Anura blames UNP for planting Karuna story

[TamilNet, Saturday, 31 July 2004, 00:44 GMT]
Minister and Sri Lanka President’s Advisor Mr.Anura Bandaranaike today castigated former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe for attempting to make him earn the wrath of the Liberation Tigers by planting a concocted story in Colombo media that he transported LTTE renegade leader Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan (Karuna) to Singapore.

Mr.Bandaranaike at a press conference held at the Board of Investment (BOI) Office in the Sri Lanka's World Trade Centre Friday vehemently denied any involvement with the much publicized story of Karuna accompanying him to Singapore. Mr.Bandaranaike added that he has neither met Karuna nor wants to meet him in the future.

He said that he was not sure if UNP wanted to demean his character or wanted to put his life in danger.

“This is a very serious statement. I don’t know how Prabhakaran will react to this," Mr. Bandaranaike said.

He claimed that certain media have maliciously given priority to a statement made by TNA MP K. Sivajilingam in the parliament on July 20th associating him and Karuna, and promised that he will raise the matter in the Parliament on August 3rd.

Mr.Bandaranaike said that the former Prime Minister concocted the story to hit back at him for being critical of Mr. Wickremesinghe’s leadership.

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