Pro-Rebel Legislator Killed in Sri Lanka (At Midnight Mass)

Pro-Rebel Legislator Killed in Sri Lanka
Sunday December 25, 2005 3:17 AM

By DILIP GANGULY
Associated Press Writer

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) - Gunmen shot and killed a pro-rebel legislator during midnight Christmas Mass, the government said Sunday, as escalating violence continued to threaten a shaky cease-fire.

Joseph Pararajasingham, 71, was fatally shot at St. Michael's Church in Batticaloa, eastern Sri Lanka's main town, military spokesman Brig. Prasad Samarasinghe said. His wife and eight others were wounded.

The lawmaker's bodyguards returned fire, but it was not known if any of the assailants were wounded.

Pararajasingham represented the Tamil National Alliance, a proxy party of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the rebel group that wants to create a homeland for Sri Lanka's 3.2 million ethnic Tamil minority in the country's northeast. A breakaway faction of the rebels is opposed to the alliance.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5502673,00.html

It shows the oppenent as turds, whoever they are are. (I don't even know the politics)

For people who aren't familiar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Romero

I'm grateful to learn about this guy:

While celebrating mass at a small chapel near his cathedral, Romero was shot to death while he was giving a sermon in which he called for soldiers to disobey orders that violated basic human rights. It is believed that his assassins were members of Salvadoran death squads,

Named a servant of God by the pope, and celebrated by many, now me. The quotes on the page are awesome, I recommend any lurkers click the link above:

* "Brothers, you came from our own people. You are killing your own brothers. Any human order to kill must be subordinate to the law of God, which says, 'Thou shalt not kill'. No soldier is obliged to obey an order contrary to the law of God. No one has to obey an immoral law. It is high time you obeyed your consciences rather than sinful orders. The church cannot remain silent before such an abomination. ... In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people whose cry rises to heaven more loudly each day, I implore you, I beg you, I order you: stop the repression."

A man celebrated by history. And those who killed him? did they think they would be thought of as heros? They are turds, and history remembers them as turds. More nameless shits to be flushed from the toilet of human memory while guys like Romero are remembered.

It is a travesty what happened to him and the fact that his death was the spark that started a brutal civil war.

http://smh.com.au/news/world/mps-killing-heightens-fears-of-civil-war/2005/12/25/1135445486674.html

A Sri Lankan MP was shot dead at a Christmas service in the latest of a series of attacks that have raised fears of a return to civil war.

Joseph Pararajasingam, of the Tamil National Alliance, the rebels' parliamentary proxy, was shot in the eastern district of Batticaloa, police said.

It was unclear who was behind the shooting, but Tamil Tiger rebels have been locked in a feud with a renegade faction led by a commander called Karuna who broke away, accusing the rebels' northern leadership of sidelining cadres in the east.

"He was shot inside St Michael's Church in Batticaloa," a police spokesman said. "The details are unclear, but seven other people were injured, including a number of children and his wife."

trying to get the Tamils to fight among themselves,
or payback, or all three.

LTTE has smacked the government in the chops a couple
times of late, and the newly elected President claims
to be a hard-liner in the mode of his predecessor.

Fears of the resumption of the conflict seem well founded.