The third annual symposium, organized by General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University (KDU) for the express purpose of ‘Sharing Knowledge for Sustainable Peace’ among researchers and scholars got underway Friday (20) morning at the KDU auditorium with the participation of Secretary to HE the President, Secretary Defence, Tri-service chiefs and a host of other distinguished guests.
The full-day symposium, designed to further promote the intellectual capacity for Sri Lanka Army, Navy and Air Force officers providing exceptional expertise, derived from diverse scholars in numerous related fields, was to present separate papers and articles, related to national defence strategies.
The inaugural ceremony commenced soon after the KDU anthem rent the air, to be followed by KDU Vice Chancellor Major General M P Peiris’ welcome address. The keynote address on the occasion was delivered by Mr Lalith Weeratunga, Secretary to HE the President.
Mr Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Secretary Defence contributed to the inaugural session making a few observations and comments as the technical sessions in the symposium were to follow afterwards.
“When I was a serving officer in the Army, intelligence reports received from Tamil Nadu confirmed that Tiger terrorists were undergoing training and some of them were entering Sri Lanka in batches from Tamil Nadu. Unfortunately, due to misunderstanding that prevailed between Sri Lanka and India at that point of time, nothing was possible. It is worth enough to research and find out how spares and parts of those artillery guns, weapons, explosives and aircraft were smuggled into Sri Lanka. For the benefit of the region, maritime security has to be strengthened and given priority,” Mr Gotabaya Rajapaksa said.
Mr Rajapaksa also recalled how personal freedom in some of the Western countries works and restrictions placed on free movement among civilians. He also noted that personal freedom should not in anyway become a bar to national security concerns.
Mr Rajapaksa also had the chance of catching a glimpse of the new construction models, planned for the KDU in the near future when invited by university authorities.
The gamut of academic papers that were taken up for discussion during those sessions in the aftermath of the ceremonial inauguration covered “Environmental aspects towards sustainable peace”, “Social Science for Social Harmony”, “Defence Studies”, “Technology for Sustainable Peace” and “Challenges in the Field of Medicine”. Mrs W C D K Fernando, Symposium Chairperson, Faculty of KDU Academic Studies raised the vote of thanks at the inauguration ceremony.
Selected academic papers forwarded to the symposium are to be published in the KDU defence journal, ‘Defence Academia’ after the symposium. The KDU, founded in 1980 with the specific purpose of inculcating service officers with an academic background has so far produced thousands of Army, Navy, Air Force and Police officers. The KDU, now recognized as one of the unique Defence Universities in the South Asian Region is to extend its academia covering a wide range of fields in the future too, while grooming officers to meet the challenges of modern defence management.
Air Chief Marshal Roshan Goonetileke, Chief of Defence Staff, Lieutenant General Jagath Jayasuriya, Commander of the Army, Vice Admiral Tisara Samarasinghe, Commander of the Navy, Inspector General of Police Mahinda Balasuriya and a gathering of senior tri-service and Police officers, scholars, researchers and invitees attended the occasion.
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