Foreign Ministry concerned over Solheim’s comments

The Foreign Ministry has expressed concern over a recent comment made by Norwegian Minister Erik Solheim.

The Foreign Ministry has also mentioned that the Government of Sri Lanka hopes that a formal response would be received from the Norwegian Government with regard to the attributed comments by a Minister of the Norwegian Government. The statement by the Foreign Ministry is as follows:

The Government of Sri Lanka deeply regrets comments made by Norwegian Minister Erik Solheim.

The Government of Sri Lanka refers to the comments made by the Minister of Environment and International Development of the Norwegian Government, Erik Solheim, published in the ‘Aftenposten’ newspaper website of 28 August 2009.

The Sri Lanka Government deeply regrets the baseless comments contained therein and is perturbed by such statements being made by the Norwegian Minister against a friendly government.

It is unbecoming of Minister Solheim to attribute blame on alleged atrocities, contained in an unsubstantiated video footage, without any recourse to an exchange of views and total disregard to the position of the Government of Sri Lanka on the issues in question.

The criticism by him of a democratically elected Head of State, who is carrying out a vibrant agenda to safeguard the rights of the people of Sri Lanka, while having eliminated the scourge of terrorism, is unacceptable. It would be recalled that Norway continued its facilitatory role in the then peace process, even after the election of President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The utterances of Minister Solheim have led the Government of Sri Lanka to reflect on his possible partisanship in the facilitatory role.

The Government of Sri Lanka hopes that a formal response would be received from the Norwegian Government with regard to the attributed comments by a Minister of that Government.