the Commonwealth summit, which is being held from Friday to Sunday, to draw attention to the host nation’s human rights record, according to an AP report last Sunday. Singh wrote to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa expressing his inability to attend the summit, according to the AP report.
Baldeosingh said the T&T embassy in China is “open for business” and the governments of the two countries were exchanging letters on the selection of an ambassador.
The British Owe A Lot To The Tamil People
Dr. Brian Senewiratne
The Chaos In Sri Lanka: The Role Of Britain & The Commonwealth
It is not widely appreciated that the current chaos in Sri Lanka is partly due to the damage done by colonial Britain, and later by the failure of the Commonwealth, to act when all the Commonwealth ‘core values’ had been systematically and blatantly violated by a succession of Sri Lankan (Sinhalese) governments. The result is a Totalitarian State where human rights have taken a bashing, democracy has been dismantled, Parliament has been reduced to a rubber stamp, the ‘Separation of Powers’ – the basis of any democracy – has ceased to exist, the Judiciary and the rule of law have become a farce and now, the very existence of the Tamil people is under threat. With corruption, nepotism, serious debt-repayment, an escalating cost of living, and the resort to violence by the Government, whatever the problem, the country is heading for a “Failed State”.
While the elite (the Rajapkasas and their henchmen) journey to a destination somewhere near the top of the world, the dispossessed are spiralling down to chaos. This climate of frustration, fear, anger and national disillusionment is the perfect breeding ground, history tells us, for Totalitarianism and Fascism.
Increasing concernsRead More
