Tamils - a Trans State Nation..

"To us all towns are one, all men our kin.
Life's good comes not from others' gift, nor ill
Man's pains and pains' relief are from within.
Thus have we seen in visions of the wise !."
- Tamil Poem in Purananuru, circa 500 B.C 

Sri Lanka denying medicine is a crime against humanity

Robert Hughes M. P., Harrow West,
former Minister of Public Service

Thank you very much indeed. It's an enormous pleasure to be here and thank you for inviting me to speak at this very important conference. I would start off by making it clear that I am not nor do I claim to be an expert about Sri Lanka. I've never been to Sri Lanka and I would like to but my interest comes from a different route.

My interest comes from my friends, parents of my children's friends at school and from constituents who've been to see me that I have met with either formally or socially and it's the desperation with which they express their fears about their relatives back in Sri Lanka and I guess that desperation, that daily fear about what might be happening to your loved ones and friends but back in Sri Lanka is something that probably you all have in common in this hall today. It is not something that anyone who is a representative politician of any party should or could ignore and so that's why I started to get interested in what's going on in Sri Lanka. And I think the perception of what's going on is quite wrong.

Christine, when she was speaking talked about the perception of the Tigers as pursuing a terrorist organisation and that is one of the problems. That there is a tendency through ignorance to assume that the Tamil Tigers are simply a terrorist organisation in the same way as the IRA or anybody else or they're apologists.

When rather than being terrorists in my view, in my judgement that they are fighters trying to protect their homes, wives and their children. And they should be judged in no way differently from the people in Israel who fought like lions sometimes outnumbered 25:1 because they knew that if  they didn't, their children in Tel Aviv and Haifa would be killed by the Syrian Army if they let them get through. And let's be quite clear that the behaviour of the Sri Lankan government over a long period has been an absolute disgrace and let's just take a microcosm of it, let's just look at this could be regarded as trivial but again I suspect that the people in this hall know exactly what I am talking about.

Let's look at the way the Tamil people are treated. When they go to the Sri Lankan High Commission trying to get a passport, visa or anything else! Ignored, rude to let us not reply to. I've written and I've have assurances from the High Commissioner that letters of mine have been passed on back to Colombo and that my constituents will receive the visas. Do they hell receive the visas? They are stuck because the High Commission in  London can't be bothered to represent the people who come from Sri Lanka who are Tamils.

And trivial in one sense that might be compared with the war that has been prosecuted but it gives you a clear indication of the attitude of one community in Sri Lanka to the other. I think that this is a problem that the Common Wealth should grasp.

 I hear what Christine says about the United Nations. The United Nations is I guess is patchy. I have to say that whatever work was done by the United Nations in El- Salvador is no co-incidence that the guerrilla fighters in EI-Salvador decided they would give up. When the Soviet Union collapsed and they hadn't got any money to buy arms any more. I mean that is no co-incidence at all. So I don't think we should overestimate the power of the United Nations.

But here perhaps is something that the Commonwealth can do. I mean I was second I have to say reading reports that are Commonwealth heads of government conference when quite rightly they castigated Nigeria, quite rightly they suspended Nigeria from the Commonwealth. It is right to condemn Nigeria the way Nigeria treats its own people and the way they have treated journalists and the disgraceful executions that have gone on. But should Sri Lanka be sitting in judgement about Nigeria?

And what I'd like to see is the Commonwealth turning its attention to that country and there are three demands that I have and they broadly echo what Christine was saying because plainly there are no party differences in this country about this. This is a problem that has to be grasped whatever the government is and whoever we are. I mean the first one is that she said - free movement for the press and television.

Let's get the television cameras in there. Let's see what's going on. Let's see whose word is right and wrong. Let's see whether you can believe what the Sri Lankan government authorities are telling us is going on. I think we all know the answer to that. But let's have the evidence in frontof the television cameras and by unbiased journalists. And let's see what's the effect is of the denial of the medicines. I mean people are dying were reported on Sun Rise Radio yesterday for the wants of medicines.

And I am not criticising Christine, she was merely reporting the fact of what the Sri Lankan government was saying but denying medicines to children for military reasons; that is against the Geneva Convention, it is something that Sadam Hussein may be accused of but the Sri Lankan government does not yet stand for the crimes; denying medicines to children who are dying as a result of it is something the world as a whole should and must condemn.

And so it's here I'm jumping slightly forward to in what I want to say but here is something that where the British government I think can play a part and it is something that I have once discussed with Linda Chalker, the Overseas Aids Minister and I assure you I will be discussing with her again before parliament resumes. And that's the very simple matter that aid that is designed to go to the Tamil population should go to the Tamil population and not be channelled through the Sri Lankan government where it is diverted, and probably sold for profit. The fact is the people who need it aren't getting it. And I do think that the world community either acting in concert or individ

ual countries acting unilaterally could put some of that right by making sure that the aid goes to where the aid is needed and perhaps one of the things I wanted to discuss with Foreign Office Minister is the way in which perhaps some of the extremely well formed Tamil population in this country could inform the British government privately about just how that aid could get to where that aid is needed. I won't ask you to discuss that today.

The third thing is the International observers. It has to be headed by somebody and Mary Robinson is of course a respected figure as Christine Oddy indicated but I want real observers in there. I want people who've got their own armed guards with them, the SAS if necessary. I want people who can travel freely around Sri Lanka and see what's going on and report it back to the International Community. So the three demands - the press and the television in, the food the medicines and the shelter going to where they should go and thirdly that the International Community observers with free movement should be allowed into every part of Sri Lanka.

And I just want to say one thing about the British government's stance. I don't expect nor am I looking for a publicly different stance from the British government. I understand the whole business of diplomacy. I understand that they want to keep everybody in play and doubtless those of you of my constituents are written or representatives who've written to their own MPs who have seen the standard answers from the Foreign Office Ministers about keeping all sides in play, I don't criticise these answers. I understand them.

That the British Government must be there to be able to talk to both sides and try to bring both sides together. Of course that is right. The question is what is being said in the meetings. What's being said behind closed doors, I mean are they getting the same Riot Act read to them as the South African government used to particularly by Linda Chalker and some of the bankrupt governments in the front line states used to get the Riot Act read to them by Linda Chalker. Never publicised but we all know and they have been gracious enough to admit that she came there and told them the blunt truth. Well, I hope that British Ministers are telling the blunt truth to Sri Lankan Ministers when they meet them in private and that's what I'm going to be asking them to do when I meet with British Government Ministers.

And lastly I simply want to say this that things are getting urgent. Your conference is well timed and I suppose actually to be fair it'd be well timed whenever you had it. But yesterday last night we had the news of the new bombardment of Tamil positions which started yesterday. And of course the news that substantial numbers of young people are dying, young girls are disappearing being taken for the reasons that young girls in wars tend to be taken and their families when they complaining are disappearing as well. And of course the many refugees that are going to India - I gather 2,000 last month.

The army is gaining ground in Sri Lanka. Although they are losing many soldiers and so the war is finally balanced but many many thousands of people many of your relatives and friends are suffering on a day by day basis. I regard this an urgent matter and it's something that I'll discuss as a matter of urgency with the relevant government ministers when I'm able to meet them at length at our party conference in Bournemouth. When I meet them at our conference that's what I'll be discussing with Ahem. I hope we can get some movement on this and start to allay your concerns and your concerns I know will only be allayed when the reality starts to be different in Sri Lanka we are able to stop the dreadful slaughter, bloodshed and depravation that is going on there day by day and I'll do what I can.