The Parasites

By Tisaranee Gunasekara -

March 28, 2013 

“The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants…” Camus (Resistance, Rebellion and Death)

The Rajapaksas are imposing the superstructure of a prosperous, developed nation on the base of an underdeveloped, cash-strapped economy.

The Rajapaksas are antagonising every single ethnic and religious minority inSri Lanka, simultaneously.

The Rajapaksas are loosing friends and isolating the country internationally.

Any one of these strategic mistakes would suffice to undermine Lankan stability and security. The harm the confluence of all three can do toSri Lankaand all her people would be unfathomably immense and unimaginable various.

Previous governments were not immune to these mistakes, but none committed all three, all at once. Their simultaneous occurrence is a function of familial rule, of the measures implemented by the Siblings to promote dynastic needs and satiate megalomaniac desires.

The Rajapaksas are parasitic rulers; they can grow and thrive only by sucking the nation dry, of its resources, potential and friends.

In his Mattala Address, President Rajapaksa tried to justify his regime’s proclivity to borrow. The problem is not debt per say, but how the borrowings are used. Under Rajapaksa Rule money is borrowed to maintain a gargantuan military in peace time, to create infrastructural monstrosities unnecessary/damaging from a national/popular perspective, to service existing debt. There is very little income or employment generation and negligible forward or backward linkages in these unproductive uses; they just burden the country with a growing herd of white-mammoths.

To sustain the unsustainable, the Rajapaksas are implementing a policy of extortionist-taxation; people are milked dry via indirect taxes. Refuelling at the Mattala Rajapaksa Airport will be done at cut-rates while fuel prices are hiked-up nationally. The proposed electricity hike will reportedly impose a 53% increase on the lowest users (up to 30 units)[i] and a relatively low 22% increase on the highest users (400 units and above). This is just one more indication of how Rajapaksa economics imposes a disproportionately high burden on those at the middle/bottom of the economic totem-pole. For all the rhetoric, the Rajapaksa strategy is structurally biased towards the rich and prejudiced towards the poor and the middle classes. (The conspicuous consumption by a segment of the middle class is enabled not by an increase in household-income but by an increase in household-debt. This is another bubble which cannot last).

The anti-minority politics is partly aimed at creating a ‘feel good factor’ amongst the poor/middle class Sinhalese overburdened by the skewed Rajapaksa economics.

In the movie ‘Mississippi Burning’, the Gene Hackman character reminiscences about his racist father who killed the mule belonging to an up-and-coming black farmer and justified his crime by arguing ‘If I am not better than them (blacks) what good am I?’ The poor whites of the Jim-Crow South felt less discontented about their poverty because they were politically superior to even the most accomplished black. The Rajapaksas offer their Sinhala base an identical quid-pro-quo: the pride of belonging to the superior ethno-religious community as compensation for exacerbating economic pains. Once Tamils, Muslims and Sinhala-Christians are rendered lesser citizens, even the poorest Sinhala-Buddhist can forget his/her economic sorrows by wallowing in a sense of political superiority.

Such delusions can dull the hunger pangs, for a while.

Unjust Equilibrium

President Rajapaksa recently warned about attempts to scuttle peace in Sri Lanka. Indeed; and if he wants to see the faces of the culprits, he should look at his brothers and look in a mirror.

Last week, the President declared open a memorial of the Arantalawa massacre. The memorial included the statues of the murdered monks in their death-agonies. An Arantalawa-memorial could have been constructed without including those grotesque and hate-inducing statues. Clearly the purpose is to keep Tamil-phobia alive in Sinhala minds.

If there are no enemies, would the Sinhalese need the Rajapaksas?

Post-victory, the Siblings could have made an effort to win over Tamils. This could have taken the form of political concessions and/or a Marshall Plan type development-drive prioritising the housing, health, education, employment and poverty alleviation needs of the Tamils. Any act of sympathy and understanding in their hour of politico-psychological nadir would have gone a considerable way in healing the wounds of war and rendering the notion of a common Lankan future acceptable to most Tamils.

But intoxicated by Sinhala supremacism, cocooned in a Chinese embrace and confident of its capacity to deceive Indiaand the West ad infinitum, the Rajapaksas rejected the moderate path. Having won the war on a Sinhala-supremacist platform they saw little reason to depart from it in their moment of greatest triumph.

Cementing familial rule and building a dynasty were/are the Rajapaksa priorities. Devolution has no place on that agenda; nor do the minorities, except as bogies/enemies.

A recent speech by Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, at a ‘literary’ event, reveals the mindset which made the Siblings reject the possible path towards a consensual peace. According to this Rajapaksa-worldview, the war stemmed solely from Tiger terrorism, aided and abetted by Tamil nationalism, Indian interventionism and Western imperialism. Successive Lankan administrations did not make any errors (except that of being too-soft on Tamils); the Tamils have no specific grievances and thus require no ameliorative measures. Consequently devolution is an undesirable (perhaps even dangerous) irrelevance.

Mr. Rajapaksa depicts life in the ‘welfare villages’ in rainbow-hues; according to his version, these barbed-wire enclosures were oasis of plenty with free rations, cooperatives, banks, post offices, communication centres, schools and vocational training centres; There was capacity building, empowerment and career counselling for adults and ‘Happiness Centres’ for children, facilities for “arts, music, drama, yoga and sports… churches, kovils and mosques….. “.

The spirit of Theresienstadt is alive in Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, even if the name is unknown to him.

Today Sri Lankans can’t visit Tamil Nadu, not even to play cricket. A less coercive and more inclusive peace-and-nation-building strategy could have isolated the diehard Tiger supporters. If, for instance, the Northern provincial council had been up and running, subsequent to a free and fair election, the extremists in Tamil Nadu could have been weakened and isolated.

But it was not to be. Nor will it be, so long as the Rajapaksas rule.

Devolution is as antithetical to the Rajapaksa project as democracy or separation of powers. Devolution is as impossible under Rajapaksa rule as judicial independence or free and fair elections. The Siblings do not want to cede power to anyone or share power with anyone.

The notion of the enemy within, of the minorities as perennial Trojan Horses working to further Indian/Tamil, Western/Christian or Arabic/Muslim, is aimed at justifying Rajapaksa politics and explaining Rajapaksa economics. It is the cord which is expected to bind Sinhala-Buddhists to the Rajapaksas for evermore, despite economic woes and international isolation.

The Rajapaksa-cohorts of the BBS are now gunning for Muslim and Christian extremists.

Peace cannot survive in an atmosphere of fear and hate. Progress requires tolerance. Intolerant lands often deprive themselves of some of their most precious resources, when they alienate and exclude the ethno-religious other.

The Siblings are parasites, feeding onSri Lanka, to the common detriment of all Lankans.

Sri Lanka survived 30 years of Vellupillai Pirapaharan. She may not survive 30 years of Rajapaksa rule.

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[i] There will be a 47% increase for 30-60 units; 59% for 60-90 units; 54% for 90-120 units; 39% for 120-180 units; 37% for 180-210 units; 34% for 210-300 units – source Daily Mirroor – 27.3.2013

Midweek Politics: The Reconciliation Gap

By Dharisha Bastians -March 28, 2013 

Dharisha Bastians

A swashbuckling opening for the country’s second airport ahead of a vote on a US backed resolution against Sri Lanka could not quite take away the sting of defeat at the Human Rights Council in Geneva. Days later, warning bells sounded in Washington DC about an impending international war crimes probe if Sri Lanka fails to mount a credible investigation into alleged atrocities. The ruling Administration in Colombo is choosing to focus instead on keeping the memory of war and bloodshed paramount in the peoples’ minds

On 2 June 1987, the LTTE slaughtered 33 Buddhist monks and four civilians in cold blood in a remote jungle village in the Ampara District.  Thirty of the monks were novice priests, being escorted by bus on pilgrimage by their mentor, Ven. Hegoda Sri Indrasara Thera. After ambushing the bus the Tiger cadres went on the rampage, attacking the monks and four civilians travelling alongside with swords and bullets.The Tigers had hoped the attack on the sangha, would incense the Sinhalese community, whose Buddhist sensibilities would be deeply wounded by the atrocities against the theros, inciting them to reactionary violence against the Tamil population. It never materialized. But the Aranthalawa Massacre stands out in Sri Lanka’s separatist conflict as one of its most brutal and unforgiving moments.

Twenty six years later, a Buddhist Cultural Centre has been constructed at the site of the gruesome murders. It will be named in honour of the teacher monk, Indrasara Thero. But the commemoration does not end there. The site also features a ‘monument’ to the massacre, a gruesome sculpture recreated inside an old CTB bus that inartistically portrays the slain and bleeding monks. President Mahinda Rajapaksa who was in Ampara to declare open the Deyata Kirula exhibition last weekend, also inaugurated the Buddhist Cultural Centre and massacre monument in Aranthalawa, saying he hoped the memorial would foster amity and ethnic harmony between the communities. The President said the monument was not aimed at creating hatred between ethnic groups, but as a symbol of the futility of conflict. The President’s comfort level with the grotesque sculpture is understandable. Aides say a certain meeting room at Temple Trees, his unofficial residence, in which the walls are plastered with photographs of LTTE atrocities, bomb explosions and village massacres is a firm favourite with the President. As the ultimate conqueror of the Tigers’ reign of terror, in the island, the President Rajapaksa views these portraits of terror and death as a constant reminder of why he made the decision he did to defeat the LTTE militarily.

Provoking the living?                          Read More

'Censoring BBC Tamil Service, violates Tamil right to information' - RSF/JDS

27 MARCH 2013

The state-owned Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) has repeatedly censored its FM retransmission of the BBC’s Tamil-language broadcasts since 16 March, a day after the start of the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council’s latest session, which has been looking at the issue of war crimes in Sri Lanka.

“The replacement of the BBC’s coverage of the Human Rights Council’s activities by completely unrelated programming is a direct violation of the Tamil population’s right to information,” Reporters Without Borders and its partner organization, Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS), said.

“Those responsible for this censorship are also directly undermining the national reconciliation process, which has already been weakened by arbitrary control of news and information and by violence targeting journalists who try to cover this process.

“It is unlikely that the SLBC decided to meddle with the BBC’s programming on its own. Everything suggests that it was a political decision taken at the highest government level. We call for an investigation into this censorship and we warn the judicial authorities against any attempt to place sole blame on the SLBC.”

Disruption of the BBC’s Tamil-language service began the day after the Human Rights Council began its Universal Periodic Review of the situation in Sri Lanka on 15 March.

The SLBC replaced programmes about government responsibility for serious human rights violations during the 1983-2009 civil war. Reports about the political situation in India, especial the state of Tamil Nadu, were also censored.

After more censorship on 25 March, BBC World Service director Peter Horrocks announced the next day that the BBC was suspending retransmissions by the SLBC altogether.

“We regret the disruption in service to our loyal audiences in Sri Lanka, but such targeted interference in our programmes is a serious breach of trust with those audiences, which the BBC cannot allow,” Horrocks said.

The BBC previously suspended SLBC retransmissions on 9 February 2009 after registering 17 cases of interference with its Tamil-language programmes and eight cases of interference with its Sinhalese-language programmes between 27 November 2008 and the start of January 2009.

Ranked 162nd out of 179 countries in the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index, Sri Lanka is also on the Reporters Without Borders list of “countries under surveillance” for censoring news websites.

Sri Lankans can continue to listen to the BBC on the shortwave and on the Internet.

BBC Tamil:

25 meterband 11965 Khz 31 meterband 9855 khz 49 meterband 6135 khz 41 meterband 7600 khz

http://www.bbc.co.uk/tamil/

BBC Sinhala:

49 meterband (6135 kHz) 31 meterband(9615 kHz) 41 meterband(7699 kHz)

BBC World Service English content is broadcast on SLBC at GMT - 0300 to 0430; 1130 to 1230 and 1330 to 1430 (all GMT)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sinhala/

Sri Lanka: Probe into LTTE Crimes Should Start with Karuna

Karuna’s call for war crimes investigations should not allow him to airbrush out his own role in atrocities. His LTTE forces were implicated in some of Sri Lanka’s most horrific abuses, so the government’s long-stalled war crimes investigations might as well begin with him.

Brad Adams, Asia director

MARCH 28, 2013

(New York) – The Sri Lankan government should act on the call by a government deputy minister to investigate war crimes by examining his own role in serious abuses.

In early March 2013, Deputy Minister Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, known as Col. Karuna, called for war crimes investigations into the Tamil National Alliance, an opposition coalition of ethnic Tamil political parties, presumably because some members had links to the secessionist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Karuna was effectively the second-in-command of the LTTE and the head of its Eastern Province forces until he broke away from the group’s leader, Vellupillai Prabhakaran, in March 2004.

“Karuna’s call for war crimes investigations should not allow him to airbrush out his own role in atrocities,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “His LTTE forces were implicated in some of Sri Lanka’s most horrific abuses, so the government’s long-stalled war crimes investigations might as well begin with him.”

LTTE forces under Karuna’s command were directly involved in some of the worst crimes of Sri Lanka’s 26-year-long armed conflict, which ended in May 2009, Human Rights Watch said. In June 1990, 400 to 600 police officers who had surrendered to LTTE forces, many of whom may have been under Karuna’s control, were bound, gagged, and beaten. The LTTE then executed the Sinhalese and Muslim police officers among them. Karuna has admitted that the LTTE committed these killings in an interview with the BBC, but claims he was not at the scene. Under the legal principle of command responsibility, though, Karuna could still be criminally liable for the massacre even if he was not physically present.

In another case, in July 1990, Karuna’s forces stopped a convoy of Muslims traveling in eastern Batticaloa district and executed about 75 people, including women and children. In August 1990 Karuna’s forces killed more than 200 civilians in two incidents in Batticaloa district.

The LTTE widely recruited and used children as soldiers, which Human Rights Watch documented in a 2004 report, “Living in Fear: Child Soldiers and the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.” Karuna’s forces played a prominent role, routinely visiting Tamil homes to tell parents to provide a child for “the movement.” The LTTE harassed and threatened families that resisted, and boys and girls were abducted from their homes at night or while walking to school.

After Karuna broke away from the LTTE, his forces continued to operate with the complicity of the Sri Lankan government security forces. The Karuna group, as it was known, abducted children for use as soldiers in Sri Lanka’s eastern districts, taking boys from their homes, work places, temples, playgrounds, public roads, camps for the internally displaced, and even weddings. These abuses are documented in Human Rights Watch’s 2007 report, “Complicit in Crime: State Collusion in Abductions and Child Recruitment by the Karuna Group.”

The Karuna group eventually joined forces with the Sri Lankan security forces and helped push back the LTTE’s stronghold in the east. After that, Karuna entered politics. He has been a member of parliament since 2008. His party is part of the coalition of the governing United People’s Freedom Alliance. He is currently the deputy minister for resettlement.

“Karuna has enjoyed immunity for some of the worst atrocities committed during Sri Lanka’s long conflict,” Adams said. “His threat to initiate investigations against a political party is a cynical gesture aimed at silencing the opposition while denying his own responsibility for war crimes.”

At Last Diaspora Eelam Tamils Recognised To Vote On ‘Separate Eelam’

By Usha S Sri-Skanda-Rajah -March 28, 2013

Usha S Sri-Skanda-Rajah

The Tamil Nadu resolution is a cause for celebrations. It’s a reason to thank the students, the people, the State Assembly and Chief Minister Jayalalithaa for taking the Eelam freedom struggle to the next level – Kusal Perera would have to one day eat his own words.

At last the Diaspora Eelam Tamils have been recognized as a people deserving to be counted. That Eelam is our land and that we have a stake in restoring our land, the land of our birth, our homeland, the land we love and cherish, the land we had to flee and can’t go back to; the land that needs to be resurrected, that land that holds the ashes and remains of tens of thousands of our slaughtered dear ones, whose souls have to be appeased so that they may rest in peace.

We the Diaspora Eelam Tamils (not just Eelam Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka) have been recognized as a people deserving the right to vote in an UN Security Council sponsored referendum for a “separate Eelam”! The Diaspora Eelam Tamils have been looked at by our detractors, as people distant from Eelam who whilst residing in and enjoying the comforts of their adopted land, pontificate on the necessity for Eelam. The TGTEhas always maintained that Diaspora Eelam Tamils are part of the Tamil nation constituting a nation of people, as Prime Minister Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran would say: they are “two sides of the same coin”.

Today Tamil Nadu has re-affirmed that truth in a history making resolution. Even the Vaddukoddai resolutionpassed in 1976 that received an overwhelming mandate in the general election of 1977 included Tamils residing abroad.

Yes Tamil Nadu has spoken, ladies and gentleman. What couldn’t be achieved in a muzzled Sri Lankan parliament has been achieved in the Tamil Nadu State Assembly that represents more than 75 Million people. The Sri Lankan parliament’s 6^th amendment prevents Tamil MPs from ever talking about a separate Eelam. In the land of the pioneers of parliamentary democracy in Great Britain,Scotland is able to discuss separation but not inSri Lanka where democracy is merely a high sounding concept of little value.

I have said it and say it again, let the world be put on notice that Eelam is not a fallacy or a pipe dream but real.

Kusal Perera is a hypocrite when he says the “the call for Thamil Eezham outside Sri Lanka is a total disconnect with its irrelevance to Tamil Politics,” citing TNA leader Sambanthan’s statement about “building on the 13^th amendment,” with Kusal attempting to create the impression that democracy is flourishing Sri Lanka: “Genocide” can only be bandied about in the Diaspora and in TN, but will not be proved under a State, how ever undemocratic and racist the State is, when Tamil people participate in open electoral campaigns and elect their own representation for different tiers of governance. When they can invest and indulge in trade and business and have representations in business chambers as well. That is reason why democratic political parties of Tamil people in SL do not take up the call for a “referendum” and do not talk about “genocide” like those in the Diaspora and in Tamil Nadu,” he concludes in his patronizing style.

For all those people like Kusal who think parliamentary democracy works in Sri Lanka and Tamil representatives enjoy parliamentary privilege and have the freedom to express their deepest aspirations and concerns, I say to him and the rest to go back and examine their conscience without blurting out misleading notions and making hollow claims on Sri Lankan democracy. I ask him what happened to the proposals made by the Tamil representatives at the talks after the talks held at the APRC that the TNA wasn’t called to attend and the UNP refused to attend. How many more talks does Kusal want before he can be convinced that these talks are not going to go anywhere?

Again for all those people who stupidly raise the fact that a huge chunk of the Tamil population lives in Colombo like Kusal does, I say why not, that’s the capital ever since for heavens sake and yes many of them have been living there for generations like my own family, when the country was called Ceylon and not Sri Lanka, others who may belong to the recently displaced people who have moved to safer ground; all of them are still Eelam Tamils, they may remain in Colombo or decide to live in Eelam, that should be their choice. This is not unusual in countries that have separated.

The Tamil Nadu Assembly’s resolution moved by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa calling for a “referendum on a separate Eelam among Tamils in Sri Lanka and those who have migrated abroad,” have made Diaspora Eelam Tamils ecstatic.

It’s a cause to celebrate and to thank the Tamil Nadu students, people, the State Assembly and CM Jayalalithaa. Nobody not even the likes of Kusal can deny the tide in Tamil Nadu is going to destroy his own notions about the students and reiterate the importance of the Tamil Nadu factor.

Tamilnet reported the passage of the resolution as a “historic move:

“In a historic move, the Tamil Nadu State Assembly on Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution for bringing in arrangements at the level of the UN Security Council to conduct a referendum among Eezham Tamils in the island as well as in the diaspora on the question of Separate Eelam. In addition, the resolution passed at the Tamil Nadu Assembly demanded the Government of India to stop calling Sri Lanka a friendly country. The resolution also included the earlier demands ie., Independent International Investigations on Genocide and War Crimes as well as imposition of economic sanctions on Sri Lanka. The resolution, unanimously passed, was moved by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Ms Jayalalithaa. Passing the resolution, Chief Minister Ms Jayalalithaa also urged the students of Tamil Nadu to end their current agitation and to return to studies, with the hope of winning their aspirations in the near future.”

All those detractors and non-believers of the Eelam Freedom cause are not going to be pleased including Kusal who represents the educated Sinhalese, some of whom have been my friends but have left me because for what I believe. They are going to call this a meaningless exercise that would not impact Sri Lanka. I disagree. I think that it’s going to have a huge impact among the people that matter in the corridors of power not to mention in the Indian centre of power.

The student protest is not merely a “solidarity campaign” as Kusal squabbles; it’s creating uproar in Tamil Nadu political circles and has the propensity to shake the Indian government from under its feet, like never before.Indiathe arbiter of theTamil National question cannot ignore the ground swell of support for a referendum call from Tamil Nadu.

Prime Minister Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran’s words ring true when he says in his article ‘Geneva Resolution: Not A Victory  For Tamils, But A Defeat For Sri Lanka’, that “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.” Achieving Tamil Eelam he says rests on “Tamil Nadu (successfully) engaging the Indian government”: “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.”

Cynics like Kusal deny everything, except that they have a bad regime in power in Sri Lanka and want to “use” us to effect a regime change in Sri Lanka; that’s all they want, their love for us ends there; they deny that the tens of thousands of Eelam Tamils who were mercilessly wiped out was genocide and genocidal acts have been systematically and structurally perpetrated against Tamils in Sri Lanka ever since independence; I have in my opinion  piece, ‘Sri Lanka’s Genocide: Major Cover-up must be Exposed’, made the case for genocide, citing authorities including providing proof of intention that would have to be decided in international courts; in addition I have backed my arguments from quotes from Prof Boyle “who represented two associations of citizens within Bosnia and was involved in developing the indictment against Slobodan Milosevic for committing genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in Bosnia and Herzegovina.”

Kusal also denies our right to a referendum on Eelam, and raises examples like South Sudan without any arguments to support his conjecture, where there is no denying that the case of South Sudan has many similarities to Tamil Eelam (including an Al Basher in Sudan and a Rajapaksa in Sri Lanka). In fact in my article INDEPENDENT TAMIL EELAM – THE FINAL DESTINATION I speak of the arrangements for the South Sudanese Diaspora to vote: “Special arrangements were made for centres to be opened in the Diaspora countries including Canada for Southern Sudanese people living abroad to cast their vote.” I said, hoping one day it would be our turn.

Kusal goes even further and denies Tamils the right to self determination and calls it a “Marxist formulation”, and shamelessly promotes and gives a link to a pdf document that was published by two members of the APRC who decided that the APRC deliberations must come out in the open; whereas the final report that the Chairman of the APRC presented to President Rajapaksa recommending a new constitution that still preached a “unitary” system including the “preservation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Sri Lanka,” has become a worthless document, gathering dust somewhere waiting to be shredded.

Kusal has to be reminded that as recently as a few weeks back Great Britain held a referendum among the people of Falklands to decide if they wished to remain with Great Britain. Everyone from David Cameron was calling on Argentina to respect the wishes of the people of Falkland to stay with Britainon the basis of their right to “self determination.” May I also remind Kusal that Argentina refers to Falk lands as Malvinas, so his refusal to accept the 1987 merged NorthEast provinces as Eelam would not deter Eelam Tamils from pursuing Eelam and invoking the right to self determination that is “recognized in international law and is mentioned as a key component in many United Nations Treaties and Declarations.” I suggest Kusal reads my article, ‘Why Tamils of Tamil Eelam Deserve Self Determination:

Pakiasothy Saravanamuthu of ‘The Centre for Policy Alternatives’ has also commented on concepts such as ‘self determination’, as not relevant, which I strongly contest. He was also the man who came and preached in Canada that “the Tamil Diaspora’s contribution to the Tamils in the NorthEast should solely be directed to “development”.

The cynics of “Eelam” are of different hues and persuasions both local and foreign. Some show sheer ignorance and some our constantly in denial mode.

I am talking of people who all want to push some sort of a political solution down our throats.

And these ideas that they fancy are thrust upon us Eelam Tamils whilst our aspirations, most specifically our inalienable right to our homeland are ignored, denigrated and even sneered at.

There are the Sinhala apologists who have this patronizing attitude that they can dictate to Tamils what they should accept as a form of political solution. Then there are some governments, should I say neighbouring or neighbourly governments, who have special and vested interests: geo-political, strategic and or commercial; and even some well intentioned rights groups pursuing their own causes; all of whom want to give their mostly unsolicited views on what is our due.

The same old archaic 13^th Amendment (plus, minus or plus plus, heaven knows what they mean), the APRC that never saw the light of day (as I explained earlier), that most insincere, “devolution to the provinces” mantra and yet other forms of delaying tactics are repeated by these folks that’s nauseating to hear and pathetic to say the least.

Worst still there are some extremist forces, I would say a significant lot and mind you from the government who think Tamils deserve absolutely nothing that the whole island belongs to them and Tamils have to pay obeisance to Sinhala Buddhist Supremacy and accept Sinhala Buddhist hegemony and resign themselves to second class status.

Words such as “peace” “reconciliation” and “accountability” are bandied about by some although fully recognizing in their own minds that it is has no meaning in the Sri Lankan context. These words are especially down right disingenuous coming from a Sinhala government that keeps claiming that it has to be given the time and space to come up with “homegrown solutions”, yes time and space to come up with nothing, I would say.

The US sponsored resolution itself still harps on these very words. But soon “governments of this world” as Prime Minister Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran envisages in the same article mentioned above, “will have  to accept  the establishment of an independent state of Tamil Eelam on the basis of remedial justice,” for genocide. Surmising that “while knowing the truth, these governments want to confine the problem within the boundaries of their own preference,” he sets out the strategy that Tamils must center on:

“….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.”

The Tamils and the TGTE would continue to engage the governments of the world together with their brethren in Tamil Nadu towards achieving their aspirations of an independent Eelam.

To those who say the Sinhalese have endured more than 30 years of terrorism, I say Tamils have endured Sri Lankan state terrorism, anti-Tamil state policies and systematic and structural genocide ever since independence. I have always maintained we need a rare breed of Sinhala statesmen who don’t play the racist card to emerge with a new narrative. It is for the Sinhala government to think what their next positive forward looking step should be as a response not only to the US resolution that expects certain obligations to be discharged by Sri Lanka but also the Tamil Nadu resolution that calls for a referendum on a separate Eelam.

*Usha S Sri-Skanda-Rajah- Chair, TGTE Senate

'A mechanism to monitor Sri Lanka`s human rights is needed'

Mar 28, 2013
Alan Keenan is the Sri Lanka director of theInternational Crisis Group (ICG) whose recent report outlines a consolidation of power in Colombo, calling for an international response to an apparently authoritarian turn. Speaking withSameer Arshad, Keenan discussed a growing lack of accountability, pressure on the judiciary and minority groups — and the steps he thinks the international community must take:

According to the ICG, how is Sri Lanka`s consolidation of power impacting the process of post-war reconciliation?

There is no process of reconciliation or accountability — the government has made no attempt to remedy the long-standing poli-tical marginalisation of Tamils. It has made it clear it has no intention to devolve meaningful power to Tamil and Muslim areas in the north and east. It has refused to acknowledge the terrible suffering of Tamils and the loss of civilian lives in the last stages of the war, focussing only on the sacrifices of government troops.

Also, it has refused to conduct any independent investigations into alleged war crimes by government and LTTE forces or other violations of human rights suffered by members of all of Sri Lanka`s communities. The further concentration of power in the Rajapaksa family and the executive, achieved through the impeachment of the chief justice, will make reconciliation and accountability even harder.

What does such a situation mean for minority rights?

The rights of Tamils and Muslims are under grave threat. Tamils have long suffered from a denial of their collective right to self-rule within a united Sri Lanka as well as from a regular denial of many of their indivi-dual civil and political rights. These problems have continued and, in some ways, grown worse since the end of the war.

Unfortunately, Muslims, generally treated better by the government, have now come under sustained attack by extremist Sinhala Buddhist groups. Unless the government takes decisive action, there is a real danger of communal violence against Muslims.

What prevented Sri Lanka from complying with the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) March 2012 resolution on reconciliation and accountability?

The lack of political will. Our report demonstrates that the Sri Lankan government has repeatedly refused to live up to its promises to the UN secretary-general, the UNHRC, the Indian prime minister and ministers of external affairs, the US secretary of state, Tamil political leaders — even their own Sinhala political constituency.

What international res-ponse does the ICG now seek?

All governments and multilateral organisations with ties to Sri Lanka must review their relations and use whatever leverage they have to communicate to it the urgent need for tangible reforms. The UNHCR should also vote to establish an independent international investigation into alleged war crimes by both sides. Ultimately, what`s needed is a sustained mechanism for monitoring the human rights situation in Sri Lanka. All those who care about rights, protections and sustainable peace in Sri Lanka are hoping the Indian government will support this.

In addition, the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group should formally consider the case of Sri Lanka and insist that the government restore the independence of the judiciary in order to be allowed to host the next heads of government meeting (CHOGM) in November — if the commonwealth fails to take this action, member states should downgrade the level at which their officials attend CHOGM.

Beyond Geneva

Editorial Tamil Guardian 27 March 2013

The UN Human Rights Council resolution on Sri Lanka last week rightly invoked mixed sentiments. On the one hand, the passing of the second resolution in two years and the advocacy efforts that accompanied it underlined that Sri Lanka remains firmly on the international agenda and that the coalition of state and non-state actors pursuing accountability for the slaughter of tens of thousands and continuing rights abuses is expanding. On the other hand, the quest for consensus on the Council, and in particular the support of India, resulted in a significant weakening of the resolution’s force and the introduction, as Delhi’s pound of flesh, of elements deeply antithetical to the goals of accountability and justice, and injurious to the political aspirations of the Tamil nation.

For these reasons the resolution has elicited a range of Tamil responses, from a disgusted rejection to an enthusiastic welcome. Across the various responses, however, there is clear agreement on two things: that accountability for the mass killings of 2009 is a foremost demand of the Tamil people, and that this can only be secured through decisive international action. The futility of the Council’s call on the Sri Lankan government to investigate the systematic atrocities committed by its forces, and its extending of another chance to do so, is well recognised by all those campaigning for accountability, as well as by Sri Lanka’s allies. It is aptly captured by the title of Amnesty International’s 2009 study of Sri Lanka’s history of sham inquiries: ‘Twenty years of make believe’. As underlined by Colombo’s hysterical rejection of even this flawed resolution, only an independent international investigation can ensure genuine and credible accountability. As such, the gains of the diplomatic horse-trading in Geneva are Sri Lanka’s, but the price will be paid by the Tamils in the island.

The UNHRC resolution is but a moment in the protracted struggle to ensure accountability and justice for some of the worst mass atrocities of this century. As the United States Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Michele Sison, put it, “life does not stop on 21 March.” In that sense, the events of the past few weeks hold a number of important lessons. Firstly, it is clear that support for the goal of accountability for Sri Lanka’s genocidal violence against the Tamils is growing across the world. Nowhere is this more demonstrable than in India, whose government did the most to shield Sri Lanka in Geneva. The spontaneous mass protests by university students, the efforts of Tamil Nadu’s major political parties, the coverage by the country’s mainstream media and the voices of many others reveal the depth of support. Moreover, as Tamil and international campaigners in Geneva found, the resolution has the support of many countries, including some not presently on the Council. In short, international action has more popular support than ever before.

Secondly, however, the search for a multilateral international effort on accountability cannot be pursued solely through the UNHRC or other fora that accord Sri Lanka’s allies de facto vetoes. Rather, as we argued ahead of the 22nd session, the international community should now also actively explore other mechanisms and modalities. International institutions are not necessary for acting in concert.

Meanwhile, as demonstrated again in Geneva this year, even when fully cognisant of the horrific atrocities inflicted on the Tamil people, even states espousing principles of democracy, liberal values and the rule of law will readily sacrifice these in tactical, if mistaken, calculations. India and Australia are examples. As Australia and other ‘receiving’ states will see, refugee flows will not be stemmed by ‘security’ collaborations with murderous regimes. As India, Britain and other members of the international community will discover, no amount of ‘friendly gestures’ will secure the cooperation of a nationalist, triumphant and paranoid state.

Sri Lanka well knows the campaign for accountability will never cease and neither will the Tamils reconcile themselves to Sinhala hegemony, no matter how intense the repression. And, as has been the case from the outset in the seventies, it is Sri Lanka’s repression that will continue to ensure Tamils’ aspiration for independent statehood remains undiminished. Sri Lanka’s conduct in the Tamil homeland even as the wrangling continued in Geneva makes clear that the island’s crisis will intensify in the coming months and years. The ramifications will be felt internationally - what these are, however, depends on whether or not the international community takes decisive action against Sri Lanka.