Calling On The U.S. And International Community To Address The Needs Of Sri Lanka's Tamil Internally Displaced Persons

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROYCE. Mr. Speaker, I rise as well in support of this resolution, calling on the U.S. Government and the international community to address the humanitarian needs of the Sri Lankan internally displaced Tamil community, and I think the needs are very great.

The Sri Lankan Government routed the Tamil Tigers, a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization, earlier this year. This terror group has left a rather bloody trail in South Asia, and that trail, frankly, has even led to our shores.

The Tamil Tigers perfected the use of suicide bombers. They invented the suicide belt. They assassinated two world leaders. They've pioneered the use of women in suicide attacks. The Tigers have fund-raised in the United States. In recent years, the FBI has arrested men attempting to export shoulder-fired missiles and other sophisticated weapons to the group.

Frankly, the FBI reports the Tamil Tigers are among the most dangerous and deadly extremists in the world. An estimated 280,000 ethnic Tamil Tigers were displaced from their homes due to the fighting earlier this year, and they are now in refugee camps. The condition of these camps are grim. They are crowded. They are dirty. They lack basic necessities. NGO reports that come to us show severe water shortages. Many Tamils have had to line up for up to 5 hours to receive even meager food rations.

It is important that we continue to monitor the human rights conditions in these camps. Abuses must be checked. Although progress has been slow up until recently, I was very pleased to read a BBC report the other day that between 2,000 to 3,000 people are now leaving the camps every day. This is progress, although I am sure it is not fast enough for some.

On this point, I think we should be clear. The Sri Lankan Government should be working to release civilian displaced persons in an expeditious manner, not the terrorist population that may be 10,000 strong, hiding out in the camps. These are the same terrorists that used civilians as human shields and employed lethal force to prevent civilians from fleeing the previous fighting. The Tamil Tiger infrastructure must be rooted out even as we support the effort to release the civilian displaced persons in this expeditious manner.

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