By Ron Ridenour, HAVANA TIMES, 20 June 2012 - “Cuban President Receives Counterpart from Sri Lanka” read the Prensa Latina headline of June 17. The agency reported that the four-day official visit by President Mahinda Rajapaksa was at the invitation of President Raul Castro. Does this mean that the “honored guest”—widely known to be one of the world’s most brutal government leaders, responsible for tens of thousands of deaths of the Tamil people, who is also selling much of his country to foreign multi-nationals corporations, and whose main export partner is the United States—is made of the same stuff as his “counterpart”? “Cuba is acting immorally and in contradiction to its long-time solidarity with the oppressed and exploited peoples of the world,” I wrote in “Cuba outvoted at “UN Human Rights Council over Sri Lanka-Tamils”.

By Ron Ridenour, 22 March 2012 - Surprise yet uneven Human Rights Council conclusion: Sri Lanka-Tamils - Human Rights Council voted today (March 22) to criticize the Sri Lankan government for “not adequately address[ing] serious allegations of violations of international law” when conducting its final phases of war against the liberation guerrilla army LTTE (Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam), which ended, May 18, 2009, with government-caused massive blood baths.

By Ron Ridenour, HAVANA TIMES, November 25, 2011 - “Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere” is usually how I begin my talks in this three-week tour through several cities and four states of India. Martin Luther King’s famous quotation is supplemented with the internationalist creed of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. The reason for my tour is the publication here of two books I wrote: “Tamil Nation in Sri Lanka” and “Sounds of Venezuela”. My main topic here is to discuss why Cuba and ALBA’s Bolivarian alliance of eight governments sided with the brutal, genocidal government of Mahinda Rajapaksa in wantonly murdering tens of thousands of Tamil civilians in the last stages of the war for liberation in Sri Lanka, and how can a mass movement get that righted.

by Ron Ridenour / November 12th, 2011 - I start from the premise that Martin Luther King expressed: “Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere”. In the country of my birth, The Devil’s Own Country, I experienced similar injustice committed against the native peoples and the black people as Tamils suffer, especially in Sri Lanka where they are subjugated to Shinalese chauvinism. I joined with millions of brothers and sisters of all colours to fight racism, to struggle for equal rights, for education and health care for all, even the basic right to vote.

By Ron Ridenour, 04 October 2011 - “We Tamils, inside and outside the island of Sri Lanka, still want an independent state. And because the war crimes and severe brutality of the Mahinda Rajapaksa government against our people has become well known, our cause is being spoken about all over the world,” Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran told me recently in Manhattan, New York.

“Tamils always looked upon Fidel and Che as heroes,” the PM said. “Our people are shocked by Cuba’s position since May 2009. Perhaps it is due to poor communication. We want to send a delegation to Cuba, to Venezuela and other ALBA [Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Latin America] governments to explain our position and to engage in dialogue.” PM Rudrakumaran maintains that his Transnational Government is not tied to any government or international power. “We are not at the mercy of any power, but will accept support for our cause from whoever cooperates with us.”