Crossing the line in Sri Lanka
Updated on 10 May 2009
Channel 4 News's Nick Paton Walsh explains how he was ordered by the Sri Lankan government to leave the country, after they took exception to his report which was broadcast on Channel 4 News on 5 May.Â
It's not often that the most powerful man in the country rings you. I'd spoken amicably to defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa 45 minutes earlier about getting some better access to Sri Lanka's 25 year war. But this time he was calling me, and seemed to have remembered something.
"Who is this? You rang me earlier? Is this Channel 4? You have been accusing my soldiers of raping civilians? Your visa is cancelled, you will be deported. You can report what you like about this country, but from your own country, not from here". I'm missing out my interjections, but that's pretty much how you get deported in Sri Lanka.
