Sri Lanka

Since 1983, there has been on-and-off civil war, mostly between the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, or the LTTE, who want to create an independent Tamil Eelam state in the northeast of the island. ([48]) Furthermore, the grammatical conjunction 'but' implies a contradiction which would only be grammatically correct if the phrase 'fixed around' was the American definition. The ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka is an ongoing conflict between the majority Sinhalese and minority Tamils on the island-nation of Sri Lanka. Others have dismissed this criticism, saying the British usage of the term is the same as in the U.S., and that the meaning of "fixed around" in the memo is clear from context. See Ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. This view was seconded by the writer Christopher Hitchens. While Islam and Christianity (including 6% Catholics and 1% Protestants) represent 8% and 7% of the population respectively. " 'Fixed around' in British English means 'bolted on' rather than altered to fit the policy," he says.

Buddhism (69%) and Hinduism (15.5%) are the dominant religions. Robin Niblett, a member of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, says it would be easy for Americans to misunderstand the reference to intelligence being "fixed around" Iraq policy. Smaller minorities include (mostly Sunni) Muslims (7%), mostly of mixed Arab, Persian, Tamil and Sinhalese origins and Malay descent, Burghers of mixed European descent (1%) and the Wanniyala-Aetto or Veddahs, the few remaining descendants of earlier cultures. [47]. All three languages are used in education and administration. It's an entirely different document that describes legal authorization for the invasion of Iraq under standing UN resolutions. English, the link language in the present constitution, is spoken competently by about 10% of the population, and is widely understood. (At this link, view this PDF: 07.03.03: Attorney general's full advice on Iraq war (pdf)) This PDF detailed Lord Goldsmith’s confidential advice on the legality of the Iraq war and does not match the text of any of the alleged Downing Street Memos.

Both Sinhala and Tamil are official languages. It turned out to actually be a picture of a document found in an 28 April 2005 Guardian Unlimited story. Tamils comprise two communities: Native Tamils and more recent immigrants from India called as Indian Origin Tamils. [46]. Tamils constitute 18%, are predominantly Hindu, and live mostly in the north, east and central provinces. On Thursday, 16 June 2005 Reuters mislabelled a photograph of what it claimed was "a copy of the Downing Street Memo". About 74% of Sri Lankans are Sinhalese, most of them Buddhist, mostly following the Theravada tradition. [45].

Assimilation and intermixing has produced a group of people who are marginaly different from each other irrespective of current racial claims. That article is called "Failure is not an option, but it doesn't mean they will avoid it". Racial identities in Sri Lanka do not represent the genetic heritage. The 18 September 2004 Daily Telegraph article contains the only known reproductions of the original memos (scanned from a photocopy). In December 2005, Sri Lanka received its first international credit rating with Fitch Ratings assigning it a BB- (a rating held by Brazil and Indonesia among others). [44]. A September 2005 IMF report called for an end to 'fiscal domination' of monetary policy and more independence for the Central Bank so that inflation could be contained. PDF format.

The tsunami helped stabilize the deterioration of macro-economic fundamentals as foreign debt relief and assistance from the International Monetary Fund strengthened both the external sector and fiscal operations. [43]. But GDP growth, which had climbed to 6.4% by the first quarter of 2004 had fallen to 4.8% by the first quarter of 2005. This document originated in the Hutton Inquiry and can be viewed here. The December 26th Tsunami brought aidflows, and support from the IMF helped improve sentiment in the foreign exchange market. Another document was the Rycroft email, showing the author of the Downing Street Memo actually believed that Saddam should be removed because of a threat by Iraq getting WMDs into the hands of terrorists. By December 2004, the country was heading for a balance of payments crisis, as the currency depreciated and reserves dwindled. A further document, a July 21, 2002, cabinet office paper titled "Conditions for Military Action", which is a briefing paper for the meeting of which the Downing Street Memo is the minutes, was published (with the last page missing) by The Sunday Times on June 12, 2005.[42].

The expansionary fiscal policy, coupled with loose monetary policy eventually drove inflation up to 18% by January 2005, as measured by the Sri Lanka Consumer Price Index. The six documents are available in PDF form from the Think Progress web site.[41]. To finance the expanded budget deficit arising from a range of subsidies and a public sector recruitment drive, the government eventually had to print Rs 65 bn (US$ 650 mn) or around 3% of GDP. The Los Angeles Times published an article on June 15, 2005, describing several of the "new" documents; the article says that "Michael Smith, the defense writer for The Times of London who revealed the Downing Street minutes in a story 1 May, provided a full text of the six new documents to the Los Angeles Times."[40]. In 2004 alone Sri Lanka spent approximately US$ 180 mn on a fuel subsidy, as fixing fuel prices was an election promise. Interest in these documents was revived around 8 June 2005, following their appearance in a discussion thread at Democratic Underground[39] and subsequently they began to be quoted in US media, after Rawstory and NBC verified their authenticity with Smith and British government sources. But this policy of subsidizing imported commodities like fuel, fertilizer and wheat, soon unravelled the fiscal sector. The file derives ultimately from the typed transcript of the documents made by Smith and the Telegraph.

Its main theme to support the rural and suburban SMEs and protect the domestic economy from external influences, such as oil prices, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. On October 5th, 2004, a zipped file (leaks-brief.zip), containing facsimiles of these documents in PDF form, appeared on Cryptome[37], provided by Professor Michael Lewis of Cambridge University, who had also housed the file at Iraq expert Glen Rangwala's Middle East Reference website[38]. The new government stopped the privatization of state enterprises, reforms of state utilities such as power and petroleum and embarked on an unprecedented subsidy program called the Rata Perata economic program. The documents were widely quoted in the British press immediately following the Telegraph's story, for example in The Guardian[35] and The Sunday Herald[36]. In April 2004, there was a sharp reversal in economic policy after the government headed by Ranil Wickremesinghe from the United National Party was defeated by a coalition made up of Sri Lanka Freedom Party and the left-nationalist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna called the United People's Freedom Alliance. (As reported in Rawstory[34].). The Colombo stock exchange reported the highest growth in Asia for 2003, and today Sri Lanka has the highest per capita income in South Asia. On receipt of the documents, in September 2004, acting on the advice of lawyers, Smith says he photocopied them and returned the originals to his source, then, after the Telegraph's legal desk secretary typed transcripts on an "old fashioned typewriter", the Telegraph destroyed their copies of the originals, in order to frustrate any future police investigation of the leaks.

Signs of recovery appeared after the government and the LTTE signed the 2002 ceasefire. (6) a memo from Jack Straw to Tony Blair, 25 March 2002 containing advice ahead of Blair's meeting with George Bush in April. 2001 saw the first economic contraction in the country's history, due to a combination of power shortages, budgetary problems, the global slowdown, and continuing civil strife. (5) a memo from Peter Ricketts, Political Director, Foreign & Commonwealth Office, to the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, dated 22 March 2002, with background and opinion for Straw's advice to Tony Blair ahead of his meeting with George Bush in April. The economy rebounded in 1997-2000, with average growth of 5.3%. (4) a report from Christopher Meyer to David Manning on his meeting with Paul Wolfowitz, dated 18 March 2002. The GDP grew at an average annual rate of 5.5% during the early 1990s, until a drought and a deteriorating security situation lowered growth to 3.8% in 1996. (3) a report from David Manning to Tony Blair on his meeting with Condoleezza Rice, dated 14 March 2002.

By 1996, plantation crops made up only 20% of exports (compared with 93% in 1970), while textiles and garments 63%. (2) Iraq: Legal Background, prepared by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office Legal Department, dated 8 March 2002. While tea and rubber are still important, the most dynamic sectors are now food processing, textiles and apparel, food and beverages, telecommunications, insurance, and banking. (1) Iraq: Options Paper, prepared by the Overseas & Defence Secretariat in the Cabinet Office, dated 8 March 2002, describing options available for pursuing regime change in Iraq. From independence, till 1977, it was a strongly socialist economy but since then it has been increasingly pursuing privatization, market-oriented policies and export-oriented trade. They are:. Sri Lanka is historically famous for its cinnamon and tea (introduced by the British in the 19th century). The documents describe issues relating to the meetings held between Bush and Blair at Bush's Crawford, Texas, ranch in April 2002.

See Endemic Birds of the Indian Subcontinent for more information. Previous to the appearance of the Downing Street Memo, six other British (Blair) Cabinet papers originating around March 2002 were obtained by Michael Smith and used in two Daily Telegraph stories[32] [33] published on 18 September 2004. Sri Lanka is a centre of bird endemism. The full transcript is available here. The island has three biosphere reserves, Hurulu (established 1977), Sinharaja (established 1978), and Kanneliya-Dediyagala-Nakiyadeniya (KDN) (established 2004). Straw stated that he had not expected the question to come up. Several preserves have been established to protect some of Sri Lanka's remaining natural areas. On May 18th, 2005, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw were questioned on the memo, although neither was able to give a detailed answer.

These forests have been largely cleared for agriculture, timber or grazing, and many of the dry evergreen forests have been degraded to thorn scrub, savanna, or thickets. On 23 May, when BTC News reporter Eric Brewer asked him about his May 16th statement, McClellan said:. The Sri Lanka dry-zone dry evergreen forests are a tropical dry broadleaf forest ecoregion, which, like the neighboring East Deccan dry evergreen forests of India's Coromandel Coast, is characterized by evergreen trees, rather than the dry-season deciduous trees that predominate in most other tropical dry broadleaf forests. [30]. The north and east are considerably drier, lying in the rain shadow of the central highlands. On 17 May, McClellan told reporters that the White House saw "no need" to respond to the letter from Congress. Both these tropical moist forest ecoregions are very similar to those of India's Western Ghats. [29].

At higher elevations they transition to the Sri Lanka montane rain forests. However, McClellan admitted that he has not read the memo, but has only received reports of what it contains. The southwest, where the influence of the moisture-bearing southwest monsoon is strongest, is home to the Sri Lanka lowland rain forests. On 16 May, presidential spokesman Scott McClellan said that the memo's statement that intelligence was "being fixed" to support a decision to invade Iraq was "flat out wrong". Its forests are among the most floristically rich in Asia and for some faunal groups, it has the world's highest density of species diversity. [28]. Sri Lanka is one of the world's bio-diversity hot-spots. He said the same thing in a June 7, 2005 interview with Gwen Ifill on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.

Other major cities include Jaffna, Galle, and Kandy. He also reiterated that he and Bush had continued to try to find a way to avert war, "As it happened, we weren't able to do that because -- as I think was very clear -- there was no way that Saddam Hussein was ever going to change the way that he worked, or the way that he acted," again without explaining the apparent contradiction with the contents of the memo. The commercial capital is Colombo, but the administrative and legislative capital is at nearby Sri Jayewardanapura (Kotte). Blair's response to Steve Holland at the joint news conference with Bush was "No, the facts were not being fixed in any shape or form at all". The lowest gravitational field on Earth lies just off the coast of Sri Lanka. When the document was published, UK Prime Minister Tony Blair denied that anything in the memo demonstrated misconduct and said that it added little to what was already known about how British policy on Iraq developed. The climate is tropical, characterized by monsoons: the northeast monsoon lasts from December to March, the southwest June to October. … I'm not sure who 'they dropped it out' is, but—I'm not suggesting that you all dropped it out there.".

Amongst these are Sri Pada and the highest point Pidurutalagala (also known as Mt Pedro), at 2,524 m. Is this an accurate reflection of what happened? Could both of you respond?" President Bush did not address the issue of the intelligence and facts being "fixed" around a decision to go to war, but he did deny that he had, at the time of the memo, already decided to use military force against Saddam Hussein, saying "There's nothing farther from the truth." Bush also questioned the motives of whoever leaked the memo during the British election, saying "Well, I—you know, I read kind of the characterizations of the memo, particularly when they dropped it out in the middle of his race. The pear-shaped island consists mostly of flat-to-rolling coastal plains, with mountains rising only in the south-central part. Bush-Tony Blair press briefing in the White House, Reuters correspondent Steve Holland asked, "On Iraq, the so-called Downing Street memo from July 2002 says intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy of removing Saddam through military action. According to temple records, this natural causeway was formerly complete, but was breached by a violent storm (probably a cyclone) in 1480. On 7 June 2005, at a joint George W. Often referred to as Adam's Bridge, it is now mostly submerged, with only a chain of limestone shoals remaining above sea level. [24] UK Prime Minister Tony Blair denied that anything in the memo demonstrated misconduct and said that it added little to what was already known about how British policy on Iraq developed.

According to Hindu mythology, a land bridge to the Indian mainland, known as Rama's Bridge, was constructed during the time of Rama. One of the first articles on the memo to appear in the US media quoted "a former senior US official", who, speaking on condition of anonymity, called the memo's account "an absolutely accurate description of what transpired" during the senior British intelligence officer's visit to Washington. It is separated from the Indian subcontinent by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. Several other documents obtained by Smith, and treated similarly (see below), were confirmed as genuine by the UK Foreign Office.[23]. The island of Sri Lanka lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal. This has led some to question the document's authenticity, but no official source has questioned it, and it has been unofficially confirmed to various news organizations, including the Washington Post, NBC, The Sunday Times and the LA Times.
. The document was retyped from the photocopy, and the photocopy destroyed.

Sri Lanka consists of 8 provinces:. Michael Smith, the journalist who first reported on the Downing Street Memo, has said that he protected the identity of his source by photocopying the original and returning the original document to the source. See also: Sri Lankan parliamentary election, 2004. [22]. At the close of 2005, deep political unease and suspicion remained between the two factions. MSNBC has an article and a video clip from NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. But these hopes were dashed by almost immediate accusations of bias and favouritism on the part of international aid agencies from both sides. Network news coverage by NBC on 14 June.

There were high hopes that the devastating Tsunami of December 2004 would force the government and Tamil rebels into a new, lasting dialogue to address the serious effects of the disaster on Sri Lanka as a whole. The Associated Press first issued a story about the memos on 7 June. The LTTE boycotted the election, thereby preventing thousands of Tamils from voting, and so Wickremasinghe from taking power, whose election promises included a Federal state to the North and East. It stated explicitly,. His narrow victory was engineered by the the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) who want Tamil Eelam to be an independent country. The Star Tribune revisited the Downing Street Minutes as part of the evidence in a Memorial Day editorial (30 May, 2005). Rajapaksa offers less autonomy than Wickremasinghe to the northeast, home to most of Sri Lanka's 3.2 million ethnic Tamils. And it was disclosed four days before the British elections, raising concerns about the timing.".

He was previously Prime Minister in 2000. Also on 8 June, USA Today printed an article by their senior assignment editor for foreign news, Jim Cox, saying with respect to the memo, "We could not obtain the memo or a copy of it from a reliable source… There was no explicit confirmation of its authenticity from (Blair's office). Ratnasiri Wickremanayake was appointed the 22nd Prime Minister on November 21, 2005, to fill the post vacated by Rajapaksa. NewsHour transcript, audio and video. Rajapaksa took oath as President on November 19, 2005. He said it may have been assigned to 'foreign news' correspondents and wasn't seen as a Bush story, or it may be the US media is still working on researching it (although he then admitted he had no reason to believe that). The Election was held on November 17, 2005, and Mahinda Rajapaksa was elected the fifth Executive President of Sri Lanka with a 50.29% of valid votes, compared to Ranil Wickremesinghe's 48.43%. [21] Although Okrent stepped down at the end of May (the routine end of his term), on NewsHour on 8 June he suggested some possible explanations for why the US media had been so slow to cover what he considered a very important story.

Mahinda Rajapaksa was nominated the SLFP candidate and former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe UNP candidate. He also stated that, due to continuing reader interest, the paper intends to give fuller coverage to the memo. In August 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that Presidential Elections would be held in November 2005, resolving a long-running dispute on the length of President Kumaratunga's term. On May 20th, 2005, Daniel Okrent, the Public Editor at the time for The New York Times, publicly assessed the coverage of the minutes in the paper in a forum on the NYT's website. Elections were held on April 02 and the new Parliament convened on April 23 and elected Mahinda Rajapaksa as the Prime Minister. [20]. Parliament was dissolved on February 07, 2004 by President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. The report was one of the most extensive for a nationwide publication up until that time.

Since its independence in 1948, Sri Lanka has remained a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. One of the first reports include that topic was a May 17 article in the Christian Science Monitor. Parliament reserves the power to make all laws. Since that time, much of the coverage about the memo has discussed the lack of coverage. The president may summon, suspend, or end a legislative session and dissolve parliament any time after it has served for one year. [19]. The primary modification is that the party that receives the largest number of valid votes in each constituency gains a unique "bonus seat" (see Hickman, 1999). The article was initially scheduled to run on May 11, but was pushed back so that it could have greater prominence on a slower news day later in the week.

Members are elected by universal (adult) suffrage based on a modified proportional representation system by district to a six-year term. After a few days of no news, however, a local reporter was assigned. The Sri Lankan Parliament is a unicameral 225-member legislature. Undoubtedly, many other newspapers across the country reacted similarly. The President's deputy is the Prime Minister, who leads the ruling party in Parliament. Being quite a distance from London, editors first waited for articles to come across on wire services. The President appoints and heads a Cabinet of Ministers responsible to Parliament. At the Star Tribune, initial interest had been piqued after a reader e-mailed information he had seen on the Internet to the paper's ombudsman, who forwarded it to others in the news department.

The incumbent may be removed from office by a two-thirds vote of Parliament, with the agreement by the Supreme Court. The Los Angeles Times and Star Tribune put local reporters on the story, and produced early articles on May 12 and May 13, respectively. The President is responsible to Parliament for the exercise of duties in accordance with the Constitution and laws. The Knight-Ridder news service produced some reportage at the time, but independent articles were limited. The President of the Republic is directly elected for a six-year term and serves as Head of State, Head of Government and Commander in Chief of the armed forces. According to Media Matters [18], there were some early mentions in The New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, the New York Sun, and the Washington Post, though coverage was slight (the Post's first article appeared in the "Style" section) and primarily aimed at the impact it would have on the British elections, rather than how it affected the Bush administration. It was rumored that the LTTE themselves did the killing. .continue to downplay [the] story." [17].

In December 2005, following a brutal gang rape and murder of a Tamil woman (Ilayathambi Tharsini)(such incidents have happened before, including Krishanti Kumaraswamy), restive civilian groups likely encouraged and controlled by the LTTE carried out a series of attacks against Government forces in the North and East, and some unknown forces assassinated a pro-LTTE Tamil politician on Christmas eve in a Catholic church. print media, saying they ". It has been alleged that only 17% of the relief aid has been spent on what it was intended for. The organization Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting has been among those that have criticized the U.S. Several Sinhala nationalist groups in the South challenged this pact and the Supreme Court declared that some articles of the pact were unconstitutional. The story had limited coverage in the USA but has recently received greater attention in the American press. On June 24, 2005, the Government signed the Post Tsunami Operational Management Structure (P-TOMS), a legal instrument for the Government to share aid with the LTTE. The Downing Street Minutes was a major story in the British press during the last few days of the 2005 general election campaign and was also covered in other countries.

Over 40,000 people died on the island and many more are still missing. A strong majority of Democrats, and around 25% of Republicans, agreed with the sentiment. On December 26, 2004, an earthquake off the western coast of Sumatra created tsunamis that washed over the Eastern and Southern coasts of Sri Lanka. voters believe that Congress should impeach President Bush if it is found that Bush did not tell the truth about his reasons for going to war with Iraq. In April 2004, the Government of Ranil Wickramasinghe was ousted from Parliament and a coalition including several Sinhala nationalist groups opposed to negotiations with LTTE came to power. A June 2005 Zogby poll shows that 42% of U.S. No significant progress has been made to date. In addition to the grand prize for eliciting a clear "Yes" or "No" answer, a number of lesser prizes are offered for lesser responses, down to $100 reward for video evidence of having posed the question clearly to President Bush within his hearing but getting no answer.[16].

LTTE negotiators proposed an Interim Self Governing Authority, but the Government's response did not satisfy LTTE, and the peace process paused in late 2003. Democrats.com has raised one thousand dollars, offered as a reward to anyone who can get George Bush to answer the following question:. 6 rounds of direct talks were held in several locations around the world, but no substantial steps were taken towards a political settlement to the conflict. A website, afterdowningstreet.org, has been established for the newly emerging citizens' coalition. In early 2002 both the LTTE and the Government signed a Memorandum of Understanding and entered into a joint ceasefire. Among the citizen groups are:. At the end of 2001 a new Parliament was elected and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe declared a ceasefire, responding to the LTTE which had declared a ceasefire in December 2001. The request states the constitutional grounds for impeachment:.

During her re-election rally, a suicide bomber killed 10 people, missing Kumaratunge. Bonifaz and is available here. In December 2000 President Kumaratunge was re-elected for her second term. The formal Resolution of Inquiry request was written by Boston constitutional attorney John C. This was the first time the country's cricket team had won the Cricket World Cup tournament. Article written by Larisa Alexandrovna, pushing the topic to the MSM. In 1996 Sri Lanka became world champions in Cricket. [12].

Both the Sri Lanka Army and LTTE stood accused of gross human rights vioaltions including abduction, torture and extrajudicial executions during the conflict. A coalition of citizen groups will ask Congress to file a Resolution of Inquiry, the first necessary legal step to determine whether President Bush has committed impeachable offenses. By the mid 1990s, LTTE controlled much of the North and had set up a de facto state. [11]. Her initial attempts to negotiate with the LTTE failed and the war in the north and east continued with heavy casualties to sides. On 26 June, drug war critic Donald Way wrote commentary on holocaustnow citing the relevance of those portions of the memos detailing how the air war began in 2002 for the purpose of provoking Saddam Hussein into reacting in such a way that could be used to justify the military invasion. In 1994 Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, daughter of two previous Prime Ministers, was elected President. [10].

In 1993 Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa was killed in a similar manner during a May Day celebration in Colombo. Also on that day, he and Kevin Zeese authored an op-ed for the Boston Globe to support the call for impeachment against Bush, citing the memo as part of the evidence that the possibility of deliberate deception by the administration should be investigated. In 1991 a LTTE suicide bomber killed former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in retaliation for the IPKF and the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord. On 31 May, consumer advocate and former Presidential hopeful Ralph Nader wrote an article on ZNet calling for Bush and Cheney’s impeachment under Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution [9]. Thousands of Muslims who had lived there for generations started a mass exodus to southern parts of the island. [8]. In 1990 the LTTE ordered all Muslims in the north to leave their homes. On 18 May, conservative pundit and former Reagan Administration advisor Paul Craig Roberts wrote an article calling for Bush's impeachment for lying to Congress about the case for war.

Many also believe that the Indian army lost support because of acts of rape and extreme misconduct by Indian soldiers. Conyers' blog is keeping tabs on the number of signatures on a petition for the campaign to re-open hearings (see petition links below). It is speculated that for this brief moment the LTTE was aided in a fight against the IPKF which drove out India. US Congressman John Conyers has also set up a blog to raise support for re-opening the Congressional investigation into the 9/11 attacks, ConyersBlog.us. It is alleged that the IPKF attempted to setup a longterm base of operations in Sri Lanka's north which frightened the Sri Lankan Government. These lists are also linked to by a network of blogs. They had lost over 1,500 men. Every day it lists new contact information for three news outlets, to urge them to provide better coverage of the issues.

The 60,000-strong Indian force soon lost the support of both sides of the conflict and began a phased withdrawal, ending in 1990. On 1 June 2005 a targeted media campaign called 'Awaken the Mainstream Media' began jointly at Daily Kos and downingstreetmemo.com. India, which had helped create and nurture the Tamil militant groups in the north had changed its stance, and in 1987 signed the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord and sent the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) to the Jaffna peninsula. On 30 May 2005, in a "blogswarm" fueled by the memo, hundreds of blogs joined together to form the Big Brass Alliance in support of After Downing Street. While the Government dealt with the JVP rebellion, it enlisted the help of the Indian government to quell the Tamil separatist movement. Created in late May, AfterDowningStreet.org is a coalition of organizations that support an official inquiry into the DSM, pre-war intelligence, and the planning and execution of the Iraq war. 60,000 people vanished in the south during this period. The website also has a blog dedicated to discussing issues surrounding the memo, called downingstreetmemo.blogspot.com.

His death ended the rebellion. A website, www.downingstreetmemo.com, was created on May 13 to inform the public about the memo and provide context. At the end of 1989, JVP leader Rohana Wijeweera was arrested and days later shot while allegedly trying to escape. By the next morning the document had become a major story at Daily Kos, where Congressman Conyers learned of it. Both JVP and the Government engaged in the abduction, torture and murder of thousands of people. James Wolcott may have been the first blogger in the US to take note of the Sunday Times publication, on 30 April 2005. By 1988 it was a full-scale guerilla war. Wilson and Cindy Sheehan among others testify.[5][6][7].

In 1986, the JVP (banned in 1983), started their second struggle in the south for state power. presides over a hearing or forum on the Downing Street memo in a basement room in the Capitol where Joseph C. One Tamil militant group, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), fought other groups, assassinated their leaders and assimilated their cadres into their ranks, and soon became the main group fighting the Army in the north and east. Congressman John Conyers, Jr. A 1985, round of peace talks in Thimphu, Bhutan failed, and the conflict intensified. On June 16, 2005: U.S. Clashes between Tamil militants and the Government increased. [4] As of 16 June 2005, over 100 congressmen had signed the letter, including Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.

Many thousands were forced to move from their homes in Colombo to the north and east. By 13 June 2005, the letter had received over 540,000 signatures from citizens, and more congressmen had signed on, bringing the total to 94. In July 1983, called Black July, in response to the killing of 13 army soldiers in Jaffna, the Government instigated a week-long pogrom against the Tamil community in the south, killing thousands. [3] The letter has been getting between 20,000 and 25,000 signatures a day, which was boosted by MoveOn.org joining the campaign on 9 June. The Government sent the military to the Jaffna peninsula, increasing tensions. Conyers initially requested 100,000 signatures from citizens (a petition) to request that President Bush answer the questions in his letter. They called this homeland Tamil Eelam. [2].

By early 1980s, calls for a separate Tamil state had grown to the point where Tamil militants engaged in guerrilla attacks against the Government. al have given serious consideration to sending a fact-finding mission to the UK. Jayewardene came to power and released imprisoned JVP members. In response to the Bush Administration's refusal to answer the congressional delegation's questions, Conyers et. R. No specific White House response to the letter has been made publicly. In 1977, J. On 5 May, Congressman John Conyers sent a letter to President Bush signed by 89 of his colleagues demanding an explanation of the revelations in the memo.

The insurrection was quelled by the government of Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike and JVP leaders were jailed for treason. However, the minutes explicitly state that the capability was less than that of Libya, Iran, and North Korea, and that Saddam was not threatening his neighbors. In 1971, the Marxist group Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) launched an insurrection in the south to gain state power. It has been said that some of those present at the meeting believed that Iraq might possess weapons of mass destruction (WMD) "capacity". Initially many of these were supported by the Indian Government which sought to appease Tamils in South India. Another paragraph has been interpreted to show that Geoff Hoon believed timing of the war's start was intended to influence American elections:. Calls for a separate Tamil state in the north and east grew, and eventually several Tamil militant groups formed, particularly in the northern Jaffna peninsula. They also say that the minutes are dated at a time when Bush stated that "we haven't made any decisions on Iraq, but all options are on the table.".

Decades of tension between Tamils living primarily in the north and east, and the Sinhala majority in the south, led to widespread communal riots in the 1950s to 1970s targeting Tamil communities and economic interests in many parts of the island. Powell presented the administration's case to the United Nations Security Council, in a speech on February 5, 2003. This led to unrest among Tamils, whose cultural identity was threatened. Bush did not finally decide to carry out the invasion of March 2003 until after Secretary of State Colin L. The 1956 Sinhala Only Act made Sinhala the sole official language, forcing Tamil-speakers to learn it. Also, proponents say that the contents (such as "Military action was now seen as inevitable.") and the date of the memo, July 23, 2002, contradicts the official White House position that Mr. Post-independence governments implemented a series of pro-Sinhala measures, supporting the Sinhala majority. In particular, they say that the minutes indicate that the Administration was determined to go to war with Iraq prior to considerations of legality, and with full knowledge that, at best, "the case was slim." And furthermore that they selected and exaggerated intelligence so as to confirm their policy and developed a plan to manipulate public opinion.

Independent Sri Lanka is famed for it's remarkable increase in human development, notably life expectency, infant mortality, and literacy, which lead the country to be seen as somewhat of a model for third world development. In the United States, proponents of a formal congressional inquiry say that the minutes, along with testimonies from credible witnesses, shed sufficient doubt on the actions of the Bush Administration to warrant a formal inquiry. In 1982, the legislative and judicial capital was moved from Colombo to nearby Sri Jayewardanapura Kotte. The main sections covering the ultimatum are:. In 1972, the country became a republic, free of the last vestiges of colonial domination; the name was changed to Sri Lanka. The British analysis of US policy is also stated elsewhere in the minutes:. The flag of the last king of Kandy was proclaimed the National Flag with few minor changes (added orange and green vertical bars to represent the Tamils and Muslims). Others argue that "being fixed around" was used in the sense of selectively choosing or ignoring facts depending on whether they supported the already decided conclusion.

The first prime minister was Don Stephen Senanayake, while Sir Henry Monck-Mason Moore became Governor-General, the Queen's nominal representative. The author of the memo, Matthew Rycroft, uses this term in an e-mail when talking about an appointment, This is now fixed for 0800 [1]. As Ceylon [1], it became a dominion in the British Commonwealth in 1948. Supporters of President Bush argue that the usage of the phrase "were being fixed" in the 5th sentence is a colloquialism meaning "to agree upon". The British used Sri Lanka as a base for operations in the Pacific. The most controversial paragraph is a report of a recent visit to Washington by head of the Secret Intelligence Service Sir Richard Dearlove (known in official terminology as 'C'):. A month later, a Sri Lankan garrison on the Cocos Islands mutinied, but the rebellion was put down. Tony Blair is quoted as saying that the British public would support regime change in the right political context.

They defeated both coastal kingdoms (Yarlpanam and Kotte) in the 16th century. The resolution currently has 70 co-sponsors. In 1517, the Portuguese established the fort and trading post Colombo. A resolution of inquiry was filed by Representative Barbara Lee, which would request that the President and the State Department turn over all relevant information with regard to US policy towards Iraq. When the Portuguese arrived, the island consisted of several autonomous kingdoms under the nominal suzerainty of the king at Kotte, such as those of Yarlpanam (Anglicised Jaffna) in the north and Kandy in the central hills. Bush to respond to the contents of the document. It was also invaded and ruled by Kings of Kalinga (present-day Indian state Orissa) and Malay Straights. A group of 131 United States Congressmen, led by John Conyers, have repeatedly requested of US President George W.

South Indian kingdoms invaded Sri Lanka on a number of occasions and so the island was ruled for extended periods by Tamil dynasties such as the Cholas, Pandyas, Cheras and Pallavas. Both UK and US officials have since either refused to affirm or deny its content, or else have tacitly validated its authenticity (as when Tony Blair replied to a press conference question by saying "That memo was written before we went to the UN."). Parakramabahu IV, who ruled from Kotte, was the last Sri Lankan king to rule over the entire island, although the other kingdoms remained under the nominal suzerainty of the High King at Kotte. No official sources have questioned its accuracy or disputed its authenticity, despite being questioned directly about it on numerous occasions. After the Polonnaruwa era, the capital moved often, and the island was rarely unified. If it is not a forgery, another original copy may surface. 1070 to 1200). Because of this, the retyped copy would not be admissible in any court.

1000 AD) and Polonnaruwa (c. Hence, it will be impossible to authenticate the contents of the copy by physical means. 200 BC to c. The retyping process certainly opens up the possibility of errors or mischief. Buddhism and a sophisticated system of irrigation became the pillars of Sinhalese civilization (200 BC-1200 AD) that flourished in the north-central Sri Lanka, with capitals at Anuradhapura (from c. To protect the source who provided him with the classified memorandum, the Sunday Times journalist who acquired it retyped its contents (using an old-fashioned typewriter rather than a computer) and returned his copy of the original to his source. Buddhism arrived from the Indian subcontinent in the 3rd century BC thanks to Arahath Mahinda Thero, missionary of Indian Emperor Ashoka, and spread rapidly. A typed replica of the memo was printed in The Sunday Times on 1 May 2005.

Given the island's proximity to the Deccan Plateau, people of different ethnicities must have traveled to and from it throughout human history. The term "Downing street memo" is also used to generally describe a larger body of associated or related documents leaked to the public from November 2004 onwards, which date from March 2002 through July 2002—the DSM being the most important. Its origins are not dated, but must post-date the arrival of the Dravidian language group in South India sometime in prehistory. As this issue began to be covered by American media, two other main allegations stemming from the memo arose: that the UN weapons inspection process was manipulated to provide a legal pretext for the war, and that pre-war air strikes were deliberately ramped up in order to soften Iraqi infrastructure in preparation for war, prior to the October congressional vote permitting the invasion. Tamil presence is noted throughout the country's written history. The Memo went largely unremarked in the US press at first but was heavily covered in progressive blogs such as those on Daily Kos, in particular because of a remark attributed to Richard Dearlove (then head of British foreign intelligence service MI6) that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" of removing Saddam Hussein from power, which was taken to show that US intelligence on Iraq prior to the war was deliberately falsified, rather than simply mistaken. However, archaic Sinhalese langauge is closer to Prakrits used in northwest India, indicating an origin in the present western coastal Indian state Gujarat. The memo was named by the Times after the official residence of the UK Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street in London ("Downing Street" is a metonym for the Prime Minister's office.).

Legend states that king Vijaya came to Sri Lanka from Orissa in northeast India. The memo was first published in The Sunday Times on May 1 2005, during the last days of the UK's general election campaign. Archaeological excavations at Anuradhapura show a settlement from the 10th century BC. . It also describes a minister of Vijaya, Anuradha, who established the village Anuradhagamma which later became Anuradhapura and became the capital of Sri Lanka centuries later. The "Downing Street memo" (occasionally DSM), sometimes described by critics of the Iraq War as the "smoking gun memo", contains an overview of a secret 23 July 2002 meeting among United Kingdom Labour government, defence and intelligence figures, discussing the build-up to the war—including direct reference to classified United States policy of the time. This may refer to a specific group of Prakrit-speaking people, and not necessarily the first such group to arrive. According to CNN, currently classified documents which were dated at the same month as the Downing Street memo, March of 2002, were uncovered in Iraq, and contained evidence that Russian intelligence notified Iraq about the "determination of the United States and Britain to launch military action." [27].

The Mahavansa describes the Sinhalese kingdom started by king Vijaya and his followers. In addition, that was before we went to the United Nations and secured the second resolution, 1441, which had unanimous support."[26]. The theory of Mahavamsa is a contraversial subject and a debate continues as to whether some aspects of it are factual. When asked about the contents of the memo by Plaid Cymru MP Adam Price in the House of Commons on 29 June 2005, Blair again refrained from disputing the document's authenticity, saying only "[…]that memo and other documents of the time were covered by the Butler review. Archaeological evidence supplements the Mahavamsa as it places people (perhaps the indigenous Yakkas and Nagas of the chronicle) of indistinguishable racial origin living in the north-central Sri Lanka from the 10th century BC onwards with knowledge of agriculture, metallurgy, and livestock breeding. A White House official said the administration wouldn't comment on leaked British documents. The Dipavamsa and Mahavamsa give a near-continuous written history of the island and is also the primary source for the early chronology of India, especially for the synchronity with Alexander the Great and the Greeks. The British Embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment.

Prior to 1972, Sri Lanka was known by a variety of names; the best known is Ceylon. Bush has not responded to questions from Congress regarding the memo's accuracy. In 1978 it was changed to the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. George W. In 1972, the official name of the nation that governs the island was changed to the Free, Sovereign and Independent Republic of Sri Lanka (ශ්‍රී ලංකා in Sinhala / இலங்கை in Tamil). US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, when questioned about the document's accuracy, did not confirm or deny its accuracy. . White House spokesman Scott McClellan, when questioned about the document's accuracy, did not confirm or deny its accuracy.

The Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (ශ්රී ලංකා in Sinhala / Sri Lanka in Tamil) (known as Ceylon before 1972) is a tropical island nation off the southeast coast of the Indian subcontinent, about 30 km south of India. Tony Blair, responding to a question on the document, said: "that memorandum was written before we went to the United Nations" [25]. The chronology of early India depends upon that of the Mahawamsa. Bush. The Buddhist scriptures were first committed to writing at Aluvihare in Sri Lanka. [13] [14] [15] Several links supporting the impeachment of George W. Winner of the Cricket World Cup in 1996. Gold Star Families for Peace.

First country to have a wildlife sanctuary [2]. Velvet Revolution, and. World's leading exporter of cinnamon; exported to Egypt as early as 1400 BC. Democratic Underground. World's leading exporter of tea; Ceylon tea is of the finest quality in the world. Democrats.com. Sri Lanka celebrated 80 years in Broadcasting on December 16th 2005. Global Exchange.

First country in South Asia to start radio broadcasting with Radio Ceylon. Code Pink. Longest period of continuous multi party democracy by a non western country (from 1931-present). Democracy Rising. First country in the World to have a female prime minister (Sirimavo Bandaranaike). 911Citizens Watch. Western. Progressive Democrats of America (PDA).

Uva. Veterans for Peace. Southern. Downing Street Director of Communications and Strategy Alastair Campbell. Sabaragamuwa. Downing Street Director of Government Relations Sally Morgan, and. North Western. Prime Minister's Chief of Staff Jonathan Powell,.

North Eastern. Head of the Secret Intelligence Service Richard Dearlove,. North Central. Chief of the Defence Staff Sir Michael Boyce,. Central. Director of the Government Communications Headquarters Francis Richards,. Ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee John Scarlett,.

Cabinet Secretary Sir Richard Wilson,. Attorney General of England and Wales Lord Goldsmith,. Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Jack Straw,. Secretary of State for Defence Geoff Hoon,.