Three years after 7/7 London bombings………

by Kumara Kaluarachchi

(July 09, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Exactly three years ago the British people woke up to face reality, reality of the cannibalism and utter destructive nature of terrorism. The “liberal” and tolerant general public of the UK were shell shocked to learn that the terrorists have hit London’s public transport system during the morning rush hour. At about 8:50 a.m., three bombs exploded within fifty seconds of each other on three London Underground trains. In Tavistock Square, a fourth bomb exploded on a bus nearly an hour later at 9:47 a.m. The bombings killed 52 passengers and the four suicide bombers and injured about 700 people. It has caused disruption of the city’s transport system and the mobile telecommunications infrastructure. The series of suicide-bomb explosions constituted the largest and deadliest terrorist attack on London in its history.

Naturally we Sri Lankans were very sad to learn about another meaningless devastation in anywhere in the world. Sri Lankans are experiencing such brutal bomb explosions in our public transport systems in regular basis, since Velupillei Prabakaran took hold of the leadership of LTTE nearly 30 yrs ago. Our casualty numbers are usually MUCH higher than the 7/7 London bombings. We know how devastating these incidents to the victims and their immediate family members. We know how the whole country is suffering due to this type of barbaric attacks on civilian targets. Therefore we could identify ourselves with the victims of the 7/7 London bombings easily.

We Sri Lankans were watching the news of the incident and surprised the way BBC and other international news channels reported the incident. When a bomb blasts in the public transport system in Sri Lanka, the leading international news channels report that as a handy work of “Tamil Rebels”. Some media use the terms such as freedom fighters, separatists or just Tamil Tigers. They NEVER mention the word TERRORISTS!! Using the word TERRORISTS to identify the gang of misfits who explode bombs in Sri Lankan public transport is no-no thing for the international news broadcasters.

However, in the aftermath of 7/7 London bombings, all the international media reported that as a TERRORIST attack. It was a good development. The best outcome of the bombing incident was the tight security measures introduced by the British Law makers to combat TERRORISM!!! Police started a worldwide terrorist-hunt and caught several people who were responsible for the attack. NGOs or Diplomats posted in London never criticized the way the Muslim community was treated in the UK at that time. That is because they understood that the combating Terrorism is no easy task. Usually tolerant British people are not so tolerant now. They developed advanced monitoring systems and cracked down number of terror cells, operating nationwide. They persuaded the government to increase the number of dates the police could keep a terror suspect in custody without bringing formal charges from 28 to 46 days! Slowly and gradually the British people are following the steps taken by the governments who were embattling Terrorism.

The reason I write this piece on 7/7 London bombings and the British response to terrorism is to highlight their apathy towards we Sri Lankans. The Sri Lankan government NEVER harbors any terrorist group that blew up London buses or tubes. We NEVER let those terrorists to celebrate, commemorate their fallen terrorists or collect funds for future attacks in London.

Unfortunately the British government allows the LTTE Terrorists to commemorate their fallen suicide carders, Black Tigers in London. I was told that the LTTE terrorists are planning that event on the 12th of July, just 5 days after the 3rd anniversary of the 7/7 London bombings. The sad truth is that the UK seems to have different measuring sticks when it comes to TERRORISM.

(The Writer is a editor of the Lanka Journal web site)
- Sri Lanka Guardian