Sent: Friday, October 21, 2011 2:54:05 PM

Dear Mr. Rasingam,

Thank you for taking the time to write to me about your concern on this very important issue. I understand that this is a pressing and emotional cause and it is of huge importance to me personally, to do what I can to contribute effectively to the peaceful resolution of this matter.

I can say that Prime Minister Harper has spoken out loudly and clearly on the issue of the human rights of the Sri Lankan Tamil population. Our Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Honourable John Baird, has relayed the Government of Canada’s position to both the High Commissioner and directly to his counterpart, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Sri Lanka, in order to express our concerns on the lack of accountability for the serious allegations of war crimes during the conflict. I have taken several initiatives to bring attention to the issue of the lack of reconciliation with the Tamil community on the part of the government, as well as the events that have take place since the end of the civil war.

Canada is working to help resolve this issue and I hope that you can put your trust in our government.

Thank you again for writing to me, I greatly value your input. Please do not hesitate to contact me again should you have any further questions.

Yours very truly,

Chris Alexander, MP

Ajax-Pickering

From: Kumar Rasingam [mailto:kumar1265@yahoo.ca]

Sent: October 19, 2011 11:27 AM

To: Alexander, Chris – M.P.; alexm33@gmail.com

Cc: John.Baird@international.gc.ca; Brown, Patrick – M.P.

Subject: Kindly urge the CHOGM to suspend Sri Lanka from Commonwealth Nations.

October 19, 2011

Hon. Chris Alexander MP

Ajax/Pickering

cc:

Hon. John Baird

Minister of Foreign Affairs

Hon. Patrick Brown MP

Dear Mr. Chris,

I would like to thank you and the Conservative Party, Hon. John Baird Minister of Foreign Affairs Hon. Patrick Brown and other Conservative MPs for your effort to give proirity to Human Rights. Being an old man aged 73 and a human rights activist I know all the injustice to the minority Tamils since Independence from the British in 1948. I thank you all from my bottom of my heart for your effort to bring justice to the oppressed, suppressed, voiceless Tamils in the north & East of Sri Lanka. I take this opportunity to feed you with more information which is in my collection of reports, quotations from leading human rights activists about Sri Lanka which will be useful to you. Once agains I together with my family and friends thank you all.

The oppressed have no platform whereas the oppressive governments are given platform on intergovernmental bodies where they can keep lying for decades:

Jayantha Dhanapala to Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission(LLRC), 30 August 2010: ‘’Each and every Government which held office from 1948 till the present bear culpability for the failure to achieve good governance, national unity and a framework of peace, stability and economic development in which all ethnic, religious and other groups could live in security and equality. Our inability to manage our own internal affairs has led to foreign intervention but more seriously has led to the taking of arms by a desperate group of our citizens.’’ (Dhanapala is a Sinhalese and was formerly UN Under-Secretary General for Disarmament and a candidate for UNSG in 2006 – many other conscientious Sinhalese have told LLRC nearly the same thing – attachment)

Nobody in the future should undergo what the ethnic minorities in

Sri Lanka had to:Paradise Poisoned: Learning about Conflict, Terrorism and Development from Sri Lanka ‘s Civil Wars(2005), John Richardson, Professor of International development, American University:‘’Paradise Poisoned is the principal product of a seventeen-year project, devoted to understanding linkages between deadly conflict, terrorism and development, by viewing them through the lens of Sri Lanka’s post-independence history, from 1948 through 1988. ……….My vision is of a day when no citizens in today’s developing nations will have to ask ‘how did we come to this?’ Paradise Poisoned will have achieved its purpose when that day comes.”

Democracy in Peril: Sri Lanka a Country in Crisis, Report to Law Asia Human Rights Standing Committee, 7 June 1985:

”There was a general consensus that within Sri Lanka today the Tamils do not have the protection of the rule of law, that the Sri Lankan government presents itself as a democracy under crisis, and that neither the government, nor its friends abroad, appreciate the serious inroads on democracy which have been made by the legislative, administrative and military measures which are being taken.”

Australian Senate Hansard, 13 March 1986 Senator A.L.Missen, Chairman, Australian Parliamentary Group of Amnesty International: "Some 6000 Tamils have been killed altogether in the last few years…These events are not accidental. It can be seen that they are the result of a deliberate policy on the part of the Sri Lankan government…Democracy in Sri Lanka does not exist in any real sense…"

Political economy of Internal conflict in Sri Lanka, SWR de A Samarasinghe(2003):

Donor funding has been crucial to Sri Lanka’s economic survival in the past twenty years. Some of the major donors, most notably Japan , tried to work around the conflict. Some others, notably Nordic countries and Canada became more sensitive to the possible linkages with the ‘Do No Harm’ principle.

Making Ethnic Conflict: The Ciivil War in Sri Lanka, Ronald J Herring in Carrots, sticks and Ethnic Conflict, ed. Milton J Esman and Ronald J Herring(2003):

Civil war in Sri Lanka cannot be understood without the attention to external development flows. The sticks often deployed to enforce compliance were mildly used. The carrots –relatively large flows in per capita terms and esp in relation to the size of the economy – exacerbated ethnic tensions through their effects on patronage and ethnic territoriality. The regime could not have survived so long without the carrots provided by international actors. The regime fuelled escalation of ethnic conflict. Donors repeatedly expressed concern about human rights abuses but were unable to act in concert, continuing instead to support the regime at critical junctures.

A senior Canadian diplomat: ”we weren’t happy about our money going into something that was going to cause more dissension and in fact a scheme you would argue simply wasn’t fair”. After failing in its efforts to convince the government to avoid ethnically provocative policies, Canada eventually withdrew its support for Mahaweli , but only after much of the damage had been done. The government of Sri Lanka was reluctant to agree to compromises proposed by Canada. Long arguments ensued over two years. One diplomat said in retrospect that the Sri Lankan government’s position was ”you sign the cheques, fella, let us deliver the goods”(Gillies 1992).

Yours Truly,

Kumarathasan Rasingam

10 – 1790 Finch Avenue East,

Pickering, Ontario