Do not Invest Sri lanka...

Our Mission is to persuade people not to invest (or to disinvest) in Sri Lanka. Investment in Sri Lanka enables the Sri Lankan government to enlarge and maintain their armed forces

Sri Lanka is already hyper-militarized. It already has a bigger army than Israel, which is almost permanently at war. Sri Lanka is currently enlarging its army and it will soon have more soldiers than major powers like Great Britain, France, Germany, or Japan.

Investment allows the Colombo government to make its large army larger. With the civil war over, most governments would be eager to reduce the unnecessary expense of an unnecessarily large army. We think that Colombo continues to strengthen its armed forces because it continues to make war on the island’s Tamil population. It continues to resettle Singhalese in areas from which Tamils have been driven. We expect that Colombo’s goal is to force as many Tamils as possible to leave Sri Lanka, and this requires soldiers.

Investing in Sri Lanka enlarges their economy, which allows them to enlarge their military budget, which allows them to pursue their policy of driving the Tamils out of Sri Lanka.

The larger-than-necessary army also suggests that the Colombo government plans to keep a heavy lid on the pressure cooker of Tamil resentment, and that they have no intention of seeking a political or humane solution to Tamil unhappiness. Sri Lanka’s former foreign secretary and current UN representative said recently that he could not see any sense in seeking a political solution.

Investing in Sri Lanka allows the Colombo government to continue to strengthen their armed forces. Colombo is currently using their army to keep an estimated 300,000 Tamil civilians prisoners in army-run internment camps.
(Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/08/opinion/08iht-edcoleman.html )

Here is what you can expect to hear about Sri Lanka

Rajapaksa with Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, in Colombo, April 28. 2008. Iran trained Sri Lankan military and intelligence officers and contributed billions to Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan soldiers execute Tamil Prisoners, January 2009, video broadcast by UK Channel 4 news

Rajapaksa and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, September 01, 2009. Libya loaned Sri Lanka $500 million dollars to help the Sri Lankan military.

Here are more reasons not to pay for Sri Lanka’s actions against Tamils.

The New York-based Genocide Prevention Project currently lists Sri Lanka among the worst offenders on its watch list of brutal regimes. (The other seven in the “Red Alert” group include Sudan, Burma, Somalia, Iraq, Pakistan, DR Congo, and Afghanistan.) Link: http://www.preventorprotect.org/press-releases/press-release-survivors-call-on-global-leaders.html

The Asian Center for Human Rights (ACHR) said “Sri Lanka is the number one [human rights] violator in the region closely followed by Bangladesh and Pakistan.” Sri Lanka is indulging in “systematic violations of human rights of civilians, [and] by deliberately oppressing journalists and freedom of expression, this measure closes off any means for the government to have access to independent information and understand the extent of the problem and the negative consequences of its own actions,” said Suhas Chakma, Director of the Asian Centre for Human Rights. Link: http://www.achrweb.org/reports/SAARC-2008.pdf

Sometimes economic sanctions help to change a nation’s policies. One example is the government of South Africa and its apartheid policy. In the 1970s and 80s most western nations decided to disinvest in South Africa’s economy. Along with other kinds of sanctions, like sports, South Africa was eventually persuaded to give up its policy of apartheid.

We hope that we can persuade the nations of the world to recognize the genocidal nature of the Sri Lankan government. Then, we hope to persuade them not to trade with or invest in Sri Lanka. We know that this is a campaign that should continue until the Sri Lankan government changes its policy. It worked in South Africa and we want to keep on until it works in Sri Lanka.

We think that to get the world to withhold investment from Sri Lanka we have to set an example: we overseas Tamils have to be the first to take our money out of Sri Lanka and keep it someplace else. (Nobody will do what we say unless we are willing to do it first.)

Labor MP Siobhain McDonagh asks “Do you really want to spend your money on a government that chooses to lock 300,000 people up behind barbed wire?” Watch the video of her speech.

Here is U.K. Chanel 4’s Video of Sri Lankan troop executing Tamil prisoners. It shows how Sri Lanka deals with the Tamils. Soon or later, you will be ashamed that you are supporting Sri Lanka with your money.