Sri Lanka Boycott campaign buoyed by British MP's endorsement

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 April 2010, 00:02 GMT]
The Sri Lanka boycott campaigners staged co-ordinated rallies in US and UK cities Saturday and were enthused by the endorsement to their campaign by the British Member of Parliament, Siobhain McDonagh, who in her publicized video and urged consumers to step up pressure on the Sri Lanka Government by sustained economic boycott, US organizer of the boycott, Dr Ellyn Shander said. Boycott rallies were held in several cities in the U.S. and in U.K. "The campaigns in the future are likely to take the form of globally co-ordinated events to increase the effectiveness and to elicit wider publicity," Shander said.

Siobhain McDonagh, a Member of Parliament, from UK

"Act Now" Director Graham Williamson said, "we are pleased to join our American friends in a Global boycott of Sri Lankan products sold by GAP. We hope the campaign expands throughout the world in the weeks and months to come. If GAP suffers financially due to their 'un-ethical' trade with Sri Lanka it will only have itself to blame," Williamson said. Ms.McDonagh took time off her General Election campaign to join the Oxford Street boycotters outside the GAP flagship store.

In the US, protest rallies were held in New York, Boston , Washington D.C., Raleigh NC, Sawgrass Mall, Florida, San Francisco and Chicago.

"This boycott is about asking people to buy with a conscience. Why buy clothing from a government who ridicules human rights and arrogantly committed war crimes? Whenever there is injustice we have an obligation to step up and try and fight for the affected people. We want companies like Victoria secret and the Gap to divest from Sri Lanka and do business ethically as an obligation to their customers and a moral obligation to humanity," Dr Ellyn Shander told TamilNet.

With the global downturn in consumer spending clothing industry has been badly affected. "This is the right time to for the expatriate Tamils to join in force to bring economic pressure on Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka Government is unlikely to heed the call of Tamils for political accommodation unless severe economic pressure is hoisted on Colombo," an activist attending the New York protest said.