The Island Page Three Tuesday 3rd March, 2009

! News World view ! Financial Review ! Leisure Land INSIDE: Govt. to employ disabled by Don Asoka ignore them. The dis- Wijewardena abled personnel in any society had the same rights and privileges The Government as others had. has decided to Minister recruit 3 per Seneviratne cent of disabled personnel for said that coun- employment in tries such as the public and China, Thailand private sector, and Japan since it had been recruit 5 per found that there cent of disabled was discrimina- personnel and tion in the Athauda recruitment pro- should follow this procedure. A vehicle belonged to the Ministerial Security Division officers attached to Social Services Minister collided with two busses at Colour lights in Havelock cedure. The new legis- lation in this regard, The government was Road 6.45 am yesterday. The driver of the private bus died as a result of the accident. Pic by Saman Abeysiriwardane approved by committed to treat Parliament will come physically and mental- into effect shortly, the ly disabled personnel Labour Relations and and action had already Manpower Ministry been taken to recruit revealed. disabled personnel for Labour Relations different kinds of jobs and Manpower in due course. The DMC should be self sufficient Minister Athauda government would Seneviratne told The also request all dis- Island that it was the abled personnel to duty of the society to visit the job banks look after three cate- scattered across the gories of human country and get regis- beings - the children, tered with their quali- – Mimura fications so that they in three years the elderly and the dis- by Zacki Jabbar in Tokyo urgency. requires monitoring disaster risks with a view to abled. Society is duty would be able to find “Tsunami early warning buoys have been placed enhancing early warning, use knowledge and inno- bound to treat these suitable employment three categories with- at the right time. Japan will assist Sri Lanka modernize its Disaster between Thailand and Sri Lanka and this ensures vation to build a culture of safety and resilience at all out discrimination. He also said that Management Centre, but expects it to become self- warnings on a real time basis. The Deep Ocean levels, reduce the underlying risk factors and also He said that of the the technological sufficient in about three years time, a senior official Assessment and Reporting of Tsunamis system has a strengthen disaster preparedness for effective total world population assistance for recruit- of the Japanese International Corporation Agency platform that lies on the seafloor monitoring seismic response at all levels. of 7 billion around 600 ment of disabled per- said. activity and sends signals to a buoy floating on the Commenting on rising sea levels and the threat million were found to sonnel would be pro- Director of JICA’s Disaster Management Division, surface. The buoy then uses satellite communication posed to low lying islands such as the Maldives, he be disabled and it was vided by the Satoru Mimura told The Island, that Japanese assis- to pass on the gathered information to tsunami warn- said that the sea wall was not an “entire solution” not the duty of any International Labour tance would include strengthening of Sri Lanka’s ing centres around the Indian Ocean. In the event of and the global community as whole needs to care for civilised society to Organisation. DMC capability, but support will end in three years an earthquake it is designed to detect whether a the environment and act responsibly. “Many Asian and it is expected that the centre would be function- tsunami will occur and pinpoint its height, location countries frequently experience disasters such as ing independently by then. and when it will make a landfall.” floods, typhoons, landslides, earthquakes and vol- Attributing the increasing frequency of natural Mimura said that disaster risk reduction should canic eruptions. It is feared that climate change in disasters to climate change, he said that preventive be a national priority with a strong institutional recent years would increase the frequency and sever- NCP health services measures need to be enforced with a sense of basis for implementation. The framework of action ity of wind and water damage.” to strike if doc’s Trinco hospital gets ‘Death attackers not arrested by Percy complaints to the Sentence’ Kuruneru, Police however had so another 50 nurses far drawn a blank and Anuradhapura Cor. by Dilanthi Jayamanne President of the Health remanded the talk was that a Services Trade Union Alliance If Police fails to powerful politician from the area was Around fifty additional nurses (HSTUA), Saman Ratnapriya said for cheating arrest the people responsible for the have been deployed at the yesterday (02) that over 2,000 behind the assault on patients were treated at the by Denagama the North Central assault. Trincomalee Hospital to cope with Subsequently, Dr. Trincomalee Hospital during the Dhammika Province (NCP) the increasing number of patients Attapattu made a pub- last couple of days. A majority of Ranaweera Director of Health being taken there from the North. lic plea asking why he them had been released by the Services, Dr. W. These nurses have been temporari- was set upon and on ly transferred from Batticaloa, LTTE to the Red Cross Services A woman who had Attapattu by tomorrow (Wednesday), staff whose instigation but Colombo and Ratnapura Hospitals, when the LTTE found that the cheated hundreds of failed to get any Health Ministry sources said. patients’ condition was deteriorat- people to part with Rs attached to all hospi- tals in the NCP would response. Patients who escaped from the ing 39 million promising launch a strike com- Employees attached clutches of the LTTE were being However, following preliminary high interest rates but mencing Thursday. to all hospitals in the taken on a daily basis to treatment the patients had been neither paid the inter- NCP except in the transferred to the Vavuniya and est nor the capital, This decision has Trincomalee by the Sri Lanka and been taken by the Anuradhapura Kantale hospitals, he said. was produced before International Red Cross societies Joint Front of health Teaching Hospital Ratnapriya said the drugs that the Hambantota and the authorities have found that sector trade unions of launched a sick note were sent for treating these 158 nurses attached to the District Judge the NCP consisting of campaign on February Trincomalee Hospital are grossly patients were donations and also Nishantha Peiris and 17 trade unions. 27 and 28 demanding inadequate to cope with the from the Supplies Division of the remanded till March Contrary to an ear- the arrest of the cul- increasing number of patients. Health Ministry. 11. lier decision to exempt prits behind the Identified as H. T. assault. Since there President shakes hands with his the Anuradhapura Ramani, the 34-year- Teaching Hospital and had been no response old from Gurupokuna Nepalese counterpart Ram Baran Yadav, in Katmandu, the Polonnaruwa to this campaign it has in Hungama, also Nepal, yesterday (2). Rajapaksa is on a two days official General hospitals from now been decided to known by the alias visit to Nepal. (AP Photo) the strike action it has launch a strike com- Marana Danduwam, been now decided to mencing Thursday meaning death sen- include these two At a recent meeting tence, was produced in major hospitals in the with Health Secretary Dr. Athula Court by Sub UNP summons its candidates NCP also to partici- Kahandaliyanage, Inspector H. T. M. The summoned all its pate in the strike, Police undertook that Thushara of the CID candidates contesting the Western Provincial according Terrence they would arrest the Council elections to meet the party’s Working Gamini, president of who said investigations suspects by Committee at the Opposition leader’s office at the NCP Joint Health into complaints against Wednesday but some Cambridge Terrace last evening. Sector Trade Union the suspect were doctors attached to the incomplete and want- Candidates were expected to be briefed on the Front. party’s new strategy and approach in the cam- Dr. Attapattu was Anuradhapura ed her remanded. Teaching Hospitals The suspect was paign to the WPC elections. assaulted in front of Party Secretary , Deputy were of the view that defended by his home by two Leader Deshabandu , Deputy Police were dragging Attorneys-at-Law M. unidentified men who Leader Rukman Senanayake, Chairman Gamini arrived on a motor their feet in arresting Samsudeen and Jayawickrema Perera, National Organiser and cycle last month when the culprits concerned Thushara party spokesman Gayantha Karunatilleke were he alighted from his due to some reason or Suriyapatabendi. due to address the candidates. car after work. His other.

The United National Party (UNP) team leader of the Central Provincial Council, elected at the recent Central Provincial Council election, S. B. Dissanayake TULF deplores the manner of arrest of Sudaroli editor hands over his confirmation of oaths to Central Provincial Governor Tikiri The TULF yesterday deplored the manner strict secrecy of the sources of information. been used if he resisted arrest or made an Kobbekaduwa at the swearing in ceremony on Monday (02) yesterday. in which Mr. Vidyatharan, Editor-in-Chief The police have a duty to act impartially. effort to escape. But in this instance Mr. of Sudaroli, a National Tamil Daily, had They are Peace Officers with a duty cast on Vidyatharan works in his office and is avail- been taken into custody. them to treat everybody equally and with able most of the time and would have TULF Leader V. Anandasangaree in a care and respect. We are not unaware of the responded to a phone call from the police, if Laugfs agrees to test CTB buses free statement issue to media yesterday said: risk and embarrassment they face at times. he was wanted by them. It is a shame that he “Newspapers are the watch-dogs of the A recent Indian report said that a police offi- had been treated in this shabby manner. I by Chitra Weerarathne Chairman of the Private bus Nation. They have a sacred duty to bring out cer committed suicide by setting himself am unable to believe that our police behaved Owners Association of the Western all news, they gather with difficulty, some of ablaze, unable to bear the shame and to face in this manner with the editor of a paper. The Laugfs Gas Lanka Limited Province told Court that, 1751 buses which under grave risk to their lives, to the the embarrassment caused to him by some No police officer should be permitted to yesterday agreed before the were investigated for the use of knowledge of the Public. The Police, as Lawyers who, while demonstrating, assault- bring disrepute to the entire Sri Lankan Supreme Court to give CTB vehi- ticketing machines and to see peace officers should give the Editors and ed him and cut him with a blade at several Police Force and therefore strict action cles a free air emission test for one whether the conductor wore uni- Journalists all protection and assistance places. should be taken against the officers who had year. forms, as ordered by the Court. and should not act in any way to disrupt What happened to Mr. Vidyatharan no moral justification for arresting him at a This was told to Court when the He added that 261 buses had the their work. It may be that all, what they should not happen again to another person, funeral of one of his very close relations. rights violation application filed by route permits cancelled. write, are not palatable to us. Yet the truth even to the worst criminal. Mr. Vidyatharan This act had been taken by his relations as a an environmentalist was called The Chief Justice said that too must come out and unbiased reports are is a respectable gentleman and the Editor-in- great insult, caused to the person about to before the Court. stern punishments should not be most welcome. We should not forget the fact Chief of a National Tamil daily. One can commence his last journey.” Meanwhile Gemunu Wijeratne, imposed. that the editor has a sacred duty to maintain understand if a certain amount of force had