{"id":61658,"date":"2012-11-24T03:39:50","date_gmt":"2012-11-24T03:39:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=61658"},"modified":"2012-11-26T09:38:52","modified_gmt":"2012-11-26T09:38:52","slug":"uk-four-visits-and-statements-in-the-commons-on-the-controversial-rajapaska-regime-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/uk-four-visits-and-statements-in-the-commons-on-the-controversial-rajapaska-regime-why\/","title":{"rendered":"UK: Four Visits And Statements In The Commons On The Controversial Rajapaska Regime, Why ?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/\">Colombo Telegraph<\/a><\/span> &#8211;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Four visits in nine months and statements in the Commons on the controversial Rajapaska regime: why does the 28-year-old MP for Stockton James Wharton care so much about Sri Lanka? the UK\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/uk\/politics\/four-visits-in-nine-months-and-statements-in-the-commons-on-the-controversial-rajapaska-regime-why-does-the-28yearold-mp-for-stockton-james-wharton-care-so-much-about-sri-lanka-8347502.html\">Independent<\/a><\/span> questions.<\/strong><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_61660\" style=\"width: 470px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/uk-four-visits-and-statements-in-the-commons-on-the-controversial-rajapaska-regime-why\/james-wharton-3\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-61660\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-61660\" class=\"size-full wp-image-61660\" title=\"james-wharton\" src=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/james-wharton.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"460\" height=\"280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/james-wharton.jpg 460w, https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/james-wharton-300x182.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 460px) 100vw, 460px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-61660\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">MP for Stockton James Wharton -Paid for by the Sri Lankan government | Photo Evening Gazette<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The newspaper today\u00a0reported; &#8221;\u00a0In February he joined the British-educated High Commissioner Christopher Nonis to toast Sri Lanka Independence Day. In June, he met President <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Mahinda+Rajapaksa&amp;x=5&amp;y=9\">Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/a><\/span> during his visit to London to celebrate the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Queen%E2%80%99s+Diamond+Jubilee&amp;x=8&amp;y=5\">Queen\u2019s Diamond Jubilee<\/a><\/span> (Wharton had also met the President in December 2010, barely six months after being elected to Parliament). In August this year he again returned to the High Commission so that Nonis could introduce him to members of the Sri Lanka Olympics team after it arrived to take part in London 2012.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Questioned by\u00a0<em>The Independent<\/em>\u00a0over the level of his involvement in Sri Lanka affairs, Wharton said: \u201cI am very much not\u2026 the Sri Lankan government\u2019s cheerleader.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to the\u00a0Independent\u00a0Wharton said that the lack of Sri Lankans in his constituency is \u201can advantage\u201d because it allows him to make an independent contribution to the debate. \u201cIt means I can take an objective view on Sri Lanka without having pressure from either of the big two diaspora communities that live in the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0Independent said \u00a0that Wharton spoke out during a Parliamentary debate on Sri Lanka in February this year, saying that a report by a United Nations panel of experts, which detailed allegations of human rights violations by the Sri Lanka government and the rebel Tamil Tigers during the civil war, should be treated with caution. \u201cIs it not clear that, while the report sets out a narrative and raises legitimate concerns, it must not be taken as a factual account?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n<p>For a 28-year old backbench Tory MP it was a highlight of his young political career. James Wharton beamed for the camera as he accepted a ceremonial plate from the Sri Lanka Defence Secretary <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Gotabaya+Rajapaksa&amp;x=14&amp;y=6\">Gotabhaya Rajapaksa<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n<p>According to the Independent, Wharton said he has made friends on both sides of Sri Lanka\u2019s ethnic divide and that he hopes to make a contribution to building peace in a country that is still recovering from conflict. \u201cThere are areas that haven\u2019t been resolved and areas where people have irreconcilable differences but there are a large number of areas where people could work together to make life better for the people in Sri Lanka.\u201d\u00a0Asked about the frequency of his visits to Sri Lanka and the country\u2019s <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=High+Commission+in+London&amp;x=9&amp;y=8\">High Commission in London<\/a><\/span> he said: \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s disproportionate or unreasonable, no.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Wharton told the\u00a0Independent\u00a0 that he wished to introduce more balance into the discussion. \u201cI do not pretend that things are absolutely fine in Sri Lanka, it would be ridiculous to do so. But I do think that the debate we have in the UK about it is very one-sided.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When the Independent asked about his apparent obsession with Sri Lankan affairs, Wharton said his interests were partly business-related on behalf of his constituents. \u201cI\u2019ve got a number of companies on Teesside that do a lot of work out there.\u201d\u00a0 He declined to identify the companies.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Wharton\u2019s interest in Sri Lanka echoes that of the former Defence Secretary Liam Fox, who was a frequent visitor to the country despite having no obvious responsibilities for it. Dr Fox was forced to call off one visit to Colombo in late 2010 after his controversial assistant Adam Werritty had already flown on ahead amid reported concerns from the Foreign Office.&#8221; the Independent reported.<\/p>\n<p>But John Mann, a Labour MP who has also travelled to Sri Lanka with the <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Royal+Commonwealth+Society&amp;x=5&amp;y=7\">Royal Commonwealth Society<\/a><\/span>, said the country still had \u201chuge human rights problems\u201d and that Mr Wharton had become too close to the government, the newspaper reported.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c&#8217;There\u2019s a reason why he has been invited so many times by the Sri Lankan government, paid for by the Sri Lankan government so many times and that they are wining and dining him so often at the Sri Lanka High Commission in London,&#8217; he said. &#8216;This is not a very effective use of parliamentary time and he\u2019s going to have difficulty explaining it to his constituents.'&#8221; the\u00a0Independent further\u00a0reports.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":61660,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2187,1],"tags":[6669,6671,6670,6667,6668],"class_list":["post-61658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-most-popular","category-news","tag-corruption-in-uk-parliament","tag-james-wharton-and-sri-lanka","tag-uk-and-sri-lanka-relations","tag-uk-government-mps-on-sri-lanka","tag-uk-mps-on-sri-lanka"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>UK: Four Visits And Statements In The Commons On The Controversial Rajapaska Regime, Why ? 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