[lkdood]

Washington, DC, United States (AHN) -

Sri Lanka's minister for external affairs, G.L. Peiris, left a scheduled meeting with journalists at the National Press Club Thursday morning without speaking.

He had been slated to address them as a precursor to his Friday meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Peiris arrived at the building with a Secret Service security detail, but left without explanation after going to the 14th floor where he was to speak.

No reason for his departure was given by his spokesman, but the National Press Club recently awarded the organization's 2009 International Freedom of the Press Award to slain Sri Lankan journalist Lasantha Wickramatunga, editor of the Sunday Leader.

His widow, journalist Sonali Samarasinghe, accepted the award at a function on April 21.

Samarasinghe is a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University and said when she accepted the award that she cannot return to Sri Lanka as long as the government of Mahinda Rajapakse is in power.

Her husband was the 14th journalist murdered in Sri Lanka in the last five years. Some 15 senior journalists from that country are now in exile and at least 20 more are waiting to be evacuated to safety, she said.

AHN