Interview with Nimalka Fernando: The UN HRC resolution and beyond

Interview with Nimalka Fernando: The UN HRC resolution and beyond

Nimalka, now we’ve seen that the council voted for the resolution on Sri Lanka. What is your initial impression?

Sunanda Deshapriya-25 Mar, 2013

It’s a serious voting pattern. Because if you look at the resolution, the resolution has very substantial  concerns raised by civil society for a period of time. From holding elections in the North, addressing issues of impunity, collapse of rule of law, the unaddressed issues of accountability, the failure of Sri Lankan Government to address issues of reconciliation for a long time, and also the selective manner in which the LLRC action plan has been constructed and also the inadequacies in the national human rights action plan. So if you take all those subjects one by one, if you look at the voting pattern one by one, I feel very serious in terms of the resolution. If you take for instance the statement made by Thailand; Thailand voted against the resolution. But Thailand made a very significant statement calling on to GoSL to look in to issues of accountability and reconciliation.

Then if you take Korea, a country from South Asia, which made a very strong statement of the need for Sri Lanka to take strong efforts to address issues of accountability; they very categorically said that the issues of justice and accountability are important for reconciliation. So just merely saying LLRC is available, and LLRC is enough was actually rejected by South Korea. And if you take the abstention of Japan, and the manner in which Japan intervened in this council session, taking on the issue of Human Rights, saying that Sri Lanka has to address unresolved issues of human rights. And also they mentioned that the president has given an assurance to hold elections in September for Northern Province, and also that the President will promptly resume the Parliamentary select committee process. So if you take the statements made by the countries like Thailand who did not vote for and Japan which had abstained and South Korea which voted for, herald a serious attitude being adopted by these countries. And India for example, categorically stated that this is our friend, this is our neighbor, what happens in Sri Lanka matters to us. And they further looked towards a credible and independent investigation to take place with regards to violation of human rights law and humanitarian law. Across the board, those who voted in favor have always been addressing these issues, but if you look at the voting pattern I think that on one hand this is serious.

On the other hand it is serious because the Muslim community in Sri Lanka has been led down by the OIC countries. Pakistan led the campaign against the resolution from the very beginning and I was amazed to see that. We’ve had discussions with the their  representatives in Geneva, bringing it to their notice what is happening in Sri Lanka. We all know that “”Bodu Bala Sena” has connections to the defense establishment in Sri Lanka and supported by Mr. Gotabhaya Rajapakse. So even though the Cabinet is just a rubber stamp, as we all know it is, but these decisions are taken by the Defense Secretary. And whatever decisions the Defense Secretary is taking, because he is the Presdent’s brother, I have to purely assume that he has the blessings of his brother. Otherwise you can’t have a government. Otherwise you would say there are two States working inside Sri Lanka. So you naturally come to conclusion that this position is also supported by the executive president. So if you look at the dangerous manner and the Bodu Bala Sena is behaving and imposing discriminatory practices in our society, this should have been taken note by Pakistan, Qatar Kuwait and Indonesia.

And no country even expressed their concern about the situation of Muslim people in Sri Lanka?

None of the countries. And also  during the presentations of the country reports, there was enough room for these Muslim countries to express concerns with  regard to religious beliefs, and the manner in which the anti-Muslim sentiments are rising in Sri Lanka. it was  the  Western countries who were talking about religious belief, religious, fundamental freedoms, to have your own belief and the countries with whom we have been critical of Islam-phobia, these are the countries, including America, talking about the need for religious freedom  in Sri Lanka.  So this is why I say this is serious. The Muslim community in Sri Lanka has to take note that they have no champion internationally.

I think now  they have to now begin to align with the Sinhala civil society, probably  they have to begin to work with Tamil Diaspora with whom they have not been having linkages for a long period of time because it has not a religious issue  or an ethnic issue anymore. It’s an issue of democracy and fundamental freedoms in Sri Lanka.

Given the past years experience, especially after the 19/02 resolution, do you think GoSL will change their mind and start implementing some of the substantial recommendations of the LLRC and will at least look at this resolution positively?

No, the GoSL is fooling themselves. And fooling us .Unfortunately for us as the civil society, these resolutions are giving us more responsibility than to the GoSL. If you look at the GoSL, they do not need resolutions like this. They have the 500-page document called LLRC and I really want to ask the GoSL what actually they have implemented. They keep on telling the international community here that “this will impact on the delicate reconciliation process”.  Mr. Mahinda Smarasinha’s statement is an example.

Now what do you mean by delicate reconciliation process? Has the GoSL started involving the Tamil National Alliance and Tamil parties in looking at and redressing the situation? For instance what is the consultation Sri Lanka has had with the Tamil National Alliance on the affected communities, on the main recommendations made in the LLRC; for instance clearing high security zones, handing back the land to the owners, what is the dialogue that has happened. We are not talking about “delicate reconciliation process”, this is what we are referring to. In order to have confidence in people, they need to know that there is normalcy in their lives. People don’t know what will happen the next day. So this “delicate reconciliation process” is mere word. For me “delicate” means asking or giving a response to Mrs. Anandi who is informing the LLRC that 59 people including her husband were surrendees and these surrendees have never come back home. This is delicate. Has the GoSL sat with Mrs. Anandi to discuss these issues.

I don’t think that the GoSL has any political will or a genuine effort to embark on reconciliation. The GoSL is thriving on its executive powers. And the minister is just white-washing the sins of an executive Presidency.

Then the other issue the GoSL mentioned  is that there is domestic process. Now what has happened to the domestic process with regards to the 17 ACF workers. What has happened regarding the Eknaligoda case. Sandya Eknaligoda is going in and out of courts. So if you look at these terminologies and the whole attitude against all constructive recommendations that the High Commissioner  who is coming from an anti-apartheid struggle is making: truth seeking mechanism, transitional justice: these words are like anathema to the GoSL.

So you think that nothing will change in Sri Lankan politics over the resolution and they will try to fool UNHCR and themselves and continue like this? for how long?

They will continue like this. These resolutions, built on the vision of people who are struggling; the families of the disappeared, the journalists who are outside the country who are calling for justice in Sri Lanka, thousands of people who have surrendered, the ex-combatants who don’t know what will happen to their lives. So these resolutions are actually the political agenda for people’s empowerment and the civil society empowerment and for us to challenge the political forces in Sri Lanka who are talking about change. And I think the importance for us is that we are giving a  warning to the future political leaders in Sri Lanka that they cannot think about the future or political change in Sri Lanka without campaigning for these issues.

Then  what will be the foreseeable repercussions if the Sri Lankan government does not implement it or look at is positively?

There will be two instances  where it’s in the agenda of the Human Rights Council in the next twelve months. Getting a resolution in to the Human Rights Council is very difficult and we know what happened in 2009. As a result you yourself had to be out of the country for a long time. So getting to the agenda, the international focus is on Sri Lanka; on war crimes, allegations; international investigation is hanging on Sri Lanka. So now the international community including we, have also as civil society agreed to these things, because it is asking Sri Lanka to do a credible national investigation. Failing that we’ll have to build the next stage where we need to ask an international credible investigation to redress the situation. Because international community still is giving time for Sri Lanka. And India very categorically said that Sri Lanka needs a  proper investigation mechanisms in place. So the next stage is we, the civil society with the international support, with the UN systems to call  for international investigation.  This is why those who are supporting Sri Lanka says this is intrusion. Surely, this is intrusion. If the Human Rights Council does not take action, who will? Human Rights Council is intrusive. Human rights council has to ask serious questions from countries. Or else what’s the meaning of being the human rights civilization or why do you have all the conventions and councils spending so much of money.

So we have an oral reporting and then we have a substantive reporting. Sri Lanka has to perform. It will have an obstinate attitude of not reporting. But it has to report. It has to deliver. Up to now there has been no witness protection in place. What about re-working the human rights commission, what is going to happen to the filing Trincomalee summary proceedings. So it is serious.

They have to take these action if not there will be further calls. I really  don’t see the reason why Sri Lanka cannot invite the UN Working Group on Disappearances. In 1999 we know the UNP government invited and the reports were formulated. Just formulation of reports and giving the families a chance to speak. So Sri Lank has to take action. In March there will be this substantive discussion and in the substantive discussion still if there is no progress the next stage will have to be calling for a special country repporteur. Like North Korea. You can’t go but there is a special country repporteur sitting outside listing to all the comments and responding. I think Sri Lanka shouldn’t go to such stage. If Sri Lanka has enough expertise and political will and we can address these situations. These are issues of justice: Nobody is going to throttle the government. If you want to catch the thief, you want to catch the thief. This is exactly what we are asking for. But if you are the thief yourself, you won’t catch the thief.

Given the concern about the power within the family and looking at the tendencies of getting more and more laws passed towards a  authoritarian regime, can actually Rajapakse rule change their course of action in  Sri Lanka. Will Sri Lanka become a democratic country, because of these pressures or ………..            

Mahinda Rakapakse the politician I knew long time ago would have made the changes. The politician I knew long time ago. But the new Mahinda Rajapakse has taken upon himself to develop this personality cult. The earlier Rajapakse, when he was a progressive man, he was moving with the masses. Now it is popularity. Now they have built a cult like Kim Il Sung….So that cult, Mahinda Rajapaksa  is getting pumped up by the military. Like what happened in North Korea. I see this trend in Sri Lanka. Everybody is dressing up as Mahinda Rajapakse. Everybody is eating Kurakkan, or wanting to eat Kurakkan. This is like a cult. So this cultish thing is not going to work for long in a country where we have enjoyed a vibrant democracy. There is still room for Mahinda Rajapakse to change. And the senior left politicians who are in the government  are also concerned about this cult driven Mahinda Rajapakse behavior. So Mahinda Rajapakse has friends in side his ruling alliance to change. He has to kick out the people who are sending him in this. If he enjoys the cult  he can’t do it.

Politics has been militarised to such a extent  today; do you think Rajapakse can still hold his political power in militarised state set up and make political reforms?

Even in 1994 when we were at a one point of time towards Chandrika Bandaranayaka Kumaratunga who had an alliance with the military so much, used to every time tell us that I am unable to do anything because the  military will be unhappy with me. Now it is not “military unhappy with me”, it’s military that is ruling. And I think it is much more serious than Chandrika’s time. Chandrika was at least able to deal with the navy commander at that time who she felt was a not following the government polices. Now the government policy with regard to land is dictated by the military. The government policy with regards to resettling and demographic changes is handled by the defense ministry. The ubernisation, cleaning up Colombo is handled by militarization. So it is a complex thing. I hope the people in our country who value democracy and also the political leaders inside the UPFA will rally around and urge Mahanda Rajapakse, to change. If not we have to change.

What is the message for opposition in UN HRC the resolution ?

See the Opposition has to take serious note of what is happening in Geneva. I am rather disturbed by this opposition trying to assist Mahanda Rajapakse through forming alliances or memorandums, asking him to respond. This should have happen long time ago. But the opposition now has to take the note of this: we have to sit with the Tamil National Alliance and those politicians may be in the UPFA who are unhappy with what is happening in Sri Lanka and we need to develop national political forum  that will take this resolutions seriously. And that we will make a new civil society force; clamoring for change. Requesting the government or pressurizing the government like we are pressurizing the government through this resolution to address issues. I don’t see the same pressure we brought on the government, by the opposition towards these things. It is politics after all. So I think we can’t just say things like ‘I didn’t sign the ICC therefore the army cannot be brought before the Rome statute’;  these are international mechanisms.  The issue of accountability and the issue of reconciliation are two sides of the same coin. Without either, you can’t have the other. So it is also a serious message that the international community has given to the opposition. So opposition has to now take note of this. It cannot just say we will protect Mahinda Rajapakse, you can’t protect Mahanda Rajapakses regime but we have to protect the country.

Country is not equal to Mahinda Rajapakse. Country is equal to accountability and reconciliation. So you can’t support Mahanda Rajapakse and at the same time support accountability and reconciliation. You oppose Mahinda Rajapakse, and you provide for reconciliation, accountability, 13^th amendment and devolution of power to take place in Sri Lanka. So the opposition has to have a different political agenda. It’s a different ball game now. We as civil society have already thrown that ball to the opposition. They have the resolutions to mobilize people, to mobilize support and to mobilize necessary stamina. So they have to now take this. Civil society has done our part.

Lanka policy gets media flak

The Tamil Nadu-based media exerted high decibel pressure on Indian foreign policy with regard to Sri Lanka. MAYA RANGANATHAN sees this is as a recasting of public space. Pix: the 12-year-old Balachandran

Posted/Updated Sunday, Mar 24 23:43:39, 2013

The differences in media on India’s stand on the US resolution in the UNHRC against Sri Lanka for war crimes seem to have dissipated post-vote. Indian media is united in opinion that the UPA-led government at the Centre bungled yet again: the English language media and those in other regionsberate it for succumbing to pressure from its electoral ally, the DMK in Tamil Nadu, and the Tamil media in Tamil Nadu for ignoring the pressure from the State.

While the policy implications of either of those arguments in a globalised world and in a country run by a coalition comprising regional parties are best left to policy-makers and constitutional experts to analyse, the media coverage in the run-up to the UN vote and its impact upon the people and polity is significant for two reasons. First, it signals more ways in which media in general and regional media in particular recasts the public space, an area effectively theorised by Robin Jeffrey in the context of the boom in the regional press in the 1970s; Arvind Rajagopal in post-television India of the 1990s; and more recently Ursula Rao in the context of news as culture. Secondly, it shows how domestic political or electoral estimations have come to exert “strong influence on Indian polity towards the problems of another country.”*The latter issue is more complex in a state like Tamil Nadu where media and domestic politics are enmeshed.

It could be argued that the present outpouring of outrage and grief over the plight of the thousands that perished in the culmination of the civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009 is to be expected given that pan-Tamil rhetoric has been the staple of both the regional media and politicians in Tamil Nadu. The ‘Tamil Nadu factor’ clearly at variance with the ‘national nodal point’ was apparent in earlier instances too concerning the ethnic issue in Sri Lanka: in the protests that followed the rejection of petition for clemency of the accused in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case in 2011 and the adoption of the resolution in UN seeking a probe into war crimes in Sri Lanka in May 2012. The current protests in the State are however, markedly different from those in the past, in that they are not only being led by students and have spread across the State, but also in that the protestors seem independent of political party affiliations, the first ever in the case of a political issue. More significantly, the events stand out for their efforts to influence India’s foreign policy, which has seldom been contested so in the past.

The sentiments of the people in Tamil Nadu became apparent following two stories in the news media, Callum Macrae’s Opinion carried in op-ed of The Hindu on February 19 and ‘No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka,’ aired on the channel Pudhiya Thalaimurai, with commentary in Tamil. While the contents of both are disturbing, the accounts enjoy more credibility owing to the media houses that published them. The Hindu’s stand on the LTTE, its assessment of its supremo V Prabhakaran and the means employed by him are too widely known to be repeated here. Post-war, it was one of the first media organisations to report directly from Sri Lanka with the then editor N Ram visiting the IDP camps facilitated by the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry. The July 2009 report, while castigating the LTTE for using its own people as human shields against the Sri Lankan forces, had credited the latter with eliminating a terrorist organisation in a ‘low-intensity military conflict’ and rescuing 300,000 Tamil civilians, in what was described as a ‘poignant human drama’. Today the picture of the son of the LTTE supremo, the 12-year-old Balachandran munching a snack, that first accompanied Macrae’s piece in The Hindu has become the ‘face’ in the protests with hundreds and hundreds of students donning the mask. However, it must also be noted here that The Hindu’s warnings on pursuing the demand for a separate state of Eelam has had few takers. Meanwhile, the documentary on Pudhiya Thalaimurai, a channel devoid of political leanings and seen as the most credible of the Tamil satellite television news channels in the State, has been more effective in driving home the plight of the Tamil civilians in Sri Lanka during the war than any other account going by the discussions in social networking sites.

Television viewers are only too familiar with 24x7 TV news channels attempts to influence external affairs. But media nationalism has seldom had an impact on foreign policies. The regional factor played an important role in the issue of the UNHRC vote not only because media and politics are inextricably intertwined in Tamil Nadu adding to redoubled pressure, but also to the evolution of coalition politics at the Centre with the Dravidian parties playing decisive roles. It is a moot question if and how the withdrawal of the DMK would affect the UPA now, but with coalition governments at the Centre coming to stay, their potential to impact upon not merely national policies, but international as well, cannot be ignored. On one level, such processes could amount to a strengthening of the democratic process, but on the other, they could also lead to further complexities eventuating in the re-imagination of a nation-state already compounded by enormous diversities.

Media is yet to become ‘the central and source point of influence’ but it seems to be exerting far more influence than ever before in the age of evolving media platforms when information has become the most easily available and in some cases least expensive, commodity. This adds yet another dimension to the current debate onmedia’s responsibility and its ability to comprehend and convey matters as complex as international diplomacy.

*Robin Jeffrey, India’s newspaper revolution: capitalism and politics of the Indian language press,1977-99 (UK, C Hurst and Co., 2000); Arvind Rajagopal, Politics after Television: Hindu Nationalism and the Reshaping of the Public in India (UK, Cambridge University Press, 2001); Ursula Rao, News as Culture: Journalistic Practices and the Remaking of Indian Leadership Traditions (New York, Berghahn Books, 2010) and Ashok Malik and Rory Medcalfe, India’s New World: Civil Society in the Making of Foreign Policy, (Internet resource,http://lowyinstitute.cachefly.net/files/pubfiles/Malik_and_Medcalf,_India%27s_new_world_web.pdf, accessed on Jan 21, 2013).

Sri Lanka may pull its mission out of Tamil Nadu

Students of various colleges shout slogans during a protest against Sri Lanka’s for alleged war crimes in Chennai. TOI Photo)

PTI | Mar 24, 2013

COLOMBO: Faced with growing anti-Sri Lankan sentiments in Tamil Nadu, Colombo may shift its deputy high commission office out of Chennai, a media report said today. 

The new location could be Trivandrum in neighbouring Kerala, the Sunday Times said. 

Threats and intimidation of Sri Lankan nationals and Sri Lankan property have been noted in Chennai. 

The paper claimed that even the Sri Lankan defence attache based in Chennai had come under harassment. 

Last week, two Buddhist monks came under attack triggering noisy protests here near the Indian High Commission premises and Sri Lanka's national carrier also suspended flights to Chennai. Top Indian officials here met with senior Buddhist monks to try to allay fears. 

The protests came as India voted against Sri Lanka alongside the US in a key UN human rightsresolution, last week, that called for an independent and credible investigation into allegations ofhuman rights violations towards the end of the island's three-decade civil war against Tamil separatists in 2009. ..................................................................................................................................................

The Plight Of Australia’s Tamil Migrants

By Frances Harrison -March 25, 2013 

Frances Harrison

He lay in agony on the ground on a tarpaulin sheet in the open, bandaged in rags in the scorching tropical heat after two major surgeries on his leg and hip, but Thevam considered himself extremely lucky. Just the day before he’d been moved out of the school building turned into a makeshift hospital. A day later and he too would have been among the eight dead and many more injured in the shell attack on the hospital.  No matter that the building had a clear red cross painted on its roof, visible to government drones and surveillance planes.

Thevam is a 39-year-old Tamil shopkeeper with a wife and two young children from northern Sri Lanka. He is a witness to war crimes whose mother was killed while sheltering in a bunker, and himself still bears huge angry scars on his body. He was granted refugee status in Australia two years ago but is not free to restart his life. Thevam is one of 51 Tamils who have failed their security clearance and shockingly he hasn’t even been told why.

How the security clearance process operates is unclear. When Australia screens refugees from Sri Lanka the intention may be to keep out former members of the Tamil Tigers – a group widely proscribed as a terrorist outfit, though not in Australia – that recruited teenagers and pioneered suicide bombing. That may sound sensible but it misses many key points.

Refugee advocates believe it’s possible Australia’s security screening could be based on information supplied by the very government from which the refugees are seeking sanctuary. Sending names to Sri Lanka to ask if individuals have cases outstanding against them is a nonsense if you know how random the persecution of war survivors has been. In most cases the Sri Lankan security forces detain Tamils on suspicion of being terrorists and then extract large bribes to release them and help them flee the country. Detainees are routinely tortured and then forced to sign a confession in a language they can’t understand. Any adult man who lived in the warzone is a potential suspect for the Sri Lankan authorities– but also a witness to the government’s war crimes and crimes against humanity now documented by UN lawyers.

In the UK Tamil asylum seekers actually strive to prove they were members of the rebel movement, knowing it will convince a tribunal that they are still at risk after the war. I’ve testified in appeals to confirm an individual was a Tiger and that’s clinched their case. In Australia refugees have to hide their connection to the organization for fear of a negative security assessment.

It’s also necessary to understand that in the patch of Sri Lanka ruled by the Tigers every family had to hand over one child to fight, whether they liked it or not. Civilians in that area also had to pay taxes and give free labour to the rebel movement that ran the administration.

I have interviewed scores of survivors from the final phase of Sri Lanka’s civil war in which the UN says possibly 70,000 civilians were killed in just five months in an area of at most 35 square kilometres. In terms of intensity and speed, the former Norwegian peace mediator Erik Solheim says the slaughter in Sri Lanka in 2009 was probably the worst in the world this century.

Those who survived are deeply traumatised – often suicidal. None of the hardened fighters I met wanted to take up arms again. They’ve had it crushed out of them. Most just want to hide somewhere quiet and try and rebuild their lives, haunted by the memories of babies’ heads blown off and the cries of the injured as they died in agony. These broken people cannot be a security risk to Australians.

What’s posing a security risk is the continued persecution of Tamils in Sri Lanka, which threatens to rekindle the civil war. In 2009, when the Tigers were defeated, the government had a window of opportunity to reconcile communities. That’s long gone.  Now it’s clear that Tamils who survived the war are being targeted for detention, torture and extortion. There’s one soldier for every five civilians in the north – the army actually increased in size after the end of the war.  Sexual harassment by the security forces is rife – especially of women Tigers.  Recently I met a Tamil girl who’d been continuously gang raped, beaten and burned with cigarettes in a Sri Lankan police station for 47 days – as recently as last November. Australian politicians who say everything is fine in Sri Lanka should meet her and many like her turning up in Europe.

The repression of Tamils in northern Sri Lanka today is so intense that anger is bubbling up. Almost every family lost someone in the war zone but the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, has documented how the authorities prevent survivors from holding religious gatherings to mourn their dead. None of the root causes of the conflict has been addressed – a triumphalist government refuses to devolve power to Tamil areas. So it’s only a matter of time before violence erupts again from another humiliated generation with nothing to live for.

Meanwhile many of Sri Lanka’s top military commanders, in charge when war crimes were committed, have been posted abroad as Ambassadors, benefiting from diplomatic immunity. Instead of locking up recognised refugees at great expense, Australia would do better to target the perpetrators of war crimes who roam free.

*Thevam is not the refugee’s real name. This article is first appeared in Asia Correspondent.

Geneva vote: GTF appreciates US role, not entirely satisfied with resolution

…requests SF to join their campaign

March 24, 2013, 12:00 pm 

By Shamindra Ferdinando

While appreciating US efforts at the recently concluded United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) sessions in Geneva, the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) said that the second US resolution targeting Sri Lanka didn’t meet the expectations of Tamil speaking people.

The GTF asserted that it was a grave lapse on the part of those who had sponsored the resolution to still believe there could be an independent and impartial domestic investigation into accountability issues in Sri Lanka.

In an exclusive interview with The Island, Suren Surendiran, UK based spokesperson for the GTF, said that leaving the investigation in the hands of President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother Gotabhaya Rajapaksa was unacceptable and unbearable.

The Diaspora established the GTF in the British parliament in Feb 2010 in the wake of the conclusion of the conflict in May 2009.

The GTF is considered the most influential and internationally accepted Tamil Diaspora grouping that represents the interests of Tamil speaking people in Sri Lanka.

Asked whether the GTF was satisfied with the outcome of last Thursday’s Geneva vote, Surendiran said that Tamil speaking people really appreciated efforts by a section of the US-led international community to keep the accountability issue alive. "We are grateful to those 39 governments, which co-sponsored the resolution. We consider 25 votes for the resolution and 13 against an overwhelming victory for our cause," Surendiran said.

Unfortunately, the resolution had failed to ensure an international investigation, which was nothing but a prerequisite for credible investigation. Could there be anything as ridiculous as allowing those who had been in charge of armed forces at the time of eelam war IV to conduct a domestic investigation, Surendiran said. The GTF spokesperson accused the government of causing the deaths of thousands of innocent people during the final phase of the offensive on the Vanni east front.

Surendiran said that those in the international community supportive of their cause should realize that the government had no desire to conduct a credible investigation. He claimed that the situation had worsened since the impeachment of Chief Justice Dr. Shirani Bandaranayake at the behest of the government. Therefore, the international community should demand that Sri Lanka agree to an external probe without further delay, Surendiran said, insisting the GTF would continue its campaign until the global community intervened in Sri Lanka.

Responding to another query, Surendiran said that the resolution had failed to address several contentious issues as well as legitimate grievances of Tamil speaking people, including state sponsored land grab, ‘Sinhalisation’ of predominately Tamil areas and heavy presence of the armed forces in the conflict zone. "What we really need is a stronger resolution which will compel the government to ensure a political solution and address legitimate aspirations of Tamil speaking people, " Surendiran said, adding that the international community should examine the grievances of Sinhalese as well as Muslims. The GTF official alleged that Sinhalese and Muslims, too, had been deprived of their right to express their views, with the latter being under attack by state-sponsored thugs. The Muslims were under threat and recent protests in Colombo and its suburbs directed against Muslims over contentious Halal issue revealed the rapidly deteriorating situation, he said.

Surendiran praised United Nations Rights Chief Navi Pillay calling for an international mechanism to conduct an independent investigation into alleged crimes, which if proven, would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Commenting on the US presenting a much diluted resolution to secure GoSL’s consent to present a joint proposal hence avoid a vote, Surendiran said that the Sri Lankan leadership would never accept any resolution that would demand an International independent investigation. However, amendments to original resolution meant that the government would not want any independent investigation to address accountability or give access to special mandate holding international rapporteurs or accept the demand for a political solution to the Tamil National Question.

Asked whether the GTF would make representations to the government of Malaysia over its decision to abstain at the Geneva vote, Surendiran said the grouping was grateful to the 25 countries (53%) out of the 47 countries with voting rights which voted yes to the resolution. "We are also grateful to the eight countries, including Malaysia for abstaining rather than opposing the resolution. This gave an overwhelming 33 (25 plus 8) countries plus Gabon which didn’t participate in the voting hence rejecting the misrepresentation of the ground reality by the Sri Lankan government, through Ambassador Ravinatha Ariyasinghe and Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe.

"Let me make this absolutely clear to the wavering mind, if any of these 34 countries (25 plus 8 plus Gabon) (72% of the voting countries) accepted Sri Lanka’s position articulated by Amb. Ariyasinghe and Minister Samarasinghe, they would have voted against the resolution just as the 13 (28%) countries which did."

Surendiran expressed surprise that Muslim countries threw their weight behind Sri Lanka in spite of President Rajapaksa’s government harassing the Muslim community. The GTF urged Muslim countries to review their position in the wake of ongoing attacks on the community. The Muslims were being threatened and prevented from practicing their religion, he said, adding that they should be concerned about attempts to ban Hijab in some schools in Sri Lanka.

The GTF would continue to engage all countries, including those who had sided with Sri Lanka, in line with their strategy to push for an international independent investigation into crimes alleged to have been committed by both sides.

Surendiran declined to reveal their plans as it could be detrimental to their project. Now that the Geneva vote had been secured, the GTF would step up campaigning in Commonwealth countries in a fresh bid to force a cancellation of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka next November.

Asked whether the GTF was surprised by former Army Chief recently disputing Channel 4 News report pertaining to the alleged killing of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran’s son by the Sri Lankan army, Surendiran said that if Gen. Fonseka was confident his troops weren’t guilty of war crimes, he as a free man should himself go to international authorities to be investigated voluntarily. Gen Fonseka could also join the ongoing GTF campaign pushing for an international independent investigation to prove his innocence.

Surendiran said that Gen. Fonseka was now making an attempt to change what he said in the run-up to the last presidential election. The GTF recalled the circumstances under which he accused Defence Secretary Rajapaksa of ordering the army to kill even those carrying white flags during the final phase of the battle. Surendiran warned that the GTF would release further evidence to support war crimes allegations in the run-up to major international events, including CHOGM.

Geneva Resolution: Not A Victory For Tamils, But A Defeat For Sri Lanka

By Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran -March 25, 2013

PM - TGTE - Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran

The resolution proposed by America at the Human Rights Council related to Sri Lanka was passed by a majority of 13 votes. Out of the Human Rights Council comprising of 47 member states, 26 voted for the resolution, 13 against and 8 abstained taking a neutral position.

The resolution proposed and adopted by America did not come close to Tamil people’s aspirations or expectations. We cannot consider this resolution, therefore as a victory for Tamils. However, we can definitely look at this as a defeat for Sri Lanka.

This resolution will be problematic to the family-based dynastic rule of Pres.Mahinda Rajapaksa, who continues to arbitrarily exercise power over the Tamil nation as well as other peoples in the island of Sri Lanka without any pressure from the international community. The fact that this resolution was debated and passed in the United Nations Human Rights Council will help to expose the atrocities committed against the Tamils during the closing stage of the war which the Sinhalase would prefer to hide and forget. Compared to last year, support for Sri Lanka in the Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has declined. Mention should be made of a strong backer of Sri Lanka, Japan abstaining and not taking sides during the vote. It is appropriate to mention that the countries who voted in favor of Sri Lanka are not necessarily supportive of Sri Lanka, but opposed to U.S. foreign policy. The voting record demonstrates we are living in a epoch when the world is moving from a unipolar world order under the leadership of America to a multipolar world order.The voting in the UNHRC points out to the fact that Sri Lanka is increasingly becoming isolated in the international arena in this new world.

As far as the Tamil people are concerned, it is important that any resolution submitted to the UNHRC should address two issues. First, the destruction in Mullivaikal constitutes an act of genocide by the Sinhala Government. Second, those engaged in genocide should be subject to an independent international investigation as a means for justice. The U.S.-led resolution does not address either of these crucial issues. Thus, we cannot consider this resolution acceptable or satisfactory to Tamils.

As people who know the “rationale” by which governments function in the UNHRC and the rest of the United Nations, where global powers act solely based on their own national interests, the ineffectiveness of this resolution on matters of survival for the Tamil People comes as no surprise to us.

At the very minimum, we are pained by the fact that there is no proper acknowledgment in the resolution that Tamil people have been subjected to injustice in the island of Sri Lanka. We condemn that the resolution, which notes that human rights are violated in the island of Sri Lanka on the basis of religion and belief, failed to pinpoint the fact that the most massive human rights violations have been directed against Tamils on account of their Tamil ethnicity.

At this moment, I think it is important that I share certain matters we must take cognizance of with our people. In order to secure justice for our people, we must continuously campaign through political and diplomatic means with world governments.

It is not difficult to understand that the tyranny and oppression unleashed against the Eelam Tamil people by the Sinhala government in the island of Sri Lankan borders on genocide. Yet, world governments take the position that incidents that took place during the last phase of the war in Vanni were not an act of genocide, but war crimes committed by both sides.

If what happened in Vanni is acknowledged as an act of genocide, there arises a need for a protective mechanism based on the international legal and moral principles of self-defense and self-preservation. Further, the governments of this world will have to accept the establishment of an independent state of Tamil Eelam on the basis of remedial justice. However, while knowing the truth, these governments want to confine the problem within the boundaries of their own preference.

How are we going to approach such governments? We have to design good strategy and tactics.

One of the important lessons the Tamils and their friends learnt through the slaughter at Mullivaaikkaal is the fact that, irrespective of how just our cause may be, how much sacrifice we may make and the gallantry we possess, when powerful governments join hands with our adversary we cannot win.

Thus, today our strategy should center on how we are going to widen the distance between powerful global players and our enemy the Sinhala government, and how we are going to develop our relationship with these global powers. However, we should not sacrifice our own self-interests to these global powers. At the same time, we cannot expect the global powers to give up their interests fully and support us on the basis of justice. Thus, in order to deal with powerful governments, I believe we must employ twin tactics that will produce results.

First, we have to determine how to align our interests and the interests of the powerful global powers and design necessary plans. This should happen at the diplomatic level.

Second, we as people should engage ourselves with global powers through democratic and diplomatic means.

These twin tactics should go hand in hand. Governments revolve around the axis of their own self-interests. But, political leaders play a big role in running these governments. Winning popular support is an important self-interest of political leaders. Due to this, the interests of the government machinery and the political leaders are not aligned in all instances. On many occasions, in order not to lose the support of the people, leaders are forced to make changes in the political stances of their governments.

Against this background, if we look at students rising up in Tamil Nadu, the importance of their efforts can be easily understood. The Tamil Nadu students’ uprising, launched with the support of the people, has the power to change the stance of the political leaders of Tamil Nadu and India.

The ongoing Tamil Nadu students’ uprising affirms the need for an international inquiry into the genocide inflicted on the Tamil people and of a referendum among the Tamil people for an independent Tamil Eelam. The students have launched their struggle convinced that if Eelam Tamil people are to live with security, dignity and equality, there is no alternative other than an independent Tamil Eelam.

We hold hands in solidarity with the Tamil Nadu students who have leapt into the battlefield on behalf of the Eelam Tamil people. We also join hands with the political leaders and the people of Tamil Nadu who stand in solidarity with the students struggle.

The political reality is, whether we like it or not, the victory of the Tamil Eelam liberation struggle depends largely on the success of Tamil Nadu in engaging the Indian government. International diplomatic calculations are made on the premise that India is the dominant regional power in the Indian Ocean and South Asia. It is also a growing global power. International relations are determined on these bases of power. Thus, India’s role is important in the creation of a new state of Tamil Eelam in South Asia.

Thus, in our strategy for winning the liberation struggle for Tamil Eelam, our aim should be to convince the Indian government to recognize an independent Tamil Eelam. This may not be immediately possible. However, internal conditions can make significant impact on the foreign policy of that country. As an example, Malaysia did not vote against the U.S.-led resolution, but abstained. The main reason is, though Malaysia is friendly with Sri Lanka, the Malaysian government has to give deference to the wishes of the Malaysian Tamils.

The emerging struggles and stances in Tamil Nadu in relation to the Eelam people have the ability to impact Tamil Nadu and other Indian States and thus influence the decisions of the Indian government. In this, the role of Tamil Nadu students is decisive. Students of Tamil Nadu have demonstrated their power fittingly. The call of the hour is for a plan of action to continue and widen the students’ struggle until conditions are created for India’s recognition of Tamil Eelam.

I would also like to record at this juncture that America is carefully and continuously observing what is happening in Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu is one of the dominant states in India. We can also understand America’s interest in Tamil Nadu through the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent visit there. We have to take note of the fact that the ongoing struggle in Tamil Nadu has the ability to impact not only in India, but at the global stage as well.

We must not lose faith because the resolution adopted at the UNHRC is not fashioned in a way that will bring justice to our people. We need not feel frustrated either. We are progressing towards our goal.

Today we are launching – together with Human Rights and other Tamil organizations – a three month world-wide signature campaign to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon calling on him to appoint an international inquiry on the basis of his inherent power, as confirmed by his legal advisers, pursuant to Article 99 of the U.N. Charter.

Today we are also launching a global signature campaign urging Mr. AdamaDieng. Special Adviser of the Secretary General on the Prevention of Genocide, to release the 2007 annual report of his office that mentioned the likelihood of the Tamil people being victims of genocide or mass atrocities, as well as other reports related to Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka, as mentioned in the U.N. Internal Review Report. There is proverb current among us: If you beat the grinding stone again and again it will move!

The Thirst of the Tamils is Tamil Eelam.

Thank you

Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran

India’s ‘Rotten Diplomacy’ in Sri Lanka Breeds Loathing

Rafiq Maqbool/Associated PressTamil protesters at a demonstration against the Sri Lankan government in Mumbai, Maharashtra, on March 20.By SAMANTH SUBRAMANIAN-March 25, 2013,

As a rule, living in Sri Lanka means encountering some of the friendliest people on earth. But since the civil war ended in 2009, it must be said, there is a startlingly consistent loathing for India, and a doubled such loathing for Tamils from India. This manifests all in the abstract, for the most part, but it is there nonetheless.

Among other reasons, the Sinhalese are angry with India for funding and training the Tamil Tigers in their infancy, helping them become the monsters they became, and it is difficult to argue this point. The Tamils are angry with India for not intervening more decisively in the waning weeks of the war, to help stop the civilian carnage that occurred – and it is difficult to argue this point also.

Both the Sinhalese and the Tamils now consider the various political parties of Tamil Nadu to be goading Sri Lanka’s ethnic strife from a safe distance so that they may milk it for electoral capital; this, too, is ineluctable. I met all these contentions in various forms, time and time again, and I learned that a tone of apology was the best and most honest response.

I was, in a sense, a victim of my country’s rotten diplomacy. It might be possible to argue – although this isn’t the place for it – that India’s foreign policy toward Sri Lanka has been the most disastrous such sustained policy it has ever run. Admittedly, these were, and are, deep and complicated waters. But India repeatedly made the cynical mistake of presuming that it could have it all. It resembled the gambler who backs every single horse in the race, and while that may minimize harm at the Kentucky Derby, it doesn’t quite work the same way in geopolitics.

When, in the 1980s, a clutch of Tamil militant groups in Sri Lanka were beginning to roughhouse among themselves for supremacy, Indian intelligence agencies covertly trained members of several of these groups in locations across north India. (In black irony, one of the Tiger cadre who came to Nainital for a stint was a woman with the nom de guerre of Dhanu, who would, a few years later, strap on a suicide vest and blow up Rajiv Gandhi.) At the same time, trying to preserve hearty bilateral relations with Colombo, India hosted and trained soldiers from Sri Lanka’s army. Later that decade, India would airdrop food and medicine parcels into besieged areas of Jaffna, until it agreed, under the terms of the Indo-Sri Lanka Peace Accord of 1987, to stop aiding the insurgents and send in a peacekeeping force.

The true history of the Indian Peace Keeping Force’s operations in Sri Lanka is still waiting to be written, but its human rights record has been frequently called into question. In seeking now to root out the Tiger insurgency, the Indian Peace Keeping Force has been accused of killing civilians; it certainly goaded the remaining splinters of rival Tamil outfits to inform on the Tigers. (I have heard several people from Jaffna tell me that they saw, firsthand, summary executions by the Indian Peace Keeping Force. “I was standing at a bus stop, and the troops came around, asking for one guy. They found him in a shop behind the bus stop. They dragged him out, shot him there, and asked the bystanders to dispose of the body,” one man said.) But it also alienated the rest of Sri Lanka to such an extent that, in a bizarre rearrangement of fealties, the Sri Lankan government is rumored to have armed and funded the Tigers for a brief spell, to fight the Indian Peace Keeping Force more effectively.

It was perhaps only with the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi that India’s formal stance became unequivocal, but even then, the central government had to contend with a sort of informal foreign policy being run out of Tamil Nadu. Tamil parties still invoked the ties of blood that bound their constituents to the Tamils in Sri Lanka, and as they began to play stronger roles in coalition government at the center, they were able to undermine official foreign policy. Money continued to flow out of Tamil Nadu and into the pockets of the Tigers. The war ended in curious fashion, with India implicitly (and, some say, materially) encouraging the army’s drive to extinguish the Tigers, even as Tamil Nadu politicians assured the Tigers of their fullest support. Until the very end, the cake had to be both possessed and eaten.

The coda to this story lies perhaps in an acknowledgement of India’s sole singular act of diplomacy through this entire grisly process: the pressure to include, in Sri Lanka’s Constitution in 1987, a 13th amendment, which called for the devolution of some administrative powers to provinces and for recognizing Tamil as an official language. The spirit of that amendment is now in some danger of being crushed by the government of Mahinda Rajapaksa, but its essence of limited federalism still represents a wise middle path for Sri Lanka.

Samanth Subramanian, the India correspondent for The National, is writing a book about the Sri Lankan civil war.