Friday, 20th February 2015
By Saman Indrajith
The previous government had paid Rs. 95,592,244 to a multinational law firm to carry out tasks that Sri Lanka Embassy officials in Washington could have carried out at a much lower cost, Parliament was told yesterday.
Sri Lanka Embassy in Washington had hired the services of multinational law firm Patton Boggs (now called Squire Patton Boggs) in 2010, 2011 and 2012, to perform tasks that could have been carried out by the embassy officers, according to a document tabled by Foreign Affairs Minister Mangala Samaraweera in response to a query raised by JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake.
The document said that Rs 35,685,907 had been given as payment to the aforementioned company in 2010 while Rs. 46,913,476 and Rs 12,992,860 was paid to the company in 2011 and 2012 respectively.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs had stated in its reply that the Sri Lanka obtained the services of the Patton Boggs Company to cultivate allies in Congress for Sri Lanka, to try and prevent any Bills or Resolutions against Sri Lanka in the Congress to help get Sri Lanka off the Trafficking in Persons Watch List and to organise a US Business delegation to Sri Lanka.
Officials of Patton Boggs have claimed to have cultivated genuine allies within the US Congress for Sri Lanka, organising official delegations of US Congressmen and their staff to visit Sri Lanka, prevented any Bills calling for an International Investigation on Sri Lanka being tabled in the Congress of United States and negotiated on behalf of the Mission to get the State Department to lift the 2010 US travel warning against Sri Lanka.
The multinational firm also claimed to have helped Sri Lanka to be removed from the ‘Trafficking of Persons Watch List’ published by the US State Department and organized a Business delegation of US companies to visit Sri Lanka, the minister said.
"I wish to add that in my opinion all these activities could have been carried out by the diplomatic officers in the Sri Lankan Embassy in Washington as these are their areas of responsibility and thereby saving considerable expenditure."
From : http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=119921
