No member of Govt wants change in venue - Kamalesh Sharma

by Manjula Fernando

Commonwealth Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma said no member of Government has indicated any wish to change the CHOGM venue from Sri Lanka, reaffirming that the Heads of meeting will go ahead as planned in Hambantota in November this year.

Sharma told a press conference dominated by critics of Sri Lanka, such as Channel 4, after the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG) at Marlborough House in London that, “No member of government has indicated even remotely that it wishes to change the venue” (from Sri Lanka).

The press conference was jointly attended by CMAG Chair, Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Dr. Dipu Moni and Vice Chair Australian Foreign Minister Senator Bob Carr. The trio stressed that the CMAG has no role in the matter of a decision concerning CHOGM.

The Secretary General said, ‘The venue for CHOGM is decided on by the leaders, and the leaders first discussed it in 2007, agreed to it in 2009, and confirmed it in 2011 that it would be in Sri Lanka, in response to a question by Channel 4 if the Commonwealth thought it appropriate that Sri Lanka hosts this meeting given the serious questions raised against the country about human rights abuses.