Nearly 82 per cent of all the civilian land in Northern Sri Lanka held by the security forces have already been released, High Commissioner for Sri Lanka in Canada, Ahmed A Jawad informed the Canadian newspaper ‘Toronto Star’.

Responding to an article published in the newspaper of 3rd November titled ‘Sri Lanka’s military aren’t ready to be peacekeepers’ by the Member of Parliament, Gary Anandasangaree, the High Commissioner said that with regard to the Mullativu District, the military has released a total of 20,784.16 acres of land as at 31st October 2017.

In his letter written to the editor, Jawad pointed out that a total of 6,704.87 acres of land is currently held by the military in Mullativu District, out of which 5,679 acres are belongs to the state and 1,025.87 acres are civilian land.

He further added that a comprehensive plan is being worked on for the release of remaining land and for the payment of compensation, therefore, the accusation in the article that “the army occupies as much as 60,000 acres of civilian land just in the Mullativu district” is untrue. (GDI)