Speaking at the UN General Assembly, Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickramanayaka said that the international organisation should not interfere in the internal affairs of a state.
He said multilateralism was not about the UN agenda responding only to the demands of a minority of powerful States, but also defending the interest of the powerless majority.
“It is also imperative that the prohibition reflected in the Article 2 (7) of the Charter that the UN should not interfere in the internal affairs of States be respected. The Charter must be our guiding norm since it is the Charter that keeps us together. Non interference in the internal affairs of states must be respected at all times,” Wickramanayaka said.
The relation between the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime and the UN has been strained since the war with LTTE ended in May.
The government recently expelled an official of UNESCO, stating that he had been making statements biased towards the LTTE.
Lanka had also objected to the use of the phrase “bloodbath’’ by an UN spokesperson while describing civilian casualties during the last phase of the war.
