Investment Promotion Minister visits Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 06 June 2009, 12:12 GMT]
Former United National Party (UNP) parliamentarian and the present Sri Lanka Minister of Investment Promotion, Naveen Dissanayake and his younger brother Mayantha Dissanayake paid a sudden visit to Jaffna peninsula Saturday which the brothers described as a personal visit, to the media, sources in Jaffna said. The brothers are the sons of late Gamini Dissanayake, who is alleged to have been the person responsible for the burning of Jaffna Public Library in June 01, 1981, by Sri Lankan police, the sources added.

It is learnt that the Investment Promotion minister came to Jaffna peninsula to explore plans to hand over Kaangkeasanththu’rai cement factory to India with a view to reactivate it.

The minister and his brother, heavily escorted by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers and policemen, visited Nalloor Kanthasuvami Koayil and Kailaayapi’l’laiyaar Koayil in Jaffna where they took part in the prayers.

The brothers also paid a visit to the Buddhist temple in Nainaatheevu.

Thousands of SLA soldiers and policemen were deployed in and around Jaffna town Saturday during the minister’s visit.

The burning of Jaffna Public Library, widely regarded by the Tamils as an act of cultural vandalism, was a deliberate destruction of 97,000 books, considered as the best collection of Tamil literature in Asia, including many irreplaceable manuscripts.