IC caused disaster of epic proportion: Anita Pratap

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 April 2009, 11:07 GMT]
“Lacking independent assessments, journalists repeat Sri Lankan claims that this is the end game, this is Prabhakaran's last stand. Judging from the past, I doubt it”, writes former CNN Bureau Chief in New Delhi, Anita Pratab, in the 03 May issue of The Week. “Nowhere in the world has a government been continuously bombing its own civilians for over a year. This is a crime Israeli, American and NATO forces are not guilty of. Nowhere else in the world is a war being waged without outsiders and independent witnesses, not in Iraq, not in Afghanistan, not in Gaza. But in Sri Lanka”, she writes.

“There is no liberation army in the world that has not faced state terror and in turn used terror as a tactic to pursue its nationalist goals. Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and Bhagat Singh-Prabhakaran considers them heroes-were designated terrorists by the British rulers of India. Until recently, Nelson Mandela was on the list of terrorists.

"The LTTE is banned as a terrorist organisation in some 30 countries. That has given the Sri Lankan government global sanction to destroy the LTTE. But in doing so, the international community has allowed a disaster of epic proportion to unfold. This is not an LTTE, but a Tamil tragedy," she said.

Quarter a century ago, in 1984, Anita Patap was the first to get a media interview with Pirapaharan, while he was in Besant Nagar, Chennai.

She has been covering Sri Lanka since 1983 and has authored a book 'Island of Blood' on the crisis in the island.

External Links:

Sangam.org:		The First Interview
The Week:		Crouching Tiger: Prabhakaran still has enough grit to continue the fight