Bridging the narratives in Sri Lanka
Instead of victory memorials, Sri Lanka needs a monument to commemorate all casualties of the war
HEALING WOUNDS: Among those in the North and East, the leftovers of war still dominate daily life in various ways. Picture shows people who were displaced to the Vanni during the war, and who now live in Jaffna. Photo: Meera Srinivasan
GERRIT KURTZ-April 19, 2014
In the hot plains of the Vanni, a larger-than-life stone soldier emerges out of a block of concrete, an AK-47 in one hand and the Sri Lankan flag in the other. Hardly visible from the ground, a dove sits on the machine gun. This is a “victory memorial” created by the Army after the end of the hostilities between the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lankan Army in May 2009. Beneath it, two plaques commemorate its creation. They are in Sinhala and in English, but not in Tamil, the majority language there.