The US ambassador to Sri Lanka Robert Blake was wounded Tuesday in an artillery attack by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels in eastern Sri Lanka, Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, who accompanied him told AFP.
Posted on 02/26/2007 9:44:08 PM PST by HAL9000
Sri Lanka: ambassadors Italian and US wounded in a rebellious offensive
COLOMBO - The ambassadors American and Italian in Sri Lanka were wounded Tuesday in an offensive with artillery carried out by rebels tamouls supposed in the east of the island, indicated to AFP the minister human rights Mahinda Samarasinghe.
The ambassador Robert Blake and his Italian counterpart Prio Mariani were touched by glares of shells which struck the landing strip of the air base of Batticaloa at the time when the diplomats left a military helicopter, specified the Samarasinghe minister.
Mr. Mariani was touched with the head, without the gravity of his wounds being known, and was transported to the local hospital with eleven others wounded, indicated the director of the establishment Muruganathan Moorthy.
The American ambassador “is slightly wounded”, added the Samarasinghe minister.
WOW Hal I didn't hear about this just broke off the wires
Well Sri Lanka did had their problem with radical muslums too
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - The U.S. and Italian ambassadors to Sri Lanka were "slightly injured" when their helicopters were targeted by mortars fired by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels in the east on Tuesday, officials said.
The helicopters used by U.S. Ambassador Robert Blake and his Italian counterpart Pio Mariani had just landed in Batticaloa when several mortars landed close to the aircraft, said Sri Lankan government minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, who accompanied them.
"Both the ambassadors are fine and they have suffered slight injuries," Samarasinghe said.
Mariani needed medical care and was taken to the area's main hospital for treatment. The nature of his injuries was not immediately known.
The Sri Lankan Defense Ministry blamed the attack on separatist Tamil Tiger rebels, who are banned in the United States and in
European Union countries as a terrorist group.
There was no immediate comment from the rebels Tuesday.
The two ambassadors, accompanied by their staff and Sri Lankan officials, had traveled Tuesday morning to Batticaloa aboard two helicopters to attend a meeting about the development of the area, a hotbed of separatist violence.
"As their choppers landed mortars were fired by the Tigers," said Lt. Col. Upali Rajapakse, a senior officer the Defense Ministry's information section.
He said the diplomats already had gotten out of the helicopters when the mortars were fired. It was not immediately known how they sustained their injuries.
Seven Sri Lankan security personnel who were on the ground also were wounded, Rajapakse said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070227/ap_on_re_as/sri_lanka_ambassadors_injured
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&q=Colombo&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&tab=wn&scoring=d
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&q=Colombo&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&tab=wn&scoring=d
http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/tw/tw_3011.html
Travel Warning
United States Department of State
Bureau of Consular Affairs
Washington, DC 20520
This information is current as of today, Mon Feb 26 2007 22:05:10 GMT-0800.
SRI LANKA
October 23, 2006
OH OKAY but I know they do have Muslum community in Sri Lanka
https://www.osac.gov/Regions/country.cfm?country=23
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http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=134928&version=1&template_id=44&pa
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6387427.stm
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Note: The following text is a quote:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3370228,00.html
US ambassador to Sri Lanka injured by rebel attack
Published: 02.27.07, 06:34 / Israel News
US ambassador to Sri Lanka Robert Blake was injured in an attack by Tamil rebels in eastern Sri Lanka.
The ambassador was injured by a munitions shell during a tour of the eastern region with the Sri Lankan minister for human rights. (AFP)
http://www.satp.org
http://www.saag.org
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http://www.saag.org/searchb10.asp?search=sri+lanka&searchtype=all&B1=Submit
http://www.saag.org/searchb10.asp?search=tamil+tigers&searchtype=all&B1=Submit
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http://www.saag.org/notes4/note367.html
Note no 367
24.02.2007
"SRI LANKA: REVISITING LTTE'S OPTIONS Update No 114"
By Col R Hariharan (Retd.)
SNIPPET: "This may be read in continuation of SAAG Note No 357 dated January 11, 2007 "Sri Lanka 2006: LTTE's Unbalanced Scorecard Update No 111 available at http://www.saag.org/notes4/note357.html ]"
I would say that 90% are Hindu. Tamil Nadu is the extreme southern part of India. The Moghul invaders did not make much headway that far south.
Ethnic cleansing
The LTTE has been blamed for forcibly removing (or "ethnically cleansing") Sinhalese and Muslim inhabitants from areas under its control, including the use of violence against those who refuse to leave. Most notably, the LTTE forcibly expelled the entire Muslim population of Jaffna on two hours notice in 1990.[45] The LTTE are also accused of organising massacres of Sinhala villagers who settled in the Northeast under the dry lands policy.[46]
The LTTE has apologized for the expulsion of Muslims and has blamed this event on the misconduct of one of its regional commanders. However these expulsions had taken place in Jaffna where the supreme leadership of the LTTE was based . It is therefore unlikely that these expulsions were planned at a local level. Furthermore no punitive action was taken against those who expelled the Muslims from Jaffna. The LTTE has taken the added step of encouraging Muslim civilians to return their homes and livelihoods and providing compensation. However very few Muslims have accepted this offer.
The LTTE feels the expulsion of Sinhalese civilian from the North East of Sri Lanka is a necessary step to safeguard the rights of the Tamil minority. The LTTE alleges that most of the North East lands were originally owned by Tamils, who were forcibly evicted to make way for government aided Sinhala colonization schemes. These schemes, they argue were created with the sole intent on making Tamil civilians a minority in their traditional homelands and hence a means to further deprive their rights under the present district based unitary political system.[47]. However Muslims and Sinhalese formed over half of the population of the East province throughout recent history. Furthermore the existence of archaeological evidence shows that the Sinhalese inhabited the Eastern province for thousands of years. Scholars acknowledge the existence of a Tamil kingdom in the Northern province but there is no evidence of a Tamil kingdom in the Eastern province[48]. Therefore the basis for the LTTE's claim of the Eastern province as a traditional homeland of the Tamils remains contentious[49].
The region (India and Sri lanka) is 90% Tamelese . It's a blend of all those religions. The India part of it is majority Hindu, So you'd be correct that way. But we are talking about Sri Lanka, which although a sliver of the continent, doesn't share such a large majority of Hindu, but rather a more equal blend of Muslim, Siekh, and hindu.
As I mentioned, this rebel group is made up of kidnapped children from all of those, whatever they can grab from the local villages in the area.
It's not a Islamic cause they are fighting about, it's a Tamelese independance one, hence the name, Tamel Tigers
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