The ‘Ugly Sri Lankan’: How Sri Lanka Is Losing The Legitimacy War
By Dayan Jayatilleka -November 5, 2013 |
Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka
I returned from New Delhi over the weekend having spent a week there while presenting a paper by invitation at a seminar organized by the Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) the oldest strategic studies think tank in Delhi. I do not think the attendees at the IDSA annual conference on South Asia could be said to simply reflect the opinion of the Indian government establishment. Though the IDSA is linked to government—and here I must add, it is not only the Ministry of Defence but also the Ministry of External Affairs that supports it– it conducts independent research and the research fellows and staff are independent minded specialists of top quality who do not take their cue from the Government of India. It is no echo chamber. There were around 150 members of the audience who were basically strategic and security policy analysts and area specialists, with a sprinkling of officials. One may call it a significant segment of the strategic studies community.
From what I could discern, there is some concern and confusion with regard to missed opportunities for post war reconciliation on the part of Sri Lanka, the slow pace of delivery on promises of devolution as per the13th amendment, the lack of progress on the implementation of the LLRC recommendations, the long term alienation of the Northern Tamils by overly large military footprint in the North, and the attitude of ‘triumphalism’ in the discourse of the regime.
My conversations left me with the impression that these strategic analysts believe that militant Tamil Nadu sentiment could have been forestalled and could still be countered by adequate devolution and implementation of the LLRC which would revive and restore better relations between Colombo and Delhi. My interlocutors were concerned about a new political culture which seemed to have arisen in Sri Lanka which was less democratic, more authoritarian, more militarized, more religious and ethno nationalist and less open minded than they recall Sri Lanka as being. What is the direction in which Sri Lanka is going, and what is the future that Sri Lanka envisages, seemed to be a question. There was some amazement that the Sri Lankan establishment seemed to think that the globalization of the Lankan issue – most visibly in the form of UNHRC resolutions and forthcoming moves in Geneva– could be countered by Colombo with only the support of China and Pakistan. I definitely got the impression that Sri Lanka has an image problem in Indian public opinion, that it had depleted its soft power and that a sophisticated new generation of young activist-lobbyists from Tamil Nadu and the Tamil Diaspora were beating Sri Lanka in winning hearts and minds. Read More
