Chennai:
Upping the ante on the Sri Lankan Tamils issue, DMK chief M Karunanidhi has warned that his party could pull out of the Union Cabinet if India failed to bring in amendments in a US-sponsored resolution against Colombo at the upcoming session of the UN Human Rights Council later this month.
"DMK will find it meaningless to continue in the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh-led Cabinet if our demand is not obliged to," the 88-year-old leader said in a statement today. With 18 MPs, his party, the DMK, is the second biggest constituent of the Congress-led UPA, providing crucial support to a government that has, of late, been tested vigorously by several coalition partners.
Mr Karunanidhi has been vociferously demanding for New Delhi to vote against Colombo during the session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). The US-sponsored motion puts the island nation in the dock over alleged war crimes and rights violations against Tamil civilians during the final phase of the war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
The DMK chief wants the Centre to make amendments in the US resolution in a manner that "those responsible for genocide are identified and an independent international probe is launched against the war criminals within a specified time frame."
The government, though, has been non-committal so far over its stand on the extremely emotive issue of Lankan Tamils with New Delhi maintaining that it will decide its position based on the wording of the resolution.
Recent photos released by Channel 4 in UK suggest that the 12-year-old-son of the chief of the rebel Tamil Tigers was executed in cold blood by Sri Lankan forces. Columbo says the photos are morphed.
Last year, India voted against Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council meeting after the DMK threatened to quit the government.