“It seemed I knew this earth too well to feel its heave and its revulsion
Expel my half ingested being from its twisted guts---
So wrote Dutch Burgher Jean Arasanayagam, married to a Hindu Tamil and left homeless in the 1983 attacks on Tamils in Sri Lanka.
She was prophetic-
"It's all happened before and will happen again
And we the onlookers
But now I'm in it
It's happened to me
At last history has meaning "
Two decades, some years later, over 70,000 had no time to feel the heave and revulsion of the earth they called home. They were completely ingested into a dark abysmal womb, blank eyed wondering why? Over 300,000 look on from behind barbed wires, history taking on meaning for them but the rest of us, onlookers, all flipping on to yet another chapter in history.
Yet brick by brick, year after year, generation after generation, those now dead and those relegated to a fenced destiny for who knows how long, reminded constantly that they are Tamils and must be punished for the sins of their brothers in race not even blood – built on the back of their hard labour, the mainstay of an economy they are now struggling to be again part of.
After Independence, income from plantation products – constituted more than 70 per cent of Sri Lankan export earnings. Many of the Tamils exported from India by their then colonial ruler Britain, to work on tea plantations bore the brunt.
Post independence many steps were taken by the Sri Lankan government that alienated the minority Tamils not least among them being the Ceylon Citizenship Act-1948. Other measures, to name but a few : changing the demographic balance in the east to favour the majority Sinhalese and making Sinhala the sole official language of the country.
This blog is not about evoking sympathy for the violence that some of the Tamils and especially the LTTE used to draw the attention of the world to their plight. India lost Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi to that violence. He was awarded a gruesome death at the hands of the LTTE, for his efforts at brokering – through the Indo –Lanka accord, a power devolution treaty as also official status for Tamil language. However the treaty did not find favour with either the Tamils or the Sinhalese.
This piece is about being able to enter into a dialogue about the two sides of a coin. Excesses of the LTTE are no secret– but there is no smoke without fire. In 1983 when thirteen Sinhalese soldiers were killed, Sinhalese in the south went on a rampage and voter lists were used to systematically locate the homes of Tamils.
Today once again we stand mute, powerless to challenge China or even its satellite state Sri Lanka. The 1997 arms deal between Sri Lanka and China is no secret. That China has played a pivotal role in Sri Lanka's civil war must be acknowledged by those battering the Tamils genuine aspirations. Cessation apart(that is just not permissable) they must be given due recognition and place in Sri Lankan society and economy.
Hapless civilian populations being curtailed in refugee camps encircled by barbed wires -these are not the LTTE but people torn asunder. Fresh from the wounds of witnessing assault by both the LTTE and their own government, they await a tougher journey even as they mourn their dead ones.
And even those that have no sympathy for those that now cry isolated tears - watch out- we – all of us by our mute spectatorship are sowing the seeds of a problem that shall erupt –someday.
Consider the nearly three hundred thousand recently displaced people, mostly Tamils, living in abysmal conditions behind barbed wars. Not far away another nearly five million Afghan refugees biding their time in Pakistan and Iran. Add to these the nearly two million Pakistani refugees within Pakistan fleeing fighting in the SWAT valley.
Add to this the list of people displaced by climate change, floods, earthquakes and even poverty and hunger. Add refugees from conflict torn Africa and put the jigsaw together. It’s indeed a mind boggling man made problem being made more and more complex even as we speak.
My belief that the refugee issue, be it due to war, environmental displacement or bad governance and poverty, is going to be a major international issue is growing. So is the belief that the United Nations institutions looking into human rights and refugee issues need to be given more teeth. To my understanding the very structure of the International organisation acts as a speed –brake to its often lofty intentions. Backing from China and its growing number of satellite allies is more than enough to absolve in fact honour those that stand in the box.
This is reinforced by recent developments in Sri Lanka. Powerful backers of Sri Lanka like China have on Wednesday managed to defeat a resolution calling for investigations that the Tigers prevented civilians from leaving the conflict zone, and that government forces used heavy artillery on the densely populated conflict zone and killed rebels trying to surrender.
In-fact the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted Wednesday a resolution which praised the government of Sri Lanka for its commitment to human rights, while condemning the Tamil Tiger rebels. The resolution, tabled by Sri Lanka itself and other nations, including China.
This, despite the fact that the UN office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported aid groups are not being given complete access to the displaced persons camps.
Wonder where the United States is on all this. Perhaps it’s standing on loose moral ground, not having been able to bring to task violations of human rights in some parts of the world. In its absence, China has taken the high moral ground. Oh, it has its own backyard to protect --
The writing is loud and clear on the wall.
European countries, along with Canada, Chile and Mexico had backed a probe, and also urged Sri Lanka to fully open up refugee camps to international aid agencies. Even the International Committee of the Red Cross which usually does not criticise publically is complaining that the Sri Lanka government denied it access to the war zone in the final weeks of the conflict. The Red Cross has also been barred from visiting some refugee camps.
The world has no sympathy with the LTTE. However are we getting confused here between the displaced voiceless Tamils and the LTTE? Are we creating the right circumstances to create another LTTE from among the wounded and the pained?
An emboldened Sri Lanka has warned the world not to give shelter to fleeing Tamil refugees.
“War is an internal matter and does not warrant outside interference”, says China
Yet what makes me sad is the attitude of India in all this. India must speak out and let China know that this is no more just a Sri Lanka – China problem. Refugees are filtering into India and she is the country to be most impacted by the influx of the refugees. Not just now- thousands poured from Sri Lanka into its southern state of Tamil Nadu even way back in the 1980’s. Why are these Tamil refugees not being sent back to Sri Lanka?
Sri Lanka says it is going to sort the refugee problem- going to rehabilitate them. How? With a fiscal imbalance and foreign currency reserves just enough to buy a month worth of imports, facing a balance of payment crisis, who in a global recession will give Sri Lanka the money to rebuild not just its own economy but also rebuild the battered northern and eastern provinces . Till then what happens to the refugees?
Perhaps here is where China will extend further support. A stretched IMF and a doubly stretched United States has left the field open for China. In fact China is Sri Lanka’s most important donor. Economic interests aside, strategic interests are playing a vital role here. China already has surveillance vessels in the Indian Ocean.
India wake up! You are hemmed in – flanked on all sides by problem States aligning around a powerful emerging superpower.
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