Ask journalists to cover Sri Lanka's genocide

[Your information will be inserted here]

Prefix Firstname Lastname

123 Street Address

MyCity, St 12345

April 1, 2009

[The Official's information will appear here]

The Honorable Firstname Lastname

123 Street Address

CapitolCity, ST 12345

Dear [Official's Title and Name will be inserted here]:

I am an admirer of your work and of your probing analysis of US foreign policy. I believe your commitment to honest and thorough reporting could be invaluable in bringing light to an issue that has been largely ignored by the international media: the unfolding genocide in northern Sri Lanka.

Currently there are an estimated 330,000 Tamil civilians encircled by advancing government forces, as Sri Lanka attempts to destroy the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Tamil civilians continue to endure a daily barrage of shelling and aerial bombing by Sri Lankan government forces, and yet the international community remains silent. The Sri Lankan government is deliberately targeting Tamil civilians in its military offensive, and the absence of strong international outcry is interpreted as acquiescence in Sri Lanka.

Some Tamils are fleeing to government-controlled territory to escape the heavy shelling and frequent air strikes. However, once under government control they are forcibly detained in internment camps, where more than 30,000 Tamils have already been confined. Robert Evans, a UK Member of Parliament said, "These are not welfare camps, they are prisoner-of-war cum concentration camps." Dr. Anna Neistat from Human Rights Watch visited the region and said "They are surrounded by barbed wire and machine gun nests, [and subjected to] indefinite confinement in de facto internment camps."

Most alarming are reports that U.S. Pacific Command is planning an evacuation of Tamil civilians from LTTE-held areas, as a "humanitarian task force". This would transfer Tamils directly into the hands of the genocidal government of Sri Lanka, giving the government - one of the world's worst perpetrators of state sponsored abductions according to Human Rights Watch - free reign to "disappear" hundreds of thousands of Tamils.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay made a recent statement that bombing and shelling by the Sri Lanka Armed Forces in the so called safe zone' has killed 2,800 Tamil civilians and left 7,000 more injured since the beginning of 2009. The UN and international humanitarian agencies have been denied access to the region since September 2008, leaving hundreds of thousands without adequate food, water or medical assistance. Despite these recent developments and a brutal history of violence against the Tamil population, the Sri Lankan government's actions have gone unnoticed and unpunished.

I am writing to you with the hope that you can raise awareness about the plight of hundreds of thousands of Tamil civilians under attack in northern Sri Lanka. The U.S. has an obligation to act only when it is in the best interests of this suffering population - yet a U.S. led evacuation of these refugees would exacerbate the crisis and make the U.S. an accomplice to Sri Lanka's genocide. You have consistently acted as a voice for the voiceless- now I hope you will agree to serve as a voice for voiceless Tamils.

Sincerely,

[Your name will appear here.]

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Edited April 2, 200916 yr by BLUE BIRD