A Father’s Love That Brought Oceans Of Tears

Roshen Chanaka shot dead by police during a protest by FTZ workers in Katunayake

Three innocent children – Avinash, Ahimsa and Aadesh believe it was nothing but divine justice that led to fall of one of the most tyrannical regimes, exactly on the sixth death anniversary of their loving father and founder Editor-in-Chief of The Sunday Leader – Lasantha Wickrematunge

by Dinuk Samarasinghe-Thursday, March 03, 2016

January 30th was a red letter day in Sri Lankan history. This marked the arrest of an offspring of a former executive president for the first time in the history of Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka Navy Lieutenant Yoshitha Rajapaksa – son of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa and de-facto chairman of the Rajapaksa family-owned Carlton Sports Network (CSN) along with its CEO Nishantha Ranatunga and the former President’s Spokesman Rohan Weliwita were arrested by the Financial Crimes Investigations Division (FCID) over alleged financial irregularities relating to the channel and money laundering charges amounting to a staggering Rs. 234 million.

Posts on Facebook showing a photo of Mahinda Rajapaksa shedding tears after Yoshitha was arrested went viral during last week. As any father would weep if his offspring was thrown into prison or remand, Mahinda shedding tears was nothing extraordinary considering the oceans of tears shed by fathers, mothers, sons and daughters of hundreds of innocent citizens allegedly attacked, maimed, killed or disappeared by the Rajapaksas.

Trincomalee quintuple youth murder 

However, the public had not forgotten the rivers of tears shed by the parents of five budding youth – Thangathurai Sivanantha (Engineering student of the University of Moratuwa), Logithasan Rohanth, Shanmugarajah Sajeenthiran, Manoharan Rajeehar and Yogarajah Hemachandran of Trincomalee killed in cold blood in 2006.

According to former DIG and JHU member H. M. G. B. Kotakadeniya, the STF team in question was sent to Trincomalee just before Christmas 2005, with the approval of Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa.

Shortly after the murders, journalist Subramaniyam Sugirdharajan was shot dead after publishing photos showing the bodies of the five students with point-blank gunshot injuries, disproving government claims that they were killed by a grenade explosion, according to Tamil Guardian.

Although President Mahinda Rajapaksa pledged publicly and to the Donor Co-chairs in Tokyo that the perpetrators would be brought to justice, irrespective of rank and a dozen members of the Special Task Force were placed under restraint pending inquiries; they were effectively discharged later on.

In a leaked US Embassy cable from Colombo in October 2006, the then US Ambassador to Sri Lanka Robert O. Blake met with the then Senior Presidential Advisor and former MP Basil Rajapaksa. The cable stated,

“Speaking with surprising candor, Rajapaksa explained the GSL’s efforts to prove that members of the Special Task Force (STF) murdered five students in Trincomalee in January: “We know the STF did it, but the bullet and gun evidence shows that they did not. They must have separate guns when they want to kill someone. We need forensic experts. We know who did it, but we can’t proceed in prosecuting them.”Read More