UN Urged to Hold Referendum in NE

by Tamils for Obama, March 3, 2009

March 03, 2009

Your Excellency, Permanent Representative to the UN:

This letter concerns UNTATE. That stands for United Nations Transitional Administration in Tamil Eelam. Tamil Eelam means Tamil homeland.  UNTATE follows the precedent of UNTAET, the U.N. Transitional Administration in East Timor. We would like to show how this precedent applies to the situation of Tamils in Sri Lanka.

Let us remind you that Indonesia invaded East Timor in 1975.  Following the invasion there was a civil war, atrocities by government-supported paramilitary groups, the starvation and disease that come with destruction of civil society that comes with civil war, and massive displacement of the civilian populations both within the disrupted country and into other countries. Note that all of these events (except for invasion) have happened in Tamil-inhabited areas of Sri Lanka.

Numerous respectable sources describe the “genocide in East Timor.” Here is one: http://www.yale.edu/gsp/east_timor/ .

While you are certainly familiar with the  U.N.’s Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, let us remind you that this document defines any of the following  acts as genocide:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Items (a), (b), and (c) are well documented as on-going events in Sri Lanka.  Many impeccable sources refer to the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka. Here is one: http://www.genocidewatch.org/srilanka.html  .

In 1999, a U.N.-sponsored referendum was held in East Timor. It ended the genocide and led to the independence of that nation. We hope that a similar U.N.-sponsored referendum can be held in Tamil-inhabited areas of Sri Lanka, and we ask you to support it.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Tamils for Obama.

www.Tamilsforobama.com