Deliver justice on disappearances

The news is likely to come as a relief to the majority of citizens that the State is making decisive moves to end a number of extra-judicial killings, abductions and disappearances among members of the Tamil community, based in Colombo.

Besides establishing a special police unit to end such crimes, President Mahinda Rajapaksa has also appointed a retired High Court judge to probe these incidents which were tending to mar the image of the State.

Now that the relevant machinery has been established to end such crimes, we call for speedy implementation of the plans which have been evolved.

We also take this opportunity to welcome moves currently underway to further investigate the recent killings of a number of aid workers in Trincomalee. Some bodies of these victims have been exhumed and we hope the truth behind the killings would be revealed in full.

We urge the State to be rigorous when it comes to meting out justice in these gruesome killings. The criminals must be tracked down and taken to task, whoever they may be. Likewise, the law and order machinery needs to function efficiently on these problems.

Words must be translated into action and the law applied rigorously and effectively. We need hardly say that the impartial and firm administration of justice in these crimes would do the State immense good and win for it immense respect and regard from all sections of the public.

It would help greatly in strengthening the Rule of Law in the land and contain lawlessness to a minimum. Therefore, we urge the State to put its best foot forward on these issues. Its authority must be felt far and wide and respected by all.

Numerous theories are afloat on the identity of those responsible for the killings, abductions and disappearances of these Tamil citizens. While the truth is being ascertained by the authorities, it is beyond dispute that the ethnic identity of the victims would give the crimes a strong communal slant.

Frankly, the cry may be raised in some quarters that communal violence is asserting itself once again in Sri Lanka.

Thus the incidents would be deeply denigratory of Sri Lanka, making the country as a whole the loser. Therefore, it would be in the country's interest for justice to be swiftly meted out in these sinister developments.

Generally speaking, every responsible section of Lankan society, besides the State, needs to voice its opposition, loud and clear to communalism. A non-communal climate needs to be consolidated within the country and for this purpose, communalism needs to be opposed, tooth and nail, by all right-thinking persons.

The State would do well to harness the influence of the numerous clergy of the land to spread the message of peace. Besides, communalism in all its forms must be outlawed, once and for all.

Meanwhile, we urge those who intend getting on to the streets on these issues to refrain from doing so. The chances are that such moves may lead to lawlessness. Even communal passions may be inflamed. They would do well to cooperate with the State in containing communalism instead.

We Sri Lankans are inheritors of religious traditions which emphasize tolerance, peace and brotherhood. Now is the time to practise these perennially significant virtues.

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