US State Department Dismisses TNA Team's Visit as 'just another meeting'
Photo of TNA team in DC - (from Sri Lanka Mirror)
By Hassina Leelarathna
The US State Department was dismissive of a recent meeting with members of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), characterizing it as nothing more than the 30-45 minutes dialogue its officials routinely have with visiting foreign delegations.
“The State Department holds these types of meetings with a variety of interlocutors from around the world, including members of political parties and legislators,” Emily Horne a spokesperson for the Department told this writer.
The delegation of TNA MPs led by R. Sampanthan, leader of the party’s parliamentary group, arrived in Washington on October 26. Despite its earlier claims of a Washington agenda that would include briefings with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake, the highest ranking official the delegation succeeded in getting an audience was Wendy Sherman, Under Secretary for Political Affairs, a former corporate executive who was appointed to the position in late September. According to the State Department website, the Under Secretary serves as the day-to-day manager of overall regional and bilateral policy issues, and oversees the bureaus for Africa, East Asia and the Pacific, Europe and Eurasia, the Near East, South and Central Asia, the Western Hemisphere, International Organizations and International Narcotics and Law Enforcement.
Ms. Horne added that the purpose of the meeting was to discuss ‘ongoing reconciliation and political developments in Sri Lanka.’
The State Department did not issue an official statement or photograph following the meeting.
While the visit has been widely publicized by the LTTE rump and by the TNA team itself, details have been scanty. The only photograph the delegation has released so far shows its members posing outside Washington’s best-known tourist icon, the Capitol Dome.
Besides Mr. Sampanthan the delegation included members of parliament Maavai Senadhiraja, Suresh Premachandran and M.A. Sumanthiran.
Mr. Premachandran was quoted by the BBC (Tamil program) as maintaining the visit was at the State Department’s invitation and that it was planned during Mr. Blake’s recent visit to Colombo.
The State Department’s meeting with the TNA, a proxy of the LTTE which has remained on the Department’s own list of designated foreign terrorist organizations since 1997, has come under fire in the local Sri Lankan media. The meeting, however, is not a departure from established US policy. For example, at Tuesday’s daily press briefing at the State Department a reporter asked: “Could we talk to the Haqqani Network if we were to designate them as a Foreign Terrorist Organization?”
The answer was: “While we can’t comment directly on a situation that is hypothetical, in general, we would be able to talk with representatives of a Foreign Terrorist Organization, should we deem it appropriate.”
Meanwhile, in an interview with The Hindu, Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris, asked for his comments on reports that the United Nations Secretary General was expected to meet with the TNA team in New York, said Sri Lanka could not dictate to the U.N. system whom it could meet. “There are many political parties, some of who are in [the Sri Lankan] parliament, that represent the Tamils. So it would be a fundamental fallacy to look upon the point of view of the TNA as the one which reflects the view of all Tamil speaking people of this country,” the minister was quoted as saying.
The US State Department was dismissive of a recent meeting with members of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), characterizing it as nothing more than the 30-45 minutes dialogue its officials routinely have with visiting foreign delegations.
“The State Department holds these types of meetings with a variety of interlocutors from around the world, including members of political parties and legislators,” Emily Horne a spokesperson for the Department told this writer.
The delegation of TNA MPs led by R. Sampanthan, leader of the party’s parliamentary group, arrived in Washington on October 26. Despite its earlier claims of a Washington agenda that would include briefings with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake, the highest ranking official the delegation succeeded in getting an audience was Wendy Sherman, Under Secretary for Political Affairs, a former corporate executive who was appointed to the position in late September. According to the State Department website, the Under Secretary serves as the day-to-day manager of overall regional and bilateral policy issues, and oversees the bureaus for Africa, East Asia and the Pacific, Europe and Eurasia, the Near East, South and Central Asia, the Western Hemisphere, International Organizations and International Narcotics and Law Enforcement.
Ms. Horne added that the purpose of the meeting was to discuss ‘ongoing reconciliation and political developments in Sri Lanka.’
The State Department did not issue an official statement or photograph following the meeting.
While the visit has been widely publicized by the LTTE rump and by the TNA team itself, details have been scanty. The only photograph the delegation has released so far shows its members posing outside Washington’s best-known tourist icon, the Capitol Dome.
Besides Mr. Sampanthan the delegation included members of parliament Maavai Senadhiraja, Suresh Premachandran and M.A. Sumanthiran.
Mr. Premachandran was quoted by the BBC (Tamil program) as maintaining the visit was at the State Department’s invitation and that it was planned during Mr. Blake’s recent visit to Colombo.
The State Department’s meeting with the TNA, a proxy of the LTTE which has remained on the Department’s own list of designated foreign terrorist organizations since 1997, has come under fire in the local Sri Lankan media. The meeting, however, is not a departure from established US policy. For example, at Tuesday’s daily press briefing at the State Department a reporter asked: “Could we talk to the Haqqani Network if we were to designate them as a Foreign Terrorist Organization?”
The answer was: “While we can’t comment directly on a situation that is hypothetical, in general, we would be able to talk with representatives of a Foreign Terrorist Organization, should we deem it appropriate.”
Meanwhile, in an interview with The Hindu, Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris, asked for his comments on reports that the United Nations Secretary General was expected to meet with the TNA team in New York, said Sri Lanka could not dictate to the U.N. system whom it could meet. “There are many political parties, some of who are in [the Sri Lankan] parliament, that represent the Tamils. So it would be a fundamental fallacy to look upon the point of view of the TNA as the one which reflects the view of all Tamil speaking people of this country,” the minister was quoted as saying.