by Tamil Guardian editorial; originally published December 18, 2003
Bloody Past -The ‘disappeared’ remain a fundamental issue
Though guns in Sri Lanka’s protracted ethnic conflict have been silent for over two years, the legacy of many bloody years remains. Last Wednesday the issue of ‘disappearances’ was highlighted yet again when a human rights organisation held a commemoration for nearly 52,000 missing people, demanding punishment of the guilty and compensation for their families. The Organization of Parents and Family Members of the Disappeared (OPFMD) says the number comprises 44,000 Sinhalese who disappeared during the second Janatha Vimukthi Perumana (JVP) insurrection between 1987 and 1992 and some 8,500 people, mostly Tamils, who went missing in the North and East provinces since 1995. This is by no means the totality of the atrocities. As the OPFMD warns, “there are no proper records of the disappearances that took place before 1987 in the South or the disappearances in the North and the East before 1995.”
The numbers, whilst staggering, are entirely in keeping with the ferocity of the violence unleashed by the Sri Lankan state in both theatres. Moreover, whilst the slaughter in the late eighties was carried out under the United National Party, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) has governed from 1995 till the fighting stopped in December 2001. Meanwhile, the state’s military machinery has remained, politically appointed senior commanders aside, essentially the same. As international human rights repeatedly argue, the key to halting disappearances, is ending impunity. The OPFMD protests “nearly 3,000 perpetrators – mainly military personnel – have gone without any punishment or cases against them.” But neither of Sri Lanka’s main Sinhala parties have even countenanced a serious investigation of the military. With good reason. The atrocities, whether bloody massacres in scorched-earth counter-insurgency operations or torture and murder in military custody, were tacitly or, on occasion, overtly sanctioned at the highest levels of political office.
It could be argued that the ending of the JVP’s insurrection (when the military decimated the organisation’s ranks and support base) and the halting of the ethnic conflict (through Norwegian brokered negotiations) have curtailed the military’s excesses anyway. But the issue is essentially one of justice and the accountability of the state. And it is therefore at the heart of the ethnic question. On what basis are the Tamils to accept the authority of a state which, purely as a consequence of their ethnicity, has readily violated their human and civil rights and which, moreover, is not prepared to acknowledge its crimes or offer legal redress?
Dec 18, 2003