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VIDEO: Will not allow extremists to destabilize Sri Lanka – Army Chief
Aug 22, 201404:44 PM
Sri Lanka’s army commander Lieutenant General Daya Ratnayake says that keeping the country stable and confronting the extremist elements which are operating from abroad to destabilize the country are the major challenges ahead for him.
He stated that extremist elements living abroad and trying to destabilize the country get support from various organizations within the country. “With that support they always try to destabilize this country,” the Commander of the Sri Lanka Army said.
“We are not allowing any room for anybody to come and destabilize this country,” he said, in an exclusive interview with Ada Derana, on the sidelines of the “Defence Seminar - 2014” held in Colombo.
On calls, predominantly from Western nations, to reduce the military presence in the North and East, he said it is Western thinking and that Sri Lanka uses its military for the best interest of the country.
“This is the way Western people think. Actually we think differently. We use our military for the best interest of the country.”
“Our military is a reflection of the society. When the society is suffering the military gets involved and supports the society to overcome those challenges. That is how we use our military,” Ratnayake said.
The Army Chief stated that they have explained to foreign delegations how the challenges were faced and overcome in Sri Lanka and that most of them who are convinced take those lessons back to their own countries.
“Of course always you have people who come and artificially create issues and try to portray a different image. Those people, we will not be able to convince,” he emphasized.
He stated that certain nations who are criticizing Sri Lanka are still fighting their own conflict and that they cannot see any solution in the near future. “That is why they come to Sri Lanka. To learn how we did it.”
He conceded that Western nations only use the military for military purposes, mostly to fight a war, and that immediately after a conflict the military is downsized. “This is basically the Western thinking.”
However, he stressed that in Sri Lanka, eve within the constitution of the country, the military can be used for any other activity of the government for the betterment of the country.
The Army Commander said that winning a war of this nature has two parts: which are the physical elimination of a threat and psychological elimination of the threat.
“What we achieved in May 2009 is physical elimination of the threat. Thereafter achieving psychological elimination is a process. There are no shortcuts to it,” he pointed out.
He added that political stability, social stability and economic stability should be achieved after the war and that only then there can be sustainable peace.
