Minister of State
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
June 12 2007 Howells has just completed a two day visit to Sri Lanka.
The full statement is reproduced below;
I have just completed my third visit to Sri Lanka, my second this year. I met His Excellency the President and discussed the role of the international community in assisting Sri Lanka resolve its conflict.
As always the people were warm and friendly and the country as beautiful as any I have ever visited.
But the clouds that hung over Sri Lanka during my last visit have become darker and more threatening.
The effects of the conflict are being felt directly in Colombo a cowardly terrorist bomb during the rush hour on 28 May 2007 killing eight people, seven of them civilians. And there was the repulsive abduction and murder of two Red Cross volunteers, whose bodies were discovered on 2 June 2007