Channel 4 perpetuating lies and half-truths, to have a natural death
By K.T.Rajasingham
Colombo, 10 July, (Asiantribune.com):
Channel - 4 continues to perpetuate lies and half-truths, expected to fold soon. British media excess will follow soon the plight of “News of the World,” which was in existence for the last 168 years.
The TV channel, which is involved in shaming Sri Lanka, exploiting the people’s miseries and challenging a sovereign nation of 20 million people with concocted video images, expected to follow suit soon the “News of the World.”
What the Channel 4 is involved is to stop the reconciliation, rehabilitation and development process that has been put in place after a 30-year long separatist war, that led to the death of several thousands and destruction.
It is a pity that none of those involved in doctoring the documentary are aware of the basic characteristics of Sri Lankans.
Many, including the so called Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS), as well as Marion Bentley, Channel 4 publicity manager, Callum Macrae who directed the extended video clippings, Saman Zia-Zarifi of Amnesty International who promotes, have failed to discern the basic characteristic of the Tamil Tiger fighters.
Usually, when a fighting cadre of the Tamil Tiger talks in Tamil, they have an accent, unlike the normal Tamil speakers.
Speaking with an accent was an adopted trait of the Tigers and it became the proclivity of their tongue.
It was unfortunate that members of the JDS as well as journalists of Channel 4 – the main people involved in preparing the video documentary, right from the beginning, never had the opportunity of meeting any single LTTE fighters, in those days when they were actively engaged in the bloody conflict with the Sri Lankan Government.
Anyhow, Channel 4 tried its best, to establish contacts with LTTE, but their news' team consisting of Nick Paton Walsh, producer Bessie Du and cameraman Matt Jasper, who were in Sri Lanka were deported from Sri Lanka on 10 May 2009, when the Ministry of Defense became aware of their ill intentions.
On the other hand, I had seen hundreds of them, intermingled with them and very well knew that majority of the LTTE armed cadres spoke very fluent Sinhala language and when they spoke Tamil, they used to speak with an accent.
I can vouch that, as the only journalist who had the opportunity to know LTTE fighters pretty well, who has witnessed their training programs in India, as well as in the Vanni , and also I had the opportunity to study their fighting strategies.
I have seen during the days of the conflict, that they use to pretend as Sinhalese soldiers by speaking Tamil with an accent and use to wear camouflage Army uniforms and attacked the Sinhalese border villages in the East as well as in the North and they even confused Tamil civilians when they abducted innocent Tamil girls, raped them and subsequently put the blame on Sri Lankan Army personnel. This was one of their devious war strategies – confusing the enemy as well civilians.
The footage in the documentary, aired by Britain's Channel 4, had originally an audio track with the ‘men acting' in those documentary were heard speaking in Tamil language with an accent.
It is unfortunate that the Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka as well as the Channel 4 are between the devil and the deep sea. They are unable fathom out the implications behind those images in that video and failed to accept the harsh truth that the original footage was in the Tamil language and subsequently doctored with footage in Sinhala and handed over to JDS who in turn passed it on to Channel 4.
Channel 4 which failed to investigate the original footage but fell head on into the trap of the rump LTTE’rs, who were helped by some cinema technicians from Tamil Nadu for filming the documentary, and were behind the whole sordid episode.
It must be remembered that Asian Tribune was the first to reveal that the documentary, aired first by Britain's Channel 4, as “Fake Video Footage: and further screamed that “At last the Original has Emerged,” on 18 September 2009.
Despite the exposure by the Asian Tribune on 18 September Channel 4 unashamedly continuously went on with the doctored video documentaries to deceive the world with its concocted version.
It was unfortunate that even after Asian Tribune coming up with the video documentary, Channel 4 continues to insist on the genuineness of their concocted video clips and also continued with a complete doctored version by coming up with a nauseating documentary -"Sri Lanka's Killing Fields," with the sole intention of discrediting a nation with 20 million people.
The words in the Channel 4 video clips don’t fit the images. Channel 4 should have taken note of this serious lapse in the documentary provided to them by the Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka.
The Asian Tribune recently learnt that the video camera used to film the documentary was not one of the common cameras available in Asia.
The documentary clearly depicts the video was on the ‘Cinema drop frame format’ and it is not possible to shoot that version with a normal video camera.
When contacted about this, Siri Hewawitharana, Internationally renowned expert in broadcast video systems and Executive Director IPTV Systems Australia and Asian Tribune’s advisor on audio and video technology said:
“I was disturbed at the beginning of the Channel 4 video 2 yrs ago, that got some strange technical data and one of them was "Cinema Drop frame" which 23.98 and this is used by Cinema Cameras and not by any mobile or by an average Video Camera. When the video is at drop frame rate, it is difficult to synchronize audio and this also explain the video and audio synchronization issue at the video. This leads us to conclude that Camera used was a Multi Format High Definition Cinema Camera and this also explains the high quality motion vectors in the video.
"Who ever took the video used Cinema type Camera and later someone try to transcode the video to the Mobile format resolution, but did not know any specialist in Video Broadcasting will pick this up later. This is where 17 frames of video that cannot explain since transcoding from higher level to lower level will create these anomalies and recently Grant's ( UN Technical specialist) Hex String anomaly of 270 characters explain as "rather it is likely due to the process of repacking the contents of Item #1 into Item #2" . Not sure Grant assume this by ignorance or deliberately to mislead, but I can say that with a Cinema drop frame trying to transcode to 3GPP will create a similar anomaly since H264 so complex and motion coding will depend on Spatial , or Hexagon approach or not. Worst part is, none of the UN expert picked this Cinema drop frame data out of the video... I wonder why... I kept this data issue hidden since every time I pin point the data anomalies, new video come up with corrected figures. Now we know the original video and main part of the new video is faked, I decide to publish this major anomaly within the video.
This data indicate someone used expensive cinema camera possibly used by LTTE elements in South India without knowing the true video capabilities not used in anywhere in Asia other than Cinema people.”
Normally this type of camera is uncommon in the Asian Countries and normally used in the United States or in Cinema Production works in high quality production houses.
Furthermore, It establishes that footage has come from a special video camera and either not from a mobile phone camera, or from the normal video cameras.
Also Read
Channel 4 Fake Video Footage: At last the Original has Emerged
- Asian Tribune -
Comments
Are we preaching to the converted?
Very good material provided by Mr Rajasingham. Obviously, the lack of understanding of LTTE dynamics and strategies have left Sri Lanka where we are today. I cannot help but feel though that we are collectively preaching to the converted, and not reaching those who should be reached. Sri Lanka can do one of two things or both. It could ask the UN Secretary general to examine the the original video by the same people who examined it earlier in the UN and ask him to examine this video to ascertain its authenticity or otherwise. Secondly, the Sri Lankan government could write to all US senators, congressmen, UK Parliamentarians, BBC personnel and others who are gunning for Sri Lanka pointing out what Mr Siri Hewavitarne has stated, and call for a fresh review of both videos by an independent party acceptable to the UN and the government of Sri Lanka. While all Sri Lankans believe and also wish to believe this video is a fake, our saying that to each other will not help to dispels suspicion amongst those outside as they have not been given a well researched evidence document. Even Mr Hewavitrane's opinion does not seem to have been publicised widely, as no foreign news service refers to that. Saying they are all biased against Sri Lanka, however true that might be, has not served Sri Lanka's cause so far. We need to counter such propaganda with independently assessed evidence in the light of this original video. Much as there is no doubt about Mr Hewavitrane's qualifications and expertise to comment, it does not appear to have been sufficient to calm rough waters outside of Sri Lanka. So far, the LTTE rump and sections of the Tamil Diaspora who spearheaded this campaign to villify Sri Lanka, have won the misinformation battle. We need to accept this and fight to win the war as we did against the LTTE, and to do that Sri Lanka needs to marshall all its forces and weapons as they did with the war against the LTTE.