In a major embarrassment for Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan Niazi, his planned address to the Sri Lankan Parliament has been cancelled.
During his scheduled two-day trip from 22 February to the island country, Imran Khan was to address the Parliament and to save face, the Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena had requested for cancellation on the pretext of Covid-19.
Besides his now cancelled speech on February 24, Imran Khan is to hold meetings with Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and attending an investors’ conference.
This information was confirmed by Sri Lanka’s daily Express who had quoted Foreign Secretary Jayanath Colombage. However, Naizi’s itinerary had included a speech which must have previously been agreed by the Sri Lankans with media reports giving different reasons for the cancellation of Khan’s address.
However, the Covid is just a reason because some people within the Sri Lankan government feared that if Imran Khan’s speech might harm ties with India.
Already India is not very happy with the cancellation of a deal over the East Container Terminal in Colombo port.
Also, experts note that Imran Khan using the platform to raise Kashmir issue might anger New Delhi.
Imran Khan has been raising the issue of treatment of Muslims and Islamophobia at many global platforms and the Sri Lankan government was concerned about the Pakistan PM raising the rights of Muslims in Sri Lanka.
There is already a lot of anger in Sri Lanka over the Easter terror suicide bombings attack in 2019 in which 267 people were killed, including at least 45 foreign nationals. The ripple effect of this attack also was felt by the tourism industry which this island nation depends a lot on.
However, it is also true that Muslims have faced discrimination in Sri Lanka. During the height of Covid, the government made it compulsory that anyone who had died due to complications of Covid will be cremated and this rule was applicable to Muslims who bury their dead.
Earlier this month the government exempted the Muslims from cremation and allowed them to bury their dead after a global outcry over the issue.
Imran Khan had welcomed the Sri Lankan government’s decision and said, “We welcome Sri Lankan PM Mahinda Rajapaksa’s assurance given in Sri Lankan Parliament today, allowing Muslims to bury those who died from Covid-19,”.
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