SANGAM.ORG
Ilankai Tamil Sangam, USA, Inc.
Association of Tamils of Sri Lanka in the USA
by Roger Gnanaindran, Tamil Mirror, August, 2006
|
The cumulative effect of the big powers’ apathy towards the persecution of the Tamils by the Sri Lankan state has been the ever-increasing human rights violations by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamils. |
Reams of paper have rolled off the printing mill on human rights violations in the international sphere by various bodies of the United Nations. The international community, led by the United States of America, the European Union, Japan and others, never fails to din into the heads of Third World countries the necessity of upholding Human Rights as a cornerstone of Democratic principles, both where these principles are practiced and where they are not. Sanctions, embargoes and whatnot have been imposed on regimes where Human rights are being systematically violated.
Surprise upon surprise, Sri Lanka has escaped any form of punishment, despite the worst forms of violation by any country in the world. The international community failed to care enough to read the Report of the United Nations Human Rights Commission for the years up to 2001. If they had read it, they would have observed that Sri Lanka gained the dubious distinction of being the second country with the most number of Human Rights disappearances following Iraq.
Did these violations elude the nimble minds of the international community of did they disregard these atrocities on purpose?
To answer this question, it is the geo-political interests of the big powers, especially the United States, that has forced the hands of others to follow suit and consider Sri Lanka with a benevolent attitude. In addition, Sri Lanka is supposed to be a Democratic country, which means going to the polling booth and voting parties in and out of power on a regular basis, despite Sri Lanka’s black history on Human Rights violations, commencing in June1956. The Tamils do not come into the political picture because of their minority representation, and they have no say in the decision-making process of the island.
For the benefit of the non-Sri Lankan community in Canada, it is worth mentioning the fact the Sri Lankan state has openly encouraged its police and armed forces to unleash violence on the ethnic Tamil minority, by way of Murder, Rape, Arson Robbery and every imaginable atrocity that a warped mind could formulate. Anti-Tamil pogroms occured with clockwork regularity in May 1958, 1961 (on a minor scale), July-August, 1977, 1979, (in Jaffna) June 1981 and July-August, 1983. The victims of state violence have unfailingly been the minority Tamils.
The reason for the anti-Tamil nature of the abuse is that the police and the armed forces are manned exclusively by the majority Sinhalese, who are empowered by the state to use their guns against Tamil civilians, supported by the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act . There has been no such thing as Human Rights - or, for that matter, rights of any dimension - for the minority Tamils, which has resulted in severe discrimination in the educational, economic and social fields .
To top it all, the abject failure of the prevailing political system effectively shut out the Tamil race from gaining any foothold in the nation-building process and kept them as second class citizens devoid of rights. It is the failure of the political system to protect the Tamils that ultimately constrained the Tamil youths to take up to arms to defend the Tamil community from complete annihilation.
The failure of the political system is completely lost sight of by western bureaucrats, politicians and the like when dealing with the ethnic violence that has wracked the country for the last sixty years, eluding a solution. The historical and cultural differences between the majority Sinhalese and the minority Tamils have widened to a chasm that it make it well nigh impossible to find common ground.
The stock solution that is offered by the so-called western experts to solve the ethnic conflict between the majority Sinhalese and the minority Tamils has been to condemn Tamil youths for defending Tamil rights and the Tamil land, albeit with the power of the gun, on one hand, and to offer the democratic way of peaceful negotiation on the other. These so-called 'peaceful' negotiations have failed the Tamils miserably for the last sixty years, because the Tamils have been deceived by the Sri Lankan state time and again, leaving the Tamils high and dry. The international community, especially the big powers, have never been sincere or serious enough to find a solution to the political problems faced by the Tamils. They have, instead, embarked on the negative voyage of banning the LTTE, the only movement that has been fighting for the liberation of the Tamil race from continued oppression by the Sri Lankan state.
The cumulative effect of the big powers’ apathy towards the persecution of the Tamils by the Sri Lankan state has been the ever-increasing human rights violations by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamils.
The International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) strongly condemns the killing of 17 local employees of the French humanitarian organization Action Contre la Faim (ACF) in the town of Muttur, Trincomalee district, Sri Lanka. "We are appalled at what happened to the ACF staff. This was a deliberate attack on a humanitarian organization that was doing valuable work for the people of Muttur,"said Yvonne Dunton, head of the ICRC's sub-delegation in Trincomalee in a press released issued Monday evening.
Amnesty International has pointed out that under the current 'state of emergency,' security forces are given wide powers of arbitrary arrest and detention under the pretext of action against terrorism. Such powers are abused by the security forces in Sri Lanka and there have been innumerable abductions, illegal arrests, detentions and disappearances.
It is deplorable that the international community, which condemns violations of human rights by non-state sectors, is quite apathetic to state terrorism. State sectors have a greater responsibility and accountability for their activities because they are expected to follow democratic principles in their process. Such apathy in the face of state terrorism is a subtle approval by the international community of the excesses indulged in by the security forces of the state. The calculated silence by the international community, especially the big powers, over state terrorism is a signal that has encouraged the security forces in Sri Lanka to continue their violence with impunity.
I give here below a few incidents that have happened in Sri Lanka and the response by the International Community (big powers), to establish the partiality shown towards the State or the majority Sinhalese community, in comparison to the apathy shown towards the minority Tamil community.
Incident 1 - 5th January, 2000
Kumar Ponnampalam - He was the December, 1982 Presidential Election candidate representing the Tamil community in Sri Lanka, and received 1,750,000 votes. A leading Civil Rights Lawyer, an Alumnus of Cambridge University, England, son of G.G.Ponnampalam, an important Tamil leader, who himself was a one time Cabinet Minister and the foremost Criminal Lawyer in Sri Lanka.
Kumar Ponnambalam was assassinated by a member of the former President’s Security Division, named Avishka Perera alias Beddagama Sanjeeva .
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 2 - 12th August, 2005
Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister – Lakshman Kathirgamar was killed by a sniper at his residence in Colombo.
Response: Joint condemnation of the LTTE by the big powers
****
Incident 3 - 25th December, 2005
Joseph Pararajasingham, one of the leading Tamil members of Parliament representing the Batticaloa District from the TULF, was killed right inside a Catholic Church by Sri Lanka’s Army Intelligence, just as he was receiving Holy Communion from the Priest on Christmas Eve.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 4 - 25th March, 2006
An attempt was made on Sri Lanka’s Army commander, Lt.General Sarath Foneseka’s life right inside Army Headquarters, by a supposed pregnant woman suicide bomber.
Response: Joint condemnation of the LTTE by the big powers
****
Incident 5 - 7th May, 2006
Tamil civilians were readying for a Hindu temple festival in Manthuvil East in the Chavakachcheri area. Around 1:10 am, the villagers heard the sounds of eight gunshots. The villagers then hurried to the temple site on seeing the unusual movement of an armored vehicle (Buffel APC) around about 4.00 am. Thereafter, eight bodies of the persons who had been shot and killed were detected in the shrub jungles near Kapputhu in Vadamaradchy.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 6 - 13th May, 2006
Sri Lankan Navy personnel with members of the paramilitary group known as the E.P.D.P. entered the house of Sellathurai Amalathas in Aallaipiddy at about 8:30 pm, and opened fire on the sleeping family, killing 8 persons including a four -month-old baby and a four-year-old boy
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 7 - 15th June, 2006 A claymore mine exploded close to a bus carrying 150 Sinhalese civilians in Kebitigollawa in Vavuniya District killing 65 and injuring 75.
Response: Joint condemnation of the LTTE by the big powers
****
Incident 8 - 20th June, 2006
The biggest Catholic church in Sri Lanka, situated in Pesalai, Mannar, was desecrated by innocent blood being shed in it when Sri Lanka Navy personnel attacked the church full of refugees, killing one and wounding several. Earlier in the day, 5 innocent fishermen who were working besides their boats had been gunned down by Navy personnel.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 9 - 28th June, 2006
The Jaffna office of the Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission (SLHRC) issued a communiqué to the effect that the number of civilian disappearances after detention by the Sri Lankan Army in the Jaffna peninsula since December, 2006 has exceeded 160 persons.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 10 - 5th August, 2006
Sri Lankan army personnel massacred 17 Aid workers (16 Tamils and 1 Muslim), working for the French Aid agency ‘ Action Contra la Faim’ (ACF) in Sampur in Trincomalee District. These workers were aiding the victims of the December, 2004 Tsunami. It is reported that they were ordered to line up and then were shot at point blank range
Response: Agitation and condemnation by France only
****
Incident 11 - 14th August, 2006
61 school girls were killed and 129 wounded when Sri Lanka's Kfir jets bombed a children’s home compound in Mullaitivu District where they were attending a residential course in First Aid.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
****
Incident 12 - 20th August, 2006
Rev. Fr. Thiruchelvam Nihal Jim Brown, age 34, the parish priest of Allaipiddy, along with a lay person, Mr. Wenceslaus Vincent Vimalan, age 38, who accompanied the Priest, were last seen at the army checkpoint seeking permission to enter Allaipiddy to say Sunday Mass. Thereafter their whereabouts are not known. It is appropriate to mention that Rev.Fr. Brown was instrumental in arranging for a judicial inquiry on the massacre in Allaipiddy and it is believed that interested persons may have been responsible for his disappearance.
Response: Deafening silence of the big powers
It is the primary responsibility of the big powers which lead the world not to apply an 'impartial' standard of judgment on human rights violations by so-called democratic Third World nations whom they favor for parochial gains and another set of rules when non-state entities are concerned, or else the social fabric of the world society will disintegrate into chaos.
© 1996-2024 Ilankai Tamil Sangam, USA, Inc.