Sri Lanka destroys evidence, prevents ICRC, UN access - Prof. Boyle

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Sri Lanka destroys evidence, prevents ICRC, UN access - Prof. Boyle

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 May 2009, 04:20 GMT]

Noting that the slow genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka accelerated to more than 10,000 in the last few months, far exceeding the horrors of Srebrenica, Professor Boyle in conversation with Los Angeles KPFK radio host, Michael Slate, Tuesday, accused Sri Lanka Government of bulldozing and destroying evidence of massacres in the Safety Zone while preventing access to the Red Cross and UN agencies. Boyle added that the United States Government with spy satellites would be knowing exactly what Sri Lanka's actions are in the Safe Zone, and stand implicated along with UK, France, and India in allowing the genocide to happen.

"Today ICRC still does not have access when the area should be flooded with food and medicine to urgently attend to the 300,000 Internally Displaced Tamils held in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) supervised camps," Boyle said, adding, survivors from the Safety Zone, from starvation, resembled escapees from Nazi death camps.

Prof Francis Boyle, University of Illinois College of LawThe situation was similar to what happened in Gaza, Boyle said, but in Gaza people had access to food via under ground tunnels, whereas the Tamils holed up in the Safety Zone were completely cutoff from the outside and were entirely dependent on food transported by the ICRC ships.

Tracing the history of the conflict, Boyle and Slate agreed that Sri Lanka was an apartheid state from the very beginning of independence, and pointed to the violent elements of the Buddhist clergy, and the India's dravidian-oriented racism as elements that exacerbated the deterioration of the conflict towards genocide.

Peace processes failed, Boyle argued, because Sri Lankan Governments, instead engaging in good faith negotiation, "wanted control, domination, and elimination of the Tamil population."

"We may be at the beginning of a humanitarian catastrophe for the Tamil people in Sri Lanka which would fit the ultimate objective of the Government motivated by chauvinist, violent racism," Boyle said, adding "my experience in working in genocidal situations says once the government and the people are possessed of this genocidal mentality it's very difficult to stop."

Slate added, "Tamil people are a severely oppressed nation. Anyone of conscience must stand up and support their resistance."
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taken from "Tamilnet.com" on 20th May 2009