{"id":45930,"date":"2012-06-22T04:54:20","date_gmt":"2012-06-22T04:54:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=45930"},"modified":"2012-06-24T13:31:21","modified_gmt":"2012-06-24T13:31:21","slug":"cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuba Hosted Sri Lanka Pres\/War Criminal"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Ron Ridenour<\/a>\u00a0–<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Ron Ridenour<\/p><\/div>\n

HAVANA TIMES<\/span> <\/a>\u2014 \u201cCuban President Receives Counterpart from Sri Lanka\u201d read the Prensa Latina headline of June 17. The agency reported that the four-day official visit by President Mahinda Rajapaksa was at the invitation of President Raul Castro.<\/p>\n

Does this mean that the \u201chonored guest\u201d\u2014widely known to be one of the world\u2019s most brutal government leaders, responsible for tens of thousands of deaths of the Tamil people, who is also selling much of his country to foreign multi-nationals corporations, and whose main export partner is the United States\u2014is made of the same stuff as his \u201ccounterpart\u201d?<\/p>\n

\u201cCuba is acting immorally and in contradiction to its long-time solidarity with the oppressed and exploited peoples of the world,\u201d I wrote in \u201cCuba outvoted at \u201cUN Human Rights Council over Sri Lanka-Tamils<\/a>\u201d.\u00a0 (See also \u201cCuba\u2019s Contradictory Stance on Tamils<\/a>\u201d)<\/p>\n

There is ample evidence that Sri Lankan governments have long been discriminating against, oppressing and murdering Tamils. Besides physical violence, the government has passed laws making Tamils second-class citizens.<\/p>\n

They are denied equal access to education and employment; their religions and language are not on an equal footing with Sinhalese and their aggressiv version of Buddhism. My recent book, \u201cTamil Nation in Sri Lanka<\/a>\u201d, outlines this sordid history.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sri Lankan President Mahind Rajapaksa and Cuban President Raul Castro.<\/p><\/div>\n

So, why is the Cuban government supporting this and the previous Sinhalese chauvinist governments? Havana Times offers some answers in \u201cWill Sri Lanka Tamils get justice from the UN?<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

The foreign politics of the Cuban government is based, in large part and understandably so, on its rancor with the United States for its permanent intrusion in Cuban affairs as well as that of many other peoples and governments who do not buckle under its domination.<\/p>\n

Recently, the US has leveled complaints that the Sri Lanka government overstepped its right to destroy the guerrilla organization Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam (LTTE) by bombing civilians.<\/p>\n

Most of the 47 governments\u00a0<\/a>on the Human Rights Council, including six Latin American governments, agreed.<\/p>\n

This is not to be construed as an offering of applause to the world\u2019s greatest terrorist state, for the US makes this \u201chuman rights\u201d gesture for its own hypocritical geo-political reasons, which the writing above explains.<\/p>\n

Since the US-UK axis makes an insignificant complaint about this, Cuba\u2019s government, in a knee jerk fashion, is all the more enthusiastic about being chummy with a government that systematically eliminates Tamils in a genocidal pattern.<\/p>\n

By so reacting, Cuba has turned its back on its own solidarity principles of standing beside all oppressed and exploited peoples. (1)<\/p>\n

As a long-time supporter of the Cuban revolution\u2014since my first demonstration, which took place in April 1961 in front of a US federal building as the Yankees invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs, and through to working for Prensa Latina and Editorial Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed in the 1980s-90s, and with hundreds of articles and six books on Cuba to my credit\u2014I am sickened by the Cuban government\u2019s hypocritical support of Rajapaksa and his family regime and, consequently, the immoral acceptance of the genocide against a minority people. I am certain that if Che Guevara were around he would rant and rave, and that is what I ask all solidarity supporters of Cuba to do.
\n\u2014\u2013<\/p>\n

(1) \u201cThose who are exploited are our compatriots all over the world; and the exploiters all over the world are our enemies.\u201d Fidel Castro told Lee Lockwood in \u201cCastro\u2019s Cuba, Cuba\u2019s Fidel\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":35379,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,46,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-constitutional-reforms","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nCuba Hosted Sri Lanka Pres\/War Criminal - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cuba Hosted Sri Lanka Pres\/War Criminal - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[…]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-06-22T04:54:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-06-24T13:31:21+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/Ron.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"430\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"567\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/cuba-hosted-sri-lanka-preswar-criminal\/\",\"name\":\"Cuba Hosted Sri Lanka Pres\/War Criminal - 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