Cabinet spokesman and Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, in a media interview conducted in Sinhala, pointed to the "weakness and inability of the British government to correctly evaluate the situation," and added that "[n]either the Thames Valley Police nor the British government could get away from the blame for their failure to give adequate security to President Rajapaksa and to his entourage by saying it was a personal trip." The Minister said the LTTE had been listed as a terrorist organization in that country and all activities carried out by the LTTE and its sympathizers had been banned, Daily Mirror reported.
“[Sri Lanka’s] President Rajapaksa accepted the invitation as the President of Sri Lanka and it is the responsibility of the British government to afford adequate security fit for a head of state. It has not done that. The Thames Valley Police and the Oxford Union have also failed to assess the situation and succumbed to the pressure exerted by some 400 odd LTTE sympathizers,” Daily Mirror said quoting Rambukwella.
Noting that LTTE is a proscribed "terrorist" organization, the Minister said that “[t]herefore, it is not only wrong but against the law that the British Police and the Oxford Union failed to go ahead with the programme that included President Rajapaksa’s speech.
“It is hilarious and surprising to think that this happened in a so called five-star democracy. The Oxford University is a highly respected and world renowned seat of education. The incident is a scar on the Oxford Union and the British government,” Rambukwella told the reporters.
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