Ending the war with dignity for all...........!!!

Ending the war with dignity for all

JEHAN PERERA

A rearguard action is being fought out of Sri Lanka and in the Tamil diaspora to halt the further advance of the Sri Lankan military into the last remaining pocket of LTTE-controlled territory, designated as a civilian safety zone by the Sri Lankan government. For a moment it appeared to have yielded a result. President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced a government decision to observe a no-fire period on the eve of the Sinhala and Tamil New Year which is a symbol of cultural ties that bind the two communities. The President expressed the hope that civilians trapped in the safety zone would move out during the pause in fighting. However, the LTTE rejected the government announcement as "aimed at deceiving the International Community and the Tamil people."
In designating a part of its territory as a no-fire safety zone the Sri Lankan government expressed its commitment to the protection of civilians. Unfortunately, this very zone became the LTTE’s chosen battlefield when they chose to move into it with their heavy weaponry. It is in this context that those who have taken up a more even handed approach, especially in the international community, have been calling on both the government and LTTE to declare a humanitarian pause in the fighting to permit the evacuation of the civilians still remaining in the safety zone. As the LTTE has very clearly been holding back the civilians any mass movement of civilians out of the safety zone will require LTTE consent, which implies a need for negotiations with them.

Over the past several weeks there have been large scale demonstrations by members of the Tamil diaspora in foreign cities, including Oslo, and many statements have been issued calling on the Sri Lankan government to call a ceasefire to safeguard the civilian population living in the LTTE-controlled safety zone. The demonstration in London brought together over 100,000 members of the diaspora. But few if any of these diaspora Tamil-led demonstrations and statements have denounced or even mentioned the LTTE’s role in keeping the civilians in the safety zones trapped there. Despite the massive efforts by Tamil people in the diaspora to get the international community to take more severe action against the Sri Lankan government, this is not happening. The international community is appalled by the LTTE’s use of the civilian population as human shields.

Evenhanded approach

There are some supporters of the LTTE and of Tamil nationalism who are not prepared to accept that the phase of achieving equal and self-determination rights for the Tamil people through war is over. They hope against hope that the LTTE can once again bounce back, to be a formidable fighting force on par with the Sri Lankan military. But this is no longer possible. The military machine that was built up over 30 years was lost in the past two years cannot be built back again. A further prolongation of the end phase will only lead to more human suffering, not to an amazing turnaround in the LTTE’s fortunes.

Tamil nationalism that sought equality for the Tamil people in the country and relied upon the fighting ability of the LTTE to shore up their bargaining power, now needs to come up with an alternative in the face of the loss of the LTTE’s military strength. With the government making it known that it will hold elections in the north soon, leader of the EPDP, Douglas Devananda, has argued that the resort to arms is not the only way in which to increase Tamil bargaining power. His own answer has been to join the government rather than to fight against it and to seek the Chief Minister’s position in the Northern Province whereby he can better extract resources for his constituents from the government.

According to the EPDP leader the argument about the need for arms for bargaining strength is only valid in the context of armed struggle. The LTTE missed the opportunity to convert its military strength into political strength on several occasions with no less than five governments that sought to negotiate with it. The two biggest opportunities that the LTTE missed came in the Indo Lanka Accord period in 1987-88 when India was directly involved in the design of the political solution and again in 2002-03 when Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe started dealing with the LTTE. All the supporters of the LTTE, both active and passive, in Sri Lanka and in the diaspora, who failed to advise the LTTE correctly, need to take responsibility for these squandered opportunities.

Way out

Some of the diaspora groups are now proposing a deal under which the LTTE may lay down arms. One proposal is that the laying down of arms should be accompanied by an agreement by the government to hold an internationally supervised referendum on the future of the northern and eastern provinces in those two provinces in the near future. Another proposal is that the international community should guarantee a political solution to the ethnic conflict in the manner that the US government prepared a roadmap on peace for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A third proposal is that the UN be given control over the safety zone to oversee the handing in of arms. At the present time these are simply proposals of sections of the Tamil diaspora on which there is no consensus either in the diaspora or in Sri Lanka, with a few supporters of the LTTE refusing to even admit military defeat let alone a laying down of arms.

These proposals may not be considered by the Sri Lankan government, which is victorious and is demanding unconditional surrender. On the other hand, they indicate a growing realization that the LTTE ought to lay down arms and cease fighting rather than take themselves and thousands of civilians to their deaths to no purpose by fighting to the last in the safety zone.

There is a tragedy in any kind of end that involves the deaths of so many, even if they largely be LTTE cadres and Tamil civilians who were forced to stay with them. The point is that the need of the future is reconciliation, which alone will sustain a political solution.

In an ethnic conflict, there cannot be unilaterally imposed solutions. The way forward therefore lies in the willingness of all parties to change their positions- in the LTTE agreeing to lay down arms and facilitating the movement of civilians to government welfare centres until they can be resettled in their home areas as soon as possible and in the international community and the Tamil diaspora urging the LTTE to permit the civilians to move out of the safety zone.
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