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EUROPEAN UNION & THE TAMIL STRUGGLE
History of Intransigence
J.T. Janani
4 October 2006, Tamil Guardian
Comment by tamilnation.org
J.T. Janani is right to
point out that 'the difficulty for the Tamils is that it is not simply that
the Sinhala polity refuses to accept Tamils have a right “to
control their own lives, to rule their own destinies, and to
govern themselves” (in Richard Boucher’s words).
Rather, the problem is that the EU and the US, while paying
lip service to Tamil rights, pointedly avoid pressuring
Sri Lanka into ensuring these are respected and
institutionalised.'
Said that, we need to ask
the further question: why is it that the EU and US have
pointedly avoided pressuring Sri Lanka? When
the EU Resolution condemned 'the intransigence of
the LTTE leadership over the years, which has
successively rejected so many possible ways forward,
including devolution at the provincial level or
Provincial Councils; devolution at the regional level or
Regional Councils; as well as the concept of a
federation with devolution at the national level' was
the EU unaware of something which Professor Marshall
Singer said more than a decade ago -
"...One of the essential elements that must
be kept in mind in understanding the Sri Lankan ethnic conflict is that,
since 1958 at least, every time Tamil politicians negotiated some sort of
power-sharing deal with a Sinhalese government - regardless of which party
was in power - the opposition Sinhalese party always claimed that the party
in power had negotiated away too much. In almost every case - sometimes
within days - the party in power backed down on the agreement..." - (Professor
Marshall Singer, at US Congress Committee on International Relations
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific Hearing on Sri Lanka November 14,1995)
Was the EU unaware of the
Report Prepared by Princeton University for the Center
for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), in June 2004?
"In our view, resolution of the
Sinhalese political party struggle is the top priority. This
conflict—whatever the merits of the arguments—is selfish in the
short-term and self defeating in the long-term. The country is
ready for peace. The LTTE is ready to continue negotiations. The
world cannot understand why Sri Lanka does not move ahead to
peace.."...Securing Peace: An Action Strategy for Sri Lanka
- A Report Prepared by Princeton
University
for the
Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), June 2004
The EU and the US are not
stupid. They are not asleep to the facts that stare them
in the face. They simply pretend to be asleep. They
pretend because they seek to prevent the emergence of
an independent Tamil Eelam. They see an independent
Tamil Eelam as a threat to the
uneasy power
balance in the Indian Ocean region.
"On April 11, 2005, India started a strategic partnership
with China, and, on June 29, 2005, signed a 10-year defense agreement with the United States. Western observers,
however, have paid less attention to an ambitious Indian move in the
military field: Project Seabird. This plan - with origins from the mid-1980s - is to be
assessed in light of two geopolitical triangles juxtaposing on the
Indian Ocean's background: U.S.-India-China relations and
China-Pakistan-India relations. In this complicated geopolitical
configuration, New Delhi is not simply a partner of China or the
United States: India is emerging as a major power that follows its
own grand strategy in order to enhance its power and interests...The China-Pakistan-India triangle is more than
ever the Arabian Sea's decisive geostrategic setting. For the Chinese, this trilateral relationship is crucial for
two reasons: from the point of view of energy security, the
Arabian Sea and Pakistan are Beijing's access points to the
oil-rich Middle East; from the perspective of military security,
Pakistan provides China an effective counter-balancing partner
in front of India's ambitions." [see also
1.
From "China fear" to "China fever"
- Pallavi Aiyar, Hindu, 27 February 2006; 2.
China undertakes construction of Hambantota Port,
11 April 2005; 3.
China, Sri Lanka Joint Communique
, 3 September 2005 and
4.
Sethusamudram
Project ]
Why has devolution of any form not happened
already, almost sixty years since independence and thirty
years since Sri Lanka’s war began?
Ulf Henricsson, the outgoing Head of the international Sri
Lankan Monitoring Mission (SLMM) said in exasperation
recently that the European Union’s decision to ban the LTTE
was “more a high-level decision made in the cafes of
Brussels” than a considered move based on an understanding
of the prevailing situation. The same could be said of the
European Parliament’s
September 2006 resolution, which makes sweeping
assertions about Sri Lanka’s conflict.
Paragraph nine of the twenty-six paragraph resolution, for
example, says with suitable indignation, that the EU
“condemns the intransigence of the LTTE leadership over the
years, which has successively rejected so many possible ways
forward, including devolution at the provincial level or
Provincial Councils; devolution at the regional level or
Regional Councils; as well as the concept of a federation
with devolution at the national level.”
Any reasonably informed observer of the history of Sri
Lanka’s ethnic politics would have been struck by the sheer
lack of nuance in the statement. Not only for disregarding
the widely-recognised complexities that underpin conflicts
such as Sri Lanka’s, but for contemptuous brushing aside of
the deep rooted grievances that Tamils of successive
generations have been attempting to seek redress for.
My first point is that the EU, whilst making sweeping
assumptions about the LTTE and the Sri Lankan state, doesn’t
answer what, if you take the logic of the resolution at face
value, is an obvious omission in it: the government of Sri
Lanka could have at any time in the sixty years since
independence legislated into existence some devolution of
power to the island’s minority communities.
In other words, the approval of the LTTE is not needed for
Sri Lanka to roll out ‘devolution at provincial level or
provincial councils or devolution at the regional level or
regional councils or federation.’
Indeed, the Sri Lankan constitution allows amendments to be
made to it provided there is the backing of two thirds of
the 225 seat Parliament - which the Sinhala majority easily
has.
In other words, the Sinhala people can legislate any
devolution, with or without the support of the Tamils or
Muslims’ MPs.
Assuming, as the EU Parliament’s resolution does, that the
Sri Lankan state is keen to implement devolution, why has it
not done so, either in the Sinhala south and/or in the Tamil
north?
Surely it does not fear that the Tamils will rise up in open
revolt if they are offered some part of their fundamental
rights? I am not saying they will necessarily settle for
what Colombo doles out, but surely no one expects an
uprising if devolution is unilaterally rolled out?
My second point concerns the European Union’s perception of
what the Tamils are entitled to politically – and, by
extension, what they think of the Tamils. Whereas all the
major international state actors have now conceded that the
Tamils have ‘legitimate political aspirations’ to manage
their own lives, none of these actors have called for Sri
Lanka to begin implementing any measures towards devolving
power (though there are occasionally some feeble calls for
‘language rights’ to be respected).
In June 2006, for example, US Assistant Secretary of State
for South and Central Asian Affairs, Richard Boucher stated
pointedly that Tamils “have a legitimate desire to control
their own lives, to rule their own destinies, and to govern
themselves in their homeland.” His sentiments have since
been echoed by other US officials and those of other
countries.
Well and good. But neither the EU or, for that matter, the
US have as yet used their considerable leverage over the Sri
Lankan state to bring about any political reform and
devolution.
In theory at least, as argued above, there is no reason why
such reform needs the buy-in of the LTTE or, for that
matter, the Tamils to be implemented. Devolution need not
therefore await the outcome of negotiations with the LTTE
even.
But instead of pushing for the institutionalisation of
Tamils aspirations (i.e. rights), far too many international
actors focus instead on the LTTE’s disarmament as an
unstated pre-condition for the Tamils to get their rights.
Which comes back to the original question: why has
devolution - of any form - not happened already, almost
sixty years since independence and thirty years since the
war began?
The fact is, the EU assertion that the governments of Sri
Lanka have been willing to make genuine offers of
powersharing to the Tamils is a patently false one.
At no point since independence have the Sinhala people made
a genuine offer of power sharing to the Tamil people. I say
Sinhala ‘people’ deliberately, referring to a broader base
than just the ruling political party, to one that truly
encompasses other institutions of the Sinhala collective –
including the Buddhist clergy.
From the outset of the war, no Sinhala government has taken
up devolution with any seriousness (i.e. to the extent of
overcoming Sinhala opposition to push it through).
Meanwhile, the history of Sri Lanka’s ethnic relations is
punctuated by a series of pacts for power sharing struck
between the representatives of the minority Tamils and the
majority Sinhala.
Yet each and all of those pacts have been abrogated after
being signed. And they have been torn up by the Sri Lankan
government due to pressure either by the Sinhala opposition
or by influential forces such as the Buddhist clergy.
And many of these double crosses occurred well before Tamil
militancy began smouldering in the 70s. These include the
Bandaranaike-Chelvanayagam (‘B-C’) pact of 1956 and the
1965
Dudley- Chelvanayagam agreement. Both were unilaterally annulled by the
government.
The Provincial Council concept of the Indo-Lanka Accord of
1987 was never implemented properly amid the JVP era
bloodletting.
The LTTE, it should be noted, was not party to that deal –
which neatly lumbered India with the unenviable task of
disarming the Tigers - anyway.
In any case, the North-East Provincial Council (encompassing
what the Accord calls the ‘historical habitation of Sri
Lankan Tamil speaking peoples’) is likely to be dismantled
by the Supreme Court shortly, given that the present
government’s ally, the JVP, has filed a case towards this.
Even in the late nineties, the government of President
Chandrika Kumaratunga, long the darling of the international
community, claimed it could not get the 2/3 majority in
needed to amend the constitution (though when it came to
extending the President’s term, a cosy arrangement between
the Supreme Court and her office was quickly reached).
And so it is again this year. The two main Sinhala parties
are talking, but the third, the JVP, is already mobilising
against any possible ‘concession’ to the Tamils. The path
behind Sri Lanka’s present crisis is littered with wreckage
of broken deals and ignored offers. Even the tsunami failed
to shift Sinhala intransigence. The P-TOMS tsunami aid
sharing deal, which was much lauded by the EU, no less, was
neatly crushed through the Supreme Court by the JVP (whilst
the other Sinhala parties simply forgot about it).
The difficulty for the Tamils is that it is not simply that
the Sinhala polity refuses to accept Tamils have a right “to
control their own lives, to rule their own destinies, and to
govern themselves” (in Richard Boucher’s words).
Rather, the problem is that the EU and the US, while paying
lip service to Tamil rights, pointedly avoid pressuring Sri
Lanka into ensuring these are respected and
institutionalised. Indeed, paragraph nine of the EU’s
September 2006 resolution could have just as easily have
insisted the Sri Lankan state do just that.
Assuming these are rights, rather than concessions, that is.
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