Asked why US-led resolutions at the UNHRC were increasingly harsher, the US Deputy Assistant Secretary noted that five years after the war ended there had been little progress on issues related to accountability and a political solution to share power with the island’s Tamil community.
“Five years since the war ended I have not seen any meaningful negotiations of the very tricky political issues related to federalism,” Keshap asserted.
As the illustration above shows the Sinhala leaders have no incentive to cater to Tamils or Muslims. And TNA or Tamils don’t gain anything by moving their position to the right of the scale. Are the Muslims also in their own distribution that is not aligned to the two above? If so, do they overlap more with the Sinhalese or with the Tamils?
There is nothing Tamils or Muslims do or say that will convince the Sinhala median voter to move to the left to meet them halfway as the median voter theorem dictates.
We are very concerned because this surely should not happen to any citizen in this country, irrespective of whether he is a Sinhalese, a Muslim, a Tamil, a Burgher, a Malay or whatever.
Third, power has been decentralized. If Iraq survives, it will probably be as a loose federation, with the national government controlling the foreign policy and the army, but the ethnic regions dominating the parts of government that touch people day to day. Rwanda hasn’t gone that far, but it has made some moves in a federalist direction. Local leaders often follow a tradition of imihigo — in which they publicly vow to meet certain concrete performance goals within, say, three years: building a certain number of schools or staffing a certain number of health centers. If they don’t meet the goals, they are humiliated and presumably replaced. The process emphasizes local accountability.
by Nimmi Gowrinathan, “The Washington Post’ Monkey Cage, June 16, 2014 Kim Yi Dionne: This guest post by political scientist Nimmi Gowrinathandraws from her earlier research and ongoing analysis of gender and violence in Sri Lanka. **** Muslim or not, women are hiding indoors in many parts of Sri Lanka today. Rumors that a bus full of members… Read more »
“They finished the Muslims in this area,” said M. Farina, who added that the police watched impassively Sunday evening as Buddhist mobs attacked Muslim shops and homes…
The Rajapaksas are hoping to consolidate the Sinhalese majority vote, which is about 75 percent of the country, by demonizing minority Muslims and Tamils, said Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu,
Angelina Jolie and British foreign secretary William Hague are hosted the Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict Luke MacGregor/Reuters Raj, a 25-year-old Tamil student, is watching a play, “Unlocked,” about three young male victims of rape. One of the actors is playing a character based on him. Even though he is in London, thousands… Read more »
TULF’s letter to Indian PM Rajeev Gandhi on 13th Amendment – TULFs_disappointment_with_13th_Amendment_Bill “We feel it our duty to also express our disappointment with the proposals to solve the Tamil problem contained in the two Bills – the 13th Amendment to the constitution and the Provincial Councils Bill – presented to Parliament by the Sri Lanka Government…. Read more »
Abuja (AFP) – Nigeria’s military indicated on Thursday that it could follow the example of Sri Lanka in fighting terror, to bring an end to an increasingly deadly insurgency by Boko Haram militants. Related Stories Nigeria military studies Sri Lankan tactics for use against Boko Haram Reuters A high-ranking military delegation from the South Asian island… Read more »
by M.K. Eelaventhan, June 11, 2014 Modi’s thumping victory stunned the world including Rajapakses. They Consoled themselves when Modi obtained the majority government not depending on Jaya who would have spared no stones unturned increasing enough pressure to listen to her demands including Eelam Tamils’ issues. However, this is also a blessing in disguise as she… Read more »
In the context of the Tamil Eelam liberation struggle, when a “micronarrative” discourse about gender, caste, region or other “special interest groups” claims autonomous status, “when it divorces itself from the primary contradiction between the Tamil nationalist metanarrative and the Sri Lankan state, it only ends up fracturing a resistance movement against genocide,” argues Karthick… Read more »
Text of the Memorandum presented by Selvi J Jayalalithaa, Hon’ble Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu to Shri Narendra Modi, Hon’ble Prime Minister of India on 3.6.2014 II. SRI LANKAN TAMIL ISSUE There are very strong sentiments amongst Tamils and in Tamil Nadu on a range of issues relating to India’s relations with the present regime in… Read more »
The Rohingya gave us the names of some Buddhists who they said had been leaders in slaughtering Muslims, and we visited one of these men they named. A 53-year-old farmer, he denied any involvement in the violence, but it was an awkward, tense conversation, partly because the Buddhists are angry at aid groups and journalists for (as they see it) siding with Muslims. Their narrative is that Muslim terrorists from Bangladesh are invading the country, overpopulating so as to marginalize the Buddhists, and then being coddled by foreigners.
My assessment is that political ideology will not play much of a role in deciding Modi’s foreign policy towards Sri Lanka. The critical factor will be Modi’s policy towards US and China. If Modi wants to take India even closer to the US and be a part of the US ‘Pivot to Asia’ project then there is reason for Rajapaksa to be worried.
The post-war Rajapaksa meta-narrative is aimed buttressing the connection between the majority ethno-religious community and the country’s new rulers. It is premised on three main myths – the myth of eternal national insecurity, the myth of miraculous development and the myth of the infallible hero-king. The three myths reinforce each other; in confluence they create and sustain the socio-psychological soil necessary for the new Rajapaksa dynasty to take root and flourish.
SriLanka_NPC_Resolution_22May2014_English SriLanka_NPC_Resolution_22May2014_Tamil —- The recent resolution by the Northern Provincial Council requesting assistance from India and Tamil Nadu governments. The following resolution was tabled by the Council Member Hon M.K. Shivajilingam and adopted by the Northern Provincial Council in Sri Lanka on May 22, 2014 RESOLUTION Calling upon India to provide Tamil speaking doctors, and teachers for… Read more »
by Frances Harrison, ‘Huffington Post,’ Los Angeles, May 20, 2014 New photographs have emerged five years after the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka showing the aftermath of government attacks on a United Nations food distribution centre inside the war zone. The pictures, shot by a Tamil working for the media unit of… Read more »
by Ryan Goodman, ‘JustSecurity.org,’ May 19, 2014 Monday, May 19th marks the five-year anniversary of the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war, which claimed the lives of 40,000 to 70,000 civilians in its “catastrophic” final phase. In 2009, Congress asked the State Department to report on the humanitarian law violations during the war, and those reports make for gruesome reading…. Read more »
TNA Statement on Diaspora Ban The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) wishes to unequivocally condemn the recent action taken by the Government of Sri Lanka to designate several Tamil diaspora organisations and individuals under Gazette Extraordinary No. 1854/41 of 21 March 2014. This Gazette notification was issued under the United Nations Regulations No. 1 of 2012… Read more »
Yet events in Sri Lanka five years ago or in the Central African Republic today show that genocide has not been consigned to history.