Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday ordered a cabinet minister to end a hunger strike against a U.N. war crimes panel, part of a five-day protest that hurt ties with the world body and the West, Reuters reported. The president arrived outside the U.N. compound in Colombo, and offered water to a supine Construction Minister Wimal Weerawansa, who was in the third day of a "fast unto death" to get U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to relent. The president made no public comment and a spokesman said he would not make a statement. Earlier in the day, medics had given an intravenous saline drip to Weerawansa, a nationalist ally of the president who gained popularity with anti-Western rhetoric. "Don't try to force me to stop. Not even the president can force me. Only Ban Ki-moon can stop this," Weerawansa said then. After Rajapaksa arrived, Weerawansa was taken away in an ambulance. Hunger strikes are a common tactic to bring attention to a cause in Sri Lanka and south Asia, but rarely end in death. Sri Lanka's relations with the world body and Western nations have been strained since it destroyed the separatist Tamil Tigers and won a 25-year conflict in May 2009, a victory that drew military praise but equal criticism over civilian deaths. -- SPA
