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Deputy Head of Sri Lanka
Monitoring Mission, SLMM, Mr. Hagrup Haukland, is wrongly
quoted in the Sri Lankan newspaper Daily Mirror, Wednesday
05th June, page 1, as saying that QUOTE: “the [Government’s]
new gazette notification on fishing restrictions was not
in accordance with the [Ceasefire] agreement.” This
is an incorrect quote, hereby officially denied by SLMM
and is therefore entirely the Daily Mirror’s responsibility.
Mr. Hagrup Haukland, DHOM
of SLMM says that: “I have never read the Sri Lankan
government’s Gazette notification on fishing restrictions,
and therefore I have certainly not commented on it or
it’s relations to the Ceasefire Agreement to the
media.” The correct and important part of the Daily
mirror’s story is that “several complaints
have been received from Tamil fishermen about harassment
by Sri Lankan forces and continued maintenance of strict
restrictions.” and “…that the complaints
by the fishermen were being looked into [by SLMM] though
no official complaints had been made by the LTTE.”
The SLMM officially denies
the above mentioned wrongful quote in the Daily Mirror,
which was spread further on Thursday when Tamilnet.com
quoted the Daily Mirror’s story in it’s news
report. The SLMM urges all media to exercise good journalistic
practice, especially when reporting on sensitive issues
regarding the Ceasefire Agreement between the LTTE and
the Government of Sri Lanka.
The Sri Lanka Monitoring
Mission, SLMM, monitors the implementation of the Ceasefire
Agreement, reached by the Government of the Democratic
Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers
of Tamil Eelam, on 22nd february 2002. SLMM has six district
offices and local monitoring committees in the Eastern
and Northern part of Sri Lanka, two naval monitoring teams
based in Jaffna and Trincomalee and Liaison officers to
both the LTTE and the Sri Lankan Government. SLMM is an
international Nordic mission, consisting of monitors from
the countries of Norway, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and
Iceland and has headquarters in Colombo, the capital of
Sri Lanka.
Released By
SLMM HQ
Colombo
Ref: SLMM HQ/09th June
2002/MED/6001
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