Beware Of Pandankarayas Who Suddenly “See The Light!
Emil van der Poorten
The admonition that is the title of this column is an unashamed parody of that warning people against “Greeks bearing gifts.”
It comes to mind in a Sri Lankan context for a not dissimilar reason: a relatively recent trend for those supporting the most violent and corrupt government in Sri Lanka’s post-1948 history who, after giving a new and expanded meaning to the word “apologist,” choosing to leave the sinking ship of state. It doesn’t take a crystal ball to divine the fact that this shift of allegiance is driven by their undeniable skills in recognizing looming disaster brought upon them by the behavior of those whom they have spent an inordinate, though well compensated, amount of time covering up for up to now.
Of course, the apologists, to cover their posteriors as they retreat, keep up the chant of “They did it first!” against those they so assiduously attacked while playing commentating pit bulls to their masters. This was their battle cry and shield every time those they defended until recently were caught with their hand in the metaphorical cookie jar (or worse, much worse). The “disengagement” from those they lionized till just the other day is attempted with a degree of sophistication. Far be it for them to perform a simple volte face, a mea culpa. Rather than simply jump ship, losing the veneer of respectability they have cultivated over the years, they have devised a simple rearguard strategy. After all, their conduct could well still be fresh in the memory banks of even Sri Lankans, a nation notorious for loss of short-term political memory! It also presents an opportunity for those with word-smithing skills to affect a measured and orderly retreat and many of these literary, previously-sea-faring, rodents have the ability to do this.Read More
UN Paralysis Over Syria And Commonwealth’s Covert Support To Sri Lanka
Rajan Philips
Eight years after its birth the so called R2P (Responsibility to Protect) norm of the United Nations is going through yet another traumatic phase in its slower than slow evolution. This time it is in Syria where the international community, far from exercising any responsibility to protect, has been responding with monumental inaction to a catastrophic human tragedy. The civil war that began in March 2011, as an extension of the Arab Spring has become a prolonged winter of violence consuming 100,000 lives and displacing as many as a third of the Syrian population. Seven out of 21 million are refugees in a country that has traditionally had 1.8 million refugees from surrounding countries. For two years, the UN and the international community have been paralysed from doing anything by the veto power play of the Russians and the Chinese in the Security Council.
Last month the Assad regime used chemical weapons in an attack killing 1000 civilians, marking only the fifth time the use of chemical weapons in history and the first time ever their use by a state against its own people. President Obama’s threat of military retaliation as punishment for chemical warfare was beginning to fizzle out as a result of his curiously cautious decision to obtain Congress support in advance. Obama has since been saved from a huge embarrassment by the diplomatic life line thrown by his arch detractor Vladimir Putin. After months of vetoes and weeks of denials, Russia and Syria are now offering to turn over Syria’s stockpile of chemical weapons for international scrutiny and destruction.Read More
