Pvt Transport Minister C.B.Ratnayake Admits Lifting of EU Ban on LTTE will Boost Mahinda’s Election Campaign while Collecting Signatures for Petition against the move.

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Franklin R. Satyapalan

Minister of Private Transport C.B. Ratnayake said yesterday that the European Court of Justice decision to lift the European Union Ban on the LTTE would have adverse effect on the initiatives taken by President Mahinda Rajapaksa to establish peace in the country. It would however unwittingly boost President Rajapaks’a bid to retain the presidency for a third term.

The minister who represents the Nuwara Eliya District is spearheading a campaign to collect 18 million signatures of Sri Lankans from Dondra to Point Pedro against lifting of the EU ban on the LTTE.

The people’s petition is to be handed over to the UNHCR in Geneva and European Parliament in Bruusels.

The signature collection campaign will be launched on Thursday with the participation of the Provincial Chief Ministers of the country at the Mirage Hotel on Marine Drive at 10.00 am.

The Minister said, “I represent the Nuwara-Eliya District, an area where all three communities Tamil, Muslim and Sinhalese and the plantation Tamil people of Indian origin live in harmony and I know how much these people suffered when they travelled to the South for economic reasons for employment during the conflict.

“Today, everybody is free to travel anywhere, the minister said, the EU have taken into these factors into consideration and refrained from deproscribing the LTTE.

Courtesy:The Island