Gotabhaya very ‘unpopular’, outgoing US Ambassador tells MR
Outgoing US Ambassador Atul Keshap has told former President Mahinda Rajapaksa that his brother, Gotabhaya was very unpopular.
Indian American Keshap has based his assessment on information received by him, a spokesperson for the former President’s Office told The Island yesterday.Career diplomat Keshap succeeded Michele J. Sison in March 2015. He took over the mission in late August 2015.
Keshap paid a courtesy call on former President Rajapaksa at the latter’s Wijerama Mawatha residence on Sunday evening.
Keshap has also inquired about Gotabhaya Rajapaksa’s recent visit to China ahead of Viyathmaga 2018 annual convention on May 13 at the Shangri-la, Colombo.
The spokesperson said that Keshap had also referred to the then Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, Indian American Nisha Biswal meeting with the then Defence Secretary Rajapaksa in early Feb. 2014. Keshap alleged that Rajapaksa hadn’t treated Biswal courteously.
Ambassador Keshap spearheaded high profile US project to adopt Geneva Resolution backed by Colombo to pave the way for foreigners including Commonwealth judges on a judicial mechanism to address accountability issues.
Following the meeting with Biswal before she left for Jaffna, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa told The Island that the official hadn’t been properly briefed by the US Embassy in Colombo.
Fielding a query by The Island, the spokesperson for the ex-President categorically denied that the outgoing US Ambassador had warned the former President Rajapaksa against fielding Gotabhaya Rajapaksa as Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (Joint Opposition) presidential candidate. He said the question of Gotabhaya’s candidature had not figured in talks.
Chairman of SLPP and former External Affairs Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris on Monday told The Island that former President Rajapaksa would announce their presidential candidate at the most opportune moment.
Meanwhile, UPFA MP Udaya Gammanpila told the media on Monday (June 11) that Gotabhaya Rajapaksa could renounce his US citizenship anytime.
Addressing the media at his Pita Kotte office, Gammanpila explained the simple procedure in giving up the US nationality as and when one wanted to do so.
US embassy on Keshap’s meeting with MR
A spokesperson for the US embassy said: The Ambassador meets routinely with political leaders, civil society and community leaders. The official said so when The Island sought clarification as regards Tamil media claims that outgoing US Ambassador Atul Keshap had warned former President Rajapaksa against fielding Gotabhaya Rajapaksa as presidential candidate. The Island asked the embassy whether this particular issue was taken up with the former President?
(Source: The Island – By Shamindra Ferdinando)
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So, is the US disowning its own outstanding Citizen who won the war against terror (according to President Geotge W Bush) in an alien country?
The US should employ GR in the Pentagon to provide leadership in the loosing battles against terrorism all over the world.
Yours is the best comment on this blog I have seen for a very long time. Well done Shareena. How is it that most of the UN delegates and US ambassadors assigned to Sri Lanka are either with a Tamil background or Indian. And how can Indians talk about human rights when they don’t even care about their own people.
Clear indication that the Yanks are gonna fund the Presidential Candidate (presumably UNP) who opposes GR at the next Presidential Elections.
There goes our sovereignty; we are already a puppet nation of the US-World Bank-UNHRC axis of evil; this axis is bound to exert its evil influence and make a colony.
That is why we need to make sure GR becomes the President .We do not want a leader who is a puppet on the white mans string. We also do not want to hear about war crimes in SL. .We just need the powerful western nations to look back in to history and see the amount of human rights violations committed around the world by them. Also they should stop human rights violations that are happening around the world currently and not chase behind war that ended in SL a long time ago.
In Sri Lanka the Sri lankan elects the President. In the USA the President was elected by the Russians.
Thanks Stanley.
This is why we need Gotha and MR to lead this country. They have the balls to stand up and point the below to Channel 4 and the UNHRC ask ” if true why only us, even when the number of civilians killed in SL is now pretty obviously wrong?
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2017/12/iraq-new-reports-place-mosul-civilian-death-toll-at-more-than-ten-times-official-estimates/