| GEO World | | LTTE march on White House, plead for help in crisis | Updated at: 0051 PST, Tuesday, May 19, 2009
WASHINGTON: Hundreds of ethnic Tamil immigrants converged on the White House Monday, imploring US President Barack Obama to pressure Sri Lanka into ending a "genocide" on the island.
"President Obama, you are our only hope!" chanted the demonstrators, many of whom held placards bearing the image of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Velupillai Prabhakaran.
Earlier Monday, the government of majority-Sinhalese Sri Lanka declared an end to its decades-old war with the Tamil Tigers -- one of Asia's oldest and most brutal ethnic conflicts -- after routing the remnants of the rebel army and killing Prabhakaran and his deputies.
Waving red and gold LTTE flags and holding posters with graphic photographs of women and children apparently wounded in the Sri Lankan army's offensive, the protesters crowded in front of the White House denouncing a civilian slaughter and Colombo's refusal to allow relief agencies or journalists into the war zone.
Senthan Nada traveled from Toronto, home to hundreds of thousands of Tamil Canadians, to urge Obama to help "stop the genocide" which demonstrators insisted is continuing despite the end of combat operations.
"The war has ended, but the ethnic cleansing and the killings are still happening... and the world knows it," Nada told media. |  |
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