THE criticism of Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa, when he visited Australia for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Perth, left the key Sri Lankan villain out of the story.

The criticism was that the Sri Lankan government engaged in serious human rights abuses, shelling areas where civilians were present, at the end of its civil war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, in May last year.

Both sides committed atrocities in this war, but the defeat of the Tamil Tigers was a decisive defeat of perhaps the bloodiest and most murderous terrorist group the world has seen.

It is time to recognize and acknowledge that the Government’s counter-thrust to the campaign to hold investigations on alleged war crimes has flopped, and flopped badly. The countries arrayed against us have been the US, the EU member states, and their allies, and judging from what has been going on at Geneva and other indications the Government’s counter-thrust has not made one whit of difference to them. In fact, the antagonism shown towards the SL government could be becoming worse. The Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has been reported as having advocated a boycott of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting scheduled to be held in Sri Lanka in 2013. In Australia the New South Wales Senator moved a motion in the Senate to suspend Sri Lanka from the Commonwealth. True, the motion was defeated, but that initiative as well as the Canadian PM’s statement would some time ago have seemed to belong to the realm of the entirely unthinkable. They have become not just thinkable but actual. They seem to testify to a worsening international situation for Sri Lanka.

Green Gold Rush in the 21st Century:

Sinharaja, the jewel in the crown of Sri Lanka’s natural forests, was once rescued from the jaws of destruction by a highly controversial selective logging project implemented in the 1970s primarily for the manufacture of plywood to make tea chests and furniture. At that time, this epic feat was achieved thanks to a collective effort by a cohort of dedicated environmentalists, religious leaders and scientists, both local and overseas, who were able to convince the then government that the long-term benefits by conserving this magnificent forest far outweighs the short-term foreign-exchange saving/earning project, whose sustainability was questionable. Looking back over 34 years, this decision to save Sinharaja from selective logging at the scale it was planned had not only been a visionary accomplishment, but was also a forerunner to several land-mark decisions taken by the successive governments towards conservation and sustainable development of our natural heritage for the benefit of current populace without compromising the survival of the future generations.

"Contrary to the opinion generated by the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce praising the revival of the stalled CEPA negotiations, Mawbimalanka urges the Government of Sri Lanka to draw attention to matters beyond the realm of trade & mutual political goodwill.

We would like to point out that the CCC membership is made up of non-Sri Lankans & multinationals. Thus the CCC is dominated by large scale traders interested in only developing their trades. With only a few industrialists as members the voice of the trading community dominates quorums purely based on the advantages accruing to them & do not echo the voice of Sri Lanka.