Govt violates UN Convention-JVP

23 April 2012 02:54 pm

Internally Displaced people (IDPs) who were originally living in the Mullathivu Coast and were engaged in fisheries as a livelihood have been resettled in an inland village Thimbili in the same district by violating the UN Convention on the status of refugees, JVP charged today.

JVP Propaganda Secretary VijithaHerath told a news conference today that these people are made to resettle in a 400 perch land. These people he said were unable to re-start their livelihood as they are made to resettle in an area which is far from the coast.

“This, he said “is not ‘resettlement’ but ‘relocation’ ‘according to the UN convention,” he said alleging that forests have been cleared to resettle the IDPs.
Mr. Herath said what the internally displaced persons (IDPs) want is to go back to the villages in which they were residing earlier and this is the very thing they have told the Indian Parliamentary delegation that visited Manik farm recently.

Therefore he said talks on power devolution which goes beyond the 13th Amendment to the Constitution which the Indian delegation and the Sri Lankan government is talking of is a useless as the war affected people in the North had not asked for any power devolution.

“Government should not waste time giving assurances on devolving power and denying them from time to time and should understand the reality,” he added. (Yohan Perera)





Pix by Nisal Badhuge