In Sri Lanka, No Access to Carnage Until Victory Speech, UN Lowers Expectations

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un3may3srilanka051709.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 17 – As the brothers Rajapaksa declare victory in northern Sri Lanka, from the conflict zone closed to press come reports of thousands dead, and thousands more injured. There will be no access, it is predicted, until after President Mahinda Rajapaksa's speech slated for Tuesday.

Until then the injured will die, and some predict mass graves and cover up, pleading via sat-phone to Inner City Press to please get the UN to take satellite photographs to preserve the evidence. But the UN withheld even the photographs their UNOSAT already had.

A press briefing has been set up for May 18 in New York, not by Ban Ki-moon's envoy Vijay Nambiar but rather by humanitarian chief John Holmes, who was visited decidedly less bloody zones during Sri Lanka's final push into the conflict zone. People are asking, where is Vijay Nambiar? He used to answer, to his credit if not be responsive to, text messages from Inner City Press.

Now even to a question 24 hours ago of what the UN is doing for the doctors being interrogated by the Sri Lanka government he has not answered. On the plane headed to Colombo he did speak to two publications, both British, and delivered a decidedly resigned message, that he doubted the government would stop. Was he reducing expectations? Or once again would he be perceived as giving the UN's blessing?

As Inner City Press reported in recent weeks, most who Ban Ki-moon chose as his advisers counseled letting the Sri Lanka conflict “run its course,” and only going to visit “after the dust settled.” We predicted then that just such a visit would happen, and we intend to cover it. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un3may3srilanka051709.html