Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka &
Regional Security
Kumari Jayawardene
October/November 1987
Introduction
The Beginnings of the Ethnic Conflict
The Pre
Colonial Situation
The Colonial
Period
Sinhala
Buddhist Identity
Political Reforms
The
Tamil Factor in Politics
Regional
Dimensions
Government
Policies
Conclusion
Notes
References
Introduction
The violent ethnic conflict that has ravaged Sri Lanka for a
decade resulted in an agreement between the governments of Sri Lanka
and India - the `Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement - to establish peace and
normalcy in Sri Lanka' (signed on 29 July 1987) and the Provincial
Councils Act (providing for regional autonomy) passed in parliament
in November 1987. What has begun as an essentially domestic problem,
arising from a minority ethnic group's attempts to overcome acts of
discrimination and oppression, acquired over time a regional and an
international dimension; it had ultimately to be resolved by the
intervention of a regional power with the support of all the major
world powers, but with opposition from both Sinhala and Tamil
militants in Sri Lanka.
It is perhaps ironic that one of the most unfortunate ethnic wars of
recent times should occur in Sri Lanka, an island reputed to have
had a peaceful transition from `model colony' to stable Third World
state achieving international praise for its excellent quality of
life and democratic institutions. These were factors which made Sri
Lanka a `country of concentration' for several aid donors, and after
1977, increased private foregin investment. All these expectations
were seriously eroded by years of carnage and destruction when the
`emerald isle' of tourists literature turned blood red. The civil
war not only killed off thousand of innocent people (Sinhala, Tamil,
and Muslim) and brutalized civil society, giving rise to a climate
of chauvinist hysteria and intolerance, but also left in its wake
little alternative except outside intervention.
This paper, written close to 1987, will give a historical summary of
ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka, and trace the many ways in which the
conflict became a matter of concern in Tamilnadu, in India and
internationally, resulting in a swiftly concluded agreement between
the governments of India and Sri Lanka, over the heads of
combatants.
The
Beginnings of the Ethnic Conflict
The Pre
Colonial Situation
The peopling of Sri Lanka has been a continuous process of migrants
from India with indigenous and other earlier migrant groups
[Bandaranayake: 1985]. The Sinhala or Sinhalese (74%) constitute the
major ethnic group; the Sri Lankan Tamils, who inhabit the north and
east form 12.6% and the group known as Indian Tamils (19th century
migrants for work on plantations) 5.6% of the population. While
Muslims constitute the third largest ethnic group (7.4%), there are
also small minorities such as Burghers (people of mixed decent), and
Malays. All the major groups in Sri Lanka belong to a similar ethnic
mix of migrants from various parts of India, especially South India,
to which there have been Southeast Asian, Arab and European
admixtures. In spite of this, each ethnic group today has a distinct
identity with strongly held myths of origin; the Sinhala believe
that they are Aryans from Bengal, the Tamils claim pure Dravidian
origin, and the Muslims aspire to decent from Arabs.
The history of ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka is the history of
emergence of consciousness among the majority community, the
Sinhala, which defined the Sri Lanka society as Sinhala-Buddhist,
thus denying its multi-ethnic character. The growth of this
consciousness impinged on the minorities in Sri Lanka to the extent
that internal resolution of the problems become impossible.
The Sinhala dominated the country from about 5th century BC and
succeeded in establishing a kingdom with its centre in the North
Central Province of the island. The term `Sinhala' was first used to
indicate the royal family of the island, then extended to cover the
royal retinue and then further extended to include the people; this
social process dating to about the 6th century AD is simultaneously
the process of the ethnic consolidation of the Sinhala people.
[Gunawardena: 1984:55-107] The Sinhala kingdom which controlled the
entire island most of the time entered into relations both of
alliance and hostility at various periods with the Chola, Pandiya
and Chera Kingdoms of South India. There were frequent invasions
from these kingdoms, and also frequent alliances and intermarriage
of the four royal families. There were thus strong links with India,
especially South India. This long history of links with South India
is still present in popular Sinhala consciousness, with perhaps the
aggressive acts being best remembered.
In the 12th and 13th centuries, certain developments in Sri Lanka
determined its ethnic demography in a decisive way with effects that
have continued to the present {1}. The demographic distribution lays
down a territorial basis for the major ethnic groups; in the case of
the Tamils, the territorial concentration grew into a concept of a
`traditional Tamil Homeland'. This did not arise for Muslims since
they were scattered over the whole island, with a majority presence
in only a part of the Eastern province.
Religion also played a dominant ideological role in ethnic
consolidation. Buddhism, introduced from India in the third century
BC, became the religion of the Sinhala as well as the state
religion. Hinduism remained the religion of the Tamils. Apart from
the conversion of a section of both Sinhalese and Tamils to
Christianity during the colonial period, the congruence between
Sinhala and Buddhist on the one hand, and Tamil and Hindu on the
other, was total.
The Colonial
Period
Social and economic developments during the early colonial period
under the Portuguese and then the Dutch - commercialization of
agriculture, the registration of title to land, registration of
births and deaths, proselytization - contributed towards a freezing
of ethnic boundaries {2}. This meant in effect the consolidation of
the Sinhala community in the central and south-western parts of the
island and of the Tamil community in the north and on the eastern
seaboard. Economic developments during the occupation of the island
by the British gave rise to two other phenomena which made the
ethnic picture in Sri Lanka even more complex.
First, the coffee plantations established by the British in the 19th
century brought to Sri Lanka, as plantation labour, a population of
over one million Tamil workers from South India. These were at first
seasonal migrants but with the development of tea plantations the
majority became permanently domiciled on the plantations. The
question of their citizenship rights became an issue that
subsequently soured relationships between India and Sri Lanka.
Second, economic developments during this period were mainly in the
central and western areas of the island. This left the Tamil
community in a disadvantaged position. They sought to overcome this
by moving in large numbers to employment in the state services, in
the private sector and by entering the learned professions. This
process was helped by the growth of educational facilities in
English in the Tamil regions, particularly the Jaffna peninsula.
This meant not only that large numbers of Tamils migrated to the
southern and central regions for purposes of employment but also
that Tamil traders established themselves in these regions.
The opening up of the plantations transformed the economy of Sri
Lanka and created opportunities for indigenous entrepreneurs to make
large fortunes; some of them converted to Christianity and sent
their children to Britain for education. These filled the expanding
needs of the state services as well as the need for doctors,
engineers, lawyers etc. The local bourgeoisie thus created was
multi-ethnic, but predominantly Sinhala, with Burghers and Tamils
too entering the various professions and the state services.
The Sinhala bourgeoisie found its expansion constrained in various
areas. The main import and export trade was dominated by the British
and Indians and retail trade throughout the country by Muslim and
Chettiar traders. Sinhala traders could not break into these areas
because of a lack of access to finance which was controlled by
British bankers or South Indian Chettiars. The Sinhala professionals
and the educated "petit-bourgeoisie" also felt this competition in
so far as they had to vie with Burghers and Tamils for state and
private employment. Workers at their own level found themselves
confronted with migrant workers from Kerala and Tamilnadu as well as
with workers of indigenous minority groups. [Jayawardena 1986:
Chapters 3 and 5].
These barriers to their advancement were perceived by the Sinhala at
all levels as being caused by the non-Sinhala elements. To
understand why economic antagonisms should be perceived in ethnic
terms, one must examine the way in which the Sinhala asserted a
sense of national identity as the basis for winning political
reforms which would give them more power.
Sinhala
Buddhist Identity
In asserting a Sinhala identity and in legitimizing Sinhala control
of the country's polity, the leaders of the Sinhala revivalist
movement reconstructed an image of the Sinhala past using many
elements of the 'origin' mythology. The Sinhala, it was claimed,
were descented from Aryan migrants from Bengal in the fifth century
BC; the arrival of their leader, Prince Vijaya, in Sri Lanka
coincided with the death of the Buddha. It was claimed that the
Buddha in his infinite wisdom saw that his doctrine would be
preserved for 5000 years in Sri Lanka by these immigrants and their
descendents; he therefore visited the island three times,
consecrated it to his doctrine and on his death-bed instructed
Sakra, the chief of the Gods, to safeguard Vijaya and to ensure his
supremacy in the land. Thus Sri Lanka becomes the land of Sinhala
and the land of Dharma - the Buddhist doctrine. The belief was that
the survival of the Buddhist religion was dependent on the survival
of the Sinhala people; the people surviving as long as they espoused
the doctrine and controlled the land consecrated to the religion.
Thus the religion, the people and the land were bound together in an
indissoluble unity.
Such a revivalist ideology attempted to established a Sinhala -
Buddhist hegemony of the island antagonistic to non-Sinhala,
non-Buddhist groups. It is this Sinhala-Buddhist consciousness that
has resulted in the denial of the multi-ethnic and multi-religious
character of Sri Lankan society and in a refusal to accept the
collective rights of other minority groups. This consciousness was
counterpoised by its ideologues against the British imperial state,
which was seen as foreign and Christian; the revival was thus more
anti-Western than anti-imperialist, asserting a Sinhala Buddhist
identity against all foreigners and minorities. Over the last 100
years, it has been asserted against Muslims, Christians, Tamil
plantation workers, Malayalis and Sri Lankan Tamils. [Jayawardena
1986: 14].
Political
Reforms
The agitation spearheaded by the political reformers of the early
20th century was primarily intended to expand the scope and powers
of Legislative Council (unreformed from 1833 to 1911) by extending
representative government based on a limited male franchise; it was
conducted by the new stratum of merchant capitalists and
professionals who fought for the representation of these new class
interests in the political institutions. The British Governor
(following the old stratagem of divide and rule) had nominated
members to the legislature on the basis of ethnicity (Sinhala,
Tamil, Muslim and Burger); the agitation initially rejected
ethnicity as a basis of representation and served to bring together
the emerging bourgeoisie of all ethnic groups into a common front.
Even though this constitutional agitation did not penetrate far down
into population, it nevertheless presented a picture of ethnic
harmony with the first president in 1919 of the main political
organization, the Ceylon National Congress, being a Tamil, Sir
Ponnambalam Arunachalam.
The unity of bourgeoisie broke down over the question of ethnic
representation, more particularly after 1931 when the British
constituted a State Council with territorial representation based on
universal suffrage. These reforms of 1931 did not meet with the
favour of minority ethnic groups who believed the constitution would
ensure the dominance of the Sinhala majority; they argued, at the
least, for constitutional safeguards for the rights of minority
ethnic groups. However, the constitution was enacted in the face of
minority protests and minority fears were realized in 1936 when a
totally Sinhala Board of Ministers was chosen. One other result was
the emergence of ethnic based organizations. This was justified by
the Sinhala "Maha Sabha"'s leader, S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike, who argued
that, `surely the best method was to start from low rung; Firstly,
unity among the Sinhalese and secondly, whilst uniting to work for
higher unity, the unity of all communities'. Other ethnic groups
also set up similar organizations whose avowed purpose was to the
good of the particular group. However, the United National Party
(UNP), formed in 1947 in preparation for the first post-independence
election, included members of all ethnic groups, as did the Left
parties. Nevertheless all these fell prey at various times to
chauvinist tendencies that manifested themselves after Sri Lanka
gained its independence in 1948.
The United National Party took power after independence; among its
MPs were many of those who had been members of legislature before
independence and was, in its origin and intentions, a party
dedicated to the ideal of a plural Sri Lanka. It was also
representative of those elite groups that had grown up and prospered
under colonial rule. However, underneath the apparently smooth
surface of Sri Lankan politics, turbulent currents were stirring.
The Sinhala-educated intelligentsia reiterated the ideals of
Sinhala-Buddist resurgence not only against minorities but also
against the English speaking members of the upper class who wielded
economic and political power. Even the United National Party was not
immune from these influences. One of their first act was to define
Sri Lankan citizenship in a way that (in 1948) disenfranchized
plantation Tamil workers who had enjoyed the vote since 1931.
The UNP tried to maintain itself in power by adjusting to the
Sinhala nationalistic current. It even went back on a pledge to make
both Sinhala and Tamil official languages by agreeing to the policy
of `Sinhala Only'. But these moves were insufficient. In 1956, the
UNP was voted out and a coalition led by S.W.R.D, Bandaranaike came
to power in a landslide victory. This coalition represented mainly
Sinhala "petit-bourgeois" and rural elements and its dynamism was
supplied by the Sinhala intelligentsia, including Buddhist monks,
teachers and "ayurvedic" (non-Western) physicians. In its policies,
it was populist and radical and one of its first act was to replace
English by Sinhala as the only official language. Since English (the
language of the ruling class) had been spoken and understood by only
6% of the population, the move to Sinhala was democratic and
egalitarian, but it had the unfortunate effect of alienating the
Tamil-speaking part of the Sri Lankan society.
Popular opinion also saw the enactment of this language policy as a
means not only of reducing the position of Tamils in state services
but also of increasing the access of the Sinhala-educated to
prestigious jobs. Insistence on the knowledge of Sinhala as a
necessary requirement, quickly reduced the Tamil intake and, by the
late 1970s, Tamils were seriously underrepresented in terms of
ethnic percentages in the state services. [Abeysekera 1985:243]
The effort to achieve this kind of ethnic Sinhala hegemony was also
demonstrated in the field of education. Primary and secondary
schooling had generally been conducted in Sinhala and Tamil; the
scheme of using `mother tongue' was extended into the universities
in the 1950s. The free education scheme had resulted in an explosion
of the school-going population. Universities too expanded, but not
at the same pace; university places remained at about a fifth of all
those who qualified to enter. This created an intense competition
which government sought to answer in the 1970s by a system of
`standardization' for science students, whereby `the minimum entry
requirements for a Tamil student were higher than for a Sinhala
medium student.' [Bastian 1985:220] This was clearly discriminatory
and created the impression that the government, having deliberately
reduced the opportunities available to Tamil youth in government
service, was now bent on also denying them educational opportunities
in the prestigious fields of medicine and engineering. This was an
explosive grievance in a community that had long looked on education
as the main means of social and economic advancement {3}.
While discrimination against the Tamil-speaking people was growing
in the period after independence in the fields of employment and
education, there was another sphere in which the Tamil ethnic group
felt itself imperilled, that of land colonization. The north central
areas which had been served by an irrigation system had reverted
back to jungle. The British initiated a programme of repairing and
restoring these irrigation reservoirs and settling people in the
reclaimed areas. The peasants thus settled were mainly Sinhala from
densely populated south-western and central areas. This process was
accelerated after 1930 and soon Sinhala settlements began to appear
in the predominantly Tamil eastern province as well. This led to a
shift in demographic patterns; for example, in the Trincomalee
district there was an increase of the Sinhala population from 20.7%
to 33.6% in the period between 1946 and 1981. This process of
state-aided colonization was seen not only as a thereat to the
political status of Tamils in the affected areas, but also as a
threat to existence of the Tamils as a community with its own
linguistic and cultural identity.
All this took place in a context of violent riots against Tamils
which occurred with increasing frequency (1956, 1958, 1977, 1981 and
1983) and cultural vandalism such as burning down by soldiers of the
Jaffna library.
The
Tamil Factor in Politics
The Tamil ethnic group sought to counter this growing discrimination
by demands at a political level. Before independence, the Tamil
Congress unsuccessfully demanded balanced representation - 50% seats
for the Sinhala and 50% for the combined minority ethnic groups.
Later, in the face of continuing discrimination, a Federal Party
emerged which asked for a federal political structure that would
give Tamils a degree of autonomy in the areas inhabited by them, as
well as adequate represen- tation at the centre. It was in this
period of accelerated demands and rejection that Tamil political
leaders concluded in 1976 that only a separate state could ensure
the security and welfare of the Tamil people, a state carved out of
the northern and eastern provinces of Sri Lanka to be called Tamil
Eelam.
The main political parties were not totally insensitive to this
process, S.W.R.D.Bandaranaike, Prime Minister and leader of the SLFP
(Sri Lanka Freedom Party) arrived at an understanding with the
leader of the Federal Party (the Bandaranaike - Chelvanayakam Pact
of 1958) which gave Tamils a degree of regional autonomy, including
control of the land settlement in their areas. However, Bandaranaike
had to abandon the pact in the face of opposition from the United
National Party (UNP) and was killed by a monk in 1959. Likewise,
when the UNP was again in power, Dudley Senanayake, the Prime
Minister, worked out a somewhat similar understanding in 1967; this
too was scuttled in the face of opposition, this time mainly from
the SLFP. The demands of the Tamil people had by this time become a
major factor in Sinhala Politics. Sinhala political hegemony was
also becoming institutionalized. The republican Constitution of
1972, while proclaiming Sinhala as the official language, declared
that Buddhism had the 'foremost place' in Sri Lanka, thus almost
affirming a Sinhala-Buddhist state. It is precisely this history
that persuaded the Tamils that co-existence with the Sinhala in a
single polity was no longer possible.
While the established political party of the Tamils - the Tamil
United Liberation Front (TULF) - was demanding a separate state and
using parliamentary democratic processes towards obtaining it, some
Tamil youth, dissatisfied with the non-violent policies of the TULF,
formed groups which took up arms in the same cause {4}. It is not
proposed to go into the details of the armed struggle in this paper.
It is only necessary to state that it led to a protracted and bitter
war in the northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka during the course
of which the state security forces were guilty of severe excesses,
attacks on civilians and serious violations of human rights of the
Sri Lankan citizens, while the armed groups in turn resorted to
brutal killings of both the Sinhala civilians and those Tamils
thought of as 'informers'. The number of deaths has been estimated
at 6000 by the government and 15000 by Tamil groups; damage to
property has been incalculable.
At the ideological level, the response to Sinhala chauvinism was the
emergence of Tamil chauvinism and extreme forms of nationalist
mythmaking. According to Radhika Coomaraswamy, these include the
myth that the tamils are pure Dravidian by race, that they are heirs
to the Mohenjadaro and Harappa civilizations of India, that they are
the original inhabitants of Sri Lanka, that the Tamil language in
its purest forms is spoken only in Sri Lanka and that the "Saiva
Siddhanta" form of Hinduism has 'a special homeland' in Sri Lanka
[Coomaraswamy 1987:79]. Many of the Tamil militant groups have also
been sustained by such ideologies, and expressions like 'Dravidian
Drive' and 'Chola charisma' have been used in their literature to
mobilise support for armed struggle.
Another effect of the Sinhala-Tamil strife has been that the class
solidarity among workers of all ethnic groups has been replaced by a
sense of trans-class ethnic solidarity on the part of both the
Sinhala and Tamils. As newton Gunasinghe has observed, in both the
Sinhala and Tamil ethnic formations "class contradiction are
overdetermined in the Althusserian sense, by ethnic conflict", while
among the Tamils, "class contradictions are softened and even
submerged" in the face of a perceived "danger to its collective
social existence"; among the Sinhalese masses, "dissatisfaction with
the existing state of affairs has taken a false external direction
against what is perceived to be the unreasonable demands advanced by
already privileged Tamils." [Abeysekera and Gunasinghe 1987 : VI]
Regional
Dimensions
It is against this historical background that the regional and
international dimensions of ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka have to be
investigated and understood. The pogrom against Tamils in July 1983
and the resulting clashes had two very important demographic
consequences. One was the exodus of over 100,000 refugees from the
northern regions of the island to Tamilnadu in South India; these
were primarily civilians who had become victims of the government's
drive against Tamil militants. It is well established that Sri
Lankan security forces often turned against Tamil civilians in their
attempt to flush out the militants. The second consequence was an
exodus of Tamils living in southern parts of the island amidst the
Sinhalese, to their 'traditional homes' in the north and east.
Paradoxically as it may seem, the violence of July 1983 convinced
many Tamils that they could be safe and secure only in their own
areas, this despite the presence and operations of the army. These
moves immediately strengthened, one the one hand, the notion of a
Tamil homeland in which Tamils would have their own state, and on
the other, it established a close link between the Tamils of Sri
Lanka and the Tamils of India, resulting in the Sri Lanka Tamil
issue becoming the major issue in Tamilnadu politics.
The presence of Sri Lankan Tamil political and militants leaders and
a large number of refugees in Tamilnadu necessarily had an impact on
the politics of that state.{5} Tamilnadu was extremely conscious of
its cultural heritage and its role vis-a-vis Tamil communities in
the other parts of the world. It had also been the scene of
separatist demands for an independent state in the 1960s. Although
these demands died down, the embers of Tamil nationalism were kept
alive by the "Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam"(DMK) which was in power
between 1967 and 1977. [Kodikara 1983] After July 1983, the DMK,
which was by then in opposition, wholeheartedly took up the cause of
Sri Lankan Tamils. It described the actions of Sri Lanka as genocide
against the Tamils and called on the Indian government to send its
armed forces to Sri Lanka in order to save the Tamils.
By 1983 the ruling party in Tamilnadu was the All-India Anna Dravida
Munnetra Kashagam(AIADMK), a split from the DMK, and its leader, M.
G. Ramachandran also spoke out on the behalf of the Tamils of Sri
Lanka. It accorded a measure of state patronage to the TULF and
militant leaders as well as Sri Lankan refugees. It also mobilized
public opinion by first organizing a state-wide stoppage of work,
protesting against the oppression of tamils by the Sri Lankan
government; a resolution was passed in October 1983 in the Tamilnadu
State Assembly condemning the violence of Sri Lanka and urging the
United Nations to intervene in the pursuit of a peaceful solution.
Even though the AIADMK's support for the Sri Lanka Tamil cause
stopped short of support for a separate state, the Sri Lankan Tamil
Issue became a focal point in the internal politics of Tamilnadu
itself.
It has sometimes been said that it was the pressure emanating from
Tamilnadu that forced the Indian central government to intervene in
the matter. The Tamilnadu government was no doubt concerned to see
the divisive issue was settled, but it is now apparent that the
central government of India was also motivated by reasons of
national security as much as the pressure from Tamilnadu.
Mediation by the central government began very shortly after July
1983. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi offered India's good offices in
order to facilitate a political solution and this was accepted by
Sri Lanka. G. Parthasarathy, a well known Indian diplomat and
advisor to Indira Gandhi, visited Sri Lanka, discussed issues with
leaders of the government, political parties, including the TULF,
and by December 1983, had developed a set of proposals to resolve
the conflict.{6} These were presented to an All Party Conference in
January 1984 which, however, ended inconclusively in December 1984.
This ended India's first mediation effort. It was activated on the
premise that a conscious on the ethnic issue among the major
political groups was desirable. Hereafter Indian mediation efforts
were primarily to concern the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil
parties and groups. During 1984 and 1985, while negotiations towards
a peaceful solution were proceeding rather desultorily, the military
conflict intensified, claiming ever more civilian casualities on
both sides.
The Sri Lankan President and the Indian Prime Minister met in early
June 1985 in New Delhi and this produced a quickening of efforts at
mediation. Peace talks followed between the Sri Lankan government
and Tamil political and militant organizations in Thimpu in Bhutan,
but these failed too.
From August 1986 and in the subsequent months, officials of the two
governments held talks in Delhi and arrived at what were described
as 'draft terms of Accord and understanding'. These terms envisaged
a system of devolution at three levels, divisional, district, and
provincial. Powers at the provincial level were defined allowing
broadly for devolution with respect to law and order, agriculture,
land settlement and other functions. This framework was the object
of discussions between the two governments as well as the government
of India and the Tamil groups in Madras and produced an expansion of
some powers devolved at the provincial level.
Many attempts in 1986 to solve the conflict proved abortive {7} but
the next stage in this process of resolution moved with amazing
rapidity. A car bomb exploded at a busy bus station in Colombo at
the end of April 1987, killing 113 people. The government, faced
with popular outrage, launched what it called an ' all-out
offensive' on the Jaffna peninsula and by the end of May captured a
large part of it at great cost in terms of life, property and the
massive dislocation of inhabitants in these areas. It was at this
stage that the Indian Government intervened directly and decisively.
Arguing that army offensive had rendered the people of Jaffna
totally destitute, it decided to send in 'humanitarian relief'. When
a flotilla of boats carrying relief supplies were turned back by the
Sri Lankan navy, India dropped relief supplies by air and then
negotiating with the Sri Lankan government for the further supplies.
The idea of resolving the ethnic conflict through an understanding
between the two governments had been in the air for a few months.
Moreover, Sri Lanka found itself under great pressure from donor
countries to solve the conflict -- especially in view of economic
devastation the war has caused and increased military expenditure.
The Indian government thus found itself in a position it could
enforce willingness both from Sri Lankan government and from the
main military group, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam(LTTE). The
Agreement which signed in July 1987 was the result. India had moved
from the position of mediator to that of direct participant, a
participant with separate and specific interests of its own.
The agreement had three components -- first, the 'modalities' of
settling the ethnic conflicts through devolution of power to a Tamil
region combining the northern and eastern provinces; second, the
guarantees and obligations of the government of India with regard to
the implementation of the accord; third, (in letters exchanged
alonged with the Agreement), the undertakings given by the
government of Sri Lanka to India which are not related to the ethnic
conflict but concern India's security interest's in the region.
Government
Policies
Before examining the specific security interests India sought to
assure in the Agreement, it is necessary to turn back and look at
some of the changes in Sri Lanka's economic and foreign policy which
had a bearing on the Agreement. From 1956 to 1977, Sri Lanka had
followed an economic policy that was characterized by state
regulation of both local and foreign investment, emphasis on the
public sector as the favoured means of growth, import-substitution
in industry , fiscal policies directed towards an egalitarian
distribution of wealth, welfare policies that sought to ensure to
all citizens basic needs of food, health and education. The foreign
policy was one of non-alignment, with a tilt to the 'socialist' bloc
in terms of assistance for public sector industry. Sri Lanka was a
strong member of the non-aligned, anti imperialist Third World.
During this period, Sri Lanka's foreign policy was totally congruent
with that of India. There seemed to be hardly any divergency between
India's and Sri Lanka's interests, and the last areas of
disagreement (the question of an island, Katchativu in the Palk
Straits, and the citizenship of plantation workers) had been solved.
However, these economic and social and social policies were
accompanied by very slow economic growth rates. Unemployment soared
and scarcities began to appear as foreign exchange became difficult
to obtain. Dissatisfaction mounted and in 1977, the people defeated
Sirima Bandaranaike and voted in the government of J.R.Jayawardene
which was committed to a different set of policies. The changes in
the economic sphere were drastic. Most regulations were scrapped;
foreign investment was encouraged, and Free Trade Zones established.
Most subsides were removed and the market place became the
determining factor in investment. In contrast to earlier policies,
private investment and entrepreneurship were encouraged and some
parts of the public sector were privatized. Moreover power,
irrigation, transport and communication facilities serving the
interests of private capital were strengthened. Although the earlier
welfare measures were retained, the new emphasis was on growth, not
distribution. This economic policy had important foreign relation
implications.
Foreign investment had to be sought from abroad and massive
infrastructure needs of the public sector had to be obtained as
grants and loans - mainly from the western countries. This whole
process also required close collaboration with the International
Monetary Fund and the World Bank. In short, the Sri Lankan economy
became firmly bonded with the capitalist world market. This swing
away from an inward-looking regulated economy to an open,
export-oriented economy had a determining influence on the country's
foreign policy.
Sri Lanka chaired the Non-aligned Movement from 1976 to 1978 when
J.R.Jayawardene handed over to Fidel Castro of Cuba. Professedly,
Sri Lanka continued to follow a policy of non-alignment, but the
imperatives of the economic strategies she had adopted pushed her in
the direction of the Western camp. The principal aid donors became
the industrialized countries of the West and Japan and their foreign
policy needs came to the fore. To give an example, Sri Lanka was one
of the very few Third World countries to vote with the UK on the
Falklands issue, influenced no doubt by the fact that Britain is a
major donor to the government's irrigation and hydro-power
programme.
The government in 1980 permitted a significant facility used by the
Voice of America and also approved the establishment of a
broadcasting facility for West German Radio near Trincomalee. These
links were seen as a further erosion of Sri Lanka's non-aligned
status and a push in the direction of the US and the West. There was
also some speculation that the US was interested in obtaining
facilities at Trincomalee harbour, including the use of its oil
storage tanks. The US denied such an interest but the uncertainities
surrounding the lease of facilities in the Philippines proved a
fresh impetus to such speculation.
These tendencies away from a non-aligned stance were strengthened
after 1983 by the course of the ethnic conflict. The Tamil militants
were based in India; their presence was tolerated by the state and
central governments. Though officially denied, it was obvious that
the training and staging grounds of the militants were in India.
During the latter days of the conflict, the patronage given by the
Tamilnadu government to the militants was demonstrated by open
financial gifts. Given this situation, the government looked to
non-Indian sources for weapons, equipment and training. Thus links
grew with Pakistan, which became the main centre for the training of
the security forces.
Weapons and ammunition were obtained from Pakistan, Israel, South
Africa and various commercial organizations. The services of Israel
were obtained for improving and expanding the government's
intelligence apparatus and Israel was allowed to open Special
Interests section in the US Embassy in Colombo. The government also
procured the services of various mercenary organizations, primarily
the KMS (Keeny Meeny Services) of the UK for training its Special
Task Force of troops. Thus the Sri Lanka Government began to build
up links with many governments and organizations seen as hostile to
India, links that many suspect may have matured into strategic
relationships.
It is in this context that one can examine those provisions of the
July 1987 Agreement concerned with India's security interests. Sri
Lanka, it was said, "agreed to meet some of India's concerns", which
were itemized as follows:
(i) ... an early understanding about the relevance and
employment of foreign military and intelligence personnel with a
view to ensuring that such presence will not prejudice Indo-Sri
Lanka relations;
(ii) Trincomalee or any other ports in Sri Lanka will not be
made available for military use by any country in a manner
prejudicial to India's interests;
(iii) The work of restoring and operating the Trincomalee Oil
Tank Farm will be undertaken as a joint venture between India
and Sri Lanka.
(iv) Sri Lanka's agreement with foreign broadcasting
organizations will be reviewed to ensure that any facilities set
up by them in Sri Lanka are used solely as public broadcasting
facilities and not for any military or intelligence purpose.
In concrete terms, the Agreement ensures that Pakistani, Israeli
and other influences on the armed forces of Sri Lanka seen as
inimical to India are removed, that Trincomalee would not be used in
a way injurious to India's interests, that the Tank Farm would be
under India's partial control and that the US and West German
broadcasting facilities would not be used to spy on India.
Moreover, what the Agreement guarantees is not only the removal of
hostile influences on Sri Lanka's security forces; India actually
substitutes herself, undertaking as a reciprocal gesture, to
'provide training facilities and military supplies for Sri Lankan
security forces'. By means of the Agreement, India removed perceived
risks to her security in Sri Lanka and assured herself that such a
situation would not occur again by reinforcing her influence over
Sri Lanka. In undertaking to ensure the due implementation of all
terms of the Agreement, India was also able to station her troops in
the northern and eastern provinces of Sri Lanka as a peace-Keeping
force.
India's intervention in the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka began as a
genuinely mediatory role. The conflict had become significant factor
in the politics of Tamilnadu and it was necessary that its influence
on the inflammatory Tamil separatist tendencies be minimized. It was
not in the India's interest, nor that of Tamilnadu state, to allow
Sri Lanka to crush Tamil opposition and assert Sinhala hegemony over
them. Such a situation would have been unacceptable to Tamils of
India. Indian tolerance of Tamil militant groups has to be seen in
that light -- an effort to prevent a military victory by the Sri
Lankan government.
However, a victory by the Tamil militants and the establishment
of a separate state would not be in India's interest either. The
Indian state itself is plagued with a number of separatist and
secessionist struggles and in this context, the emergence of a small
state in Northern Sri Lanka would not have been a desirable
precedent. It could also exert an influence on the volatile
sentiments of Tamilnadu; an independent Tamil state might have
become an attractive magnet for separative sentiments.
Thus India would have wished neither for a Sri Lankan military
victory nor military success for the Tamil militants. Its best
interests would be served by a resolution of the conflict whiched
recognized Sri Lanka's unity and territorial integrity, but which
also allowed for democratic, political and economic rights of the
Tamil people as a collectivity.
This conclusion would also assume that Sri Lanka's movement away
from a non-aligned policy in its foreign relations would have been
no more than an irritant in the eyes of India. It was unwelcome, but
posed no immediate threat to India's security interests. That India
looked on this problem as one of human right is also evident from
the fact that the only international forum at which she raised it
was the US Commission for Human Rights.
However, the course of developments during the escalation of the
conflict was instrumental in pushing Indian security concerns to the
fore. These were the growing military relationship between Sri Lanka
and Pakistan, Israel and certain Western countries, the growing
influence of such countries on Sri Lankan security forces, the
linkages seen to be developing between Sri Lanka, Pakistan and
China. Taken together these indicated s security threat on India's
southern flank, an area which had previously appeared secure. Thus
the resolution of the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka became bound up
with the safeguarding of India's security interests.
It is the contention of many that India's security interests played
a larger role in the accord than the actual resolution of the ethnic
conflict. V. Prabhakaran, the leader of the most powerful Tamil
militant group, the LTTE, has openly declared that he has no
alternative but to acquiesce in the Agreement, even though it
sacrifices Tamil aspirations and hopes to India's security concerns;
he expressed dissatisfaction with the temporary nature of the merger
between the northern and eastern provinces and said that LTTE would
continue to work towards a separate state. There have been equally
vehement attacks on the Agreement from the Sinhala side. The
Jayawardena government has been accused of accommodating Indian
security concerns to the extent of seriously compromising Sri
Lanka's sovereignity and independence. This view rests on an
analysis of the Agreement that places greater emphasis on the
security issues; it argues that India was prepared to dismantle
Tamil militant camps in India only when Sri Lanka agreed to give in
on the security issues.
The Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement also has many implications for the
security of South Asian region. It is a known fact that all of
India's neighbours have problems which involve India in some way.
Nepal is faced with internal unrest led by movements which evoke
some sympathy in India; while expecting Indian support in meeting
these threats, Nepal is at the same time attempting to modify some
of the provisions of the Treaty of Peace and Friendship entered into
with India in 1950, particularly those with regard to security
affairs. Bangladesh has problems with its Chakma ethnic group in the
Chittagong hill areas and has been flowing a foregin policy
favourable to the US. The problems between Pakistan and India are so
familiar that it is not necessary to summarize them. The Indo-Sri
Lanka Agreement can be read by all these countries as a signal that
their internal and foregin policies must be so adjusted as to not to
affect significantly India's security concerns. In this connection
it is interesting to note that, while most countries were not happy
with India's violation of Sri Lankan air space in dropping food
supplies, most countries have expressed their support for the Peace
Agreement. The two countries to have voiced reservations have been
Pakistan and China.
In effect, in signing the Peace Agreement, Sri Lanka has recognized
the necessity of formulating its foreign relations so as not to
affect its big and powerful neighbour, India. It is an acceptance of
India's role as the regional power. The Agreement has been welcome
by both USA and USSR. This also signifies the acceptance by all of
India's role in the South Asian region and of the general desire to
remove a focus of instability in the region.
The Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement has implication for Regional
Co-operation as well. The South Asian Association for Regional
Co-operation (SAARC) excludes from consideration purely bilateral
issues. Sri Lanka, however, has on many occasions attempted to
override this and bring up the ethnic issue for discussion. These
efforts have generally been supported by other members like
Pakistan, who have also argued that the SAARC forum should be open
to the consideration of bilateral issues. India has always opposed
this view, maintaining that issues between any two countries of the
region could best be settled on a bilateral basis and not be allowed
to cloud issues of regional co-operation.
Another area of concern on which the Agreement may have some impact
is the project to keep the Indian Ocean as a zone of peace. This
idea was first advanced by Sirimavo Bandaranaike at the Non-aligned
summits at Nairobi and Cairo, and later at the United Nations in
1971 where it was generally received with favour. India too
supported the project, seeing it in a way of keeping the Indian
Ocean free from naval deployments by both superpowers. The US has
established a naval base on the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian
Ocean. Although most countries still back the proposal in principle,
it has been found difficult to get to the next stage of the project
-- namely a meeting in Colombo to work out the details. India has
shown herself deeply suspicious of Sri Lanka's stand and refused to
attend meetings in Colombo of technical groups concerned with
research into aspects of Indian Ocean activities. India still
appears keen to pursue this project and Sri Lanka's re-structured
relationship with India will possibly be of help.
Conclusion
The Peace agreement has roused varied reactions. Opinion in India,
even on the Left, has been favourable. Some have also seen it as a
foreign policy triumph for Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, reaffirming
India's role as the regional power, safeguarding India's security as
well as manifesting humanitarian ideals. It has been criticized by a
few of Gandhi's political opponents, but this has been limited to
speculations that it embodies a hasty and simple solution to a very
complex problem and that it might fail as, for example, the Punjab
Accord has failed.
In Sri Lanka, a section of the Sinhala majority including Sirima
Bandaranaike see it as a base surrender to Sri Lankan Tamils on the
question of the Tamil region, and to India on the use of Trincomalee
and other ports. The traditional Sinhala fears of domination by
India, specifically South India, have been aroused by the Agreement.
It has been argued that Sri Lanka's sovereignity and independence
have been seriously eroded. However, other sections of Sinhalese
welcome the Agreement as the only alternative to continuous warfare
and misery for the people of Sri Lanka.
The reaction of the Sri Lankan Tamils to the Agreement has been
mixed. Most Tamils - peasants, fishermen, workers, traders and the
middle classes - welcomed the cessation of the conflict, the end of
violence and the chance to engage once again in their normal
pursuits. But among most of them there is the feeling, articulated
at the moment only by the militant groups, that the aspirations of
the Tamil people are not going to be fully met. Their dream of a
separate state is over; the viable reality they were ready to accept
- a federal political structure - will also not be achieved. There
is also doubt about the extent to which India will now go to
advocate Tamil needs and aspirations.
In spite of all objections the Agreement does lay down a framework
within which the citizens of Sri Lanka may work out a political
structure based on regional autonomy; it also allows this process to
be worked in the course peaceful negotiations.
While fulfilling these needs, the Agreement has also restored Indo-
Sri Lankan relations. Sri Lanka has had to acknowledge that her
foreign relations have to be conducted in such a way as to pose no
threat to her far more powerful neighbour. This is really faced by
many small countries, but a reality that Sri Lanka had attempted to
ignore over the past ten years.
The restructuring of political relations has been very quickly
followed by actions in the economic sphere as well. A joint Economic
Commission has been set up to facilitate trade between the two
countries and to promote Indian investment in Sri Lanka; there is
also talk of a joint marketing effort in tea and other primary
products. These developments can be seen as desirable between two
countries in close proximity but may also be construed as the
economic fruits of the political involvement.
While left-wing parties in both India and Sri Lanka have supported
the peace initiative, and with some reservations have welcomed the
Agreement, opposition to the Agreement and specially to the presence
of around 20,000 Indian troops in the northern and eastern parts of
Sri Lanka remains significant and includes several political parties
including the leading opposition party, the SLFP led by Sirima
Bandaranaike. Serious opposition has also come from the banned JVP
(Peoples Liberation Front), a populist militant movement with its
social base among the discontented Sinhala "petit-bourgeoisie",
using the tactic of killing government supporters as a method of
destabilizing the government. As in the north, several decades of
democratic reforms, welfarism and access to secondary education have
raised expectations among the youth which the economy has not been
able to fulfil. Numbers of young persons in both the north and
south, unable to enter the universities or get suitable employment.
have thus been easily diverted to destructive armed actions based on
chauvinist war cries, inspired by what has recently been called
'ethno-populism' [Siriwardena and Coomaraswamy 1987].
New ideologies of Sinhala chauvinism have also appeared among the
Sinhala intelligentsia, using methods ominously reminiscent of
Goebbels and Senator McCarthy; they have encouraged a witch-hunt and
smears against liberals, Leftists, civil rights activists and
religious groups who have spoken out and written against chauvinism
and have supported efforts for peace. Anonymous threats of violence
have also been made against those supporting the Agreement and
against the members of the parliament who in November 1987, voted
(with a 2:1 majority) for the Provincial Councils Bill which grants
regional autonomy for the provinces of Sri Lanka, with one
provincial council for the Northern and Eastern provinces, subject
to a referendum at the end of a year.
Thirty years ago (in 1958) when measures of regional autonomy were
agreed upon between the government of S.W.R.D.Bandaranaike and the
Tamil political leaders, the proposal was scuttled by the Sinhala
chauvinists. Attempts by the subsequent UNP government to solve the
problem were in turn effectively sabotaged by the SLFP in
opposition. Thus both the main parties have over the past years used
the issue to try to come to power, by cynically playing on the fears
of the Sinhalese.
History, thus, has kept on repeating itself with tragic consequences
for the whole population; and successive Sri Lankan governments
failed to perceive the danger that the ethnic issue, if aggravated,
could not only undermine the whole democratic process but also
result in intervention by India. Today the presence of Indian troops
and the mere fact of Indian intervention are obviously bound to
cease reaction among Sri Lankans of all ethnic groups. But, in the
final analysis, one cannot deny that the present situation is a
consequence of the failure of the Sri Lankans themselves to sort out
their own problems. Herein lies the real lesson of Sri Lanka's
recent history. For, as a statement welcoming the peace agreement,
signed by 30 liberal and Left Sri Lankan scholars and human rights
activists warned, "we should be conscious that a continued inability
to be sensitive to and solve problems in our own society could
become a weakness fatal to Sri Lanka's existence as a free and
independent nation" [8].
Notes
{1} When the hydraulic economy and civilization that had flourished
in the north-central plains came to an end, the Sinhala people
migrated to the rain-fed areas in the central and south-western
regions of the island. The north-central plains reverted to jungle
with a few scattered villages. With little control from the Sinhala
kingdom, the Tamil people became concentrated in the northern and
eastern coastal regions that were closest to that part of the Indian
mainland also populated by Tamil speaking people; eventually Tamils
of northern region established the Jaffna Kingdom at the end of the
13th century.
{2} The Portuguese arrived in Sri Lanka in 1505 and occupied the
south-western littoral of the island and in due time, the northern
and eastern coastal regions. The Dutch succeeded them in 1658 and,
as did Portuguese, ruled the Sinhala and Tamil areas as separate
regions. During this period, the Sinhala Kingdom continued to exist,
first in the south-west and then in the hill country in Kandy. The
British succeeded the Dutch in 1796 and eventually subdued the
Kandiyan Kingdom in 1815. In 1833 they brought the whole island,
i.e., the areas occupied by the Sinhala and Tamils, within one
administrative unit.
{3} This system was replaced in 1978 by a system of
`standardization' that was designed to give equal opportunities to
students from educationally disadvantaged areas. However, since
Jaffna was classified as an educationally-advanced area, the net
effect was very much the same.
{4} These include, among others, the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam), PLOTE ( Peoples Libration Organization of Tamil
Eelam), EPRLF (Eelam Peoples Revolutionary Libration Front), and
EROS (Eelam revolutionary Organization of Students).
{5} The exodus from Sri Lanka of ordinary Tamil civilians was
preceded by that of Tamil political and military leaders. In July
1985, the Sri Lankan constitution had been amended, by what is
popularly known as the Sixth Amendment, to require all legislators
and public officials to take an oath of allegiance to the unitary
Sri Lankan state and to disavow all the notions of secessions and
separatism. The TULF members of Parliament refused to take this oath
and were deemed to have vacated their seats. They then fled to India
and began to express their grievances to the Tamilnadu and Indian
governments. The militant groups had been using South India as a
base even earlier, but this situation became somewhat formalized
after July 1983. Then all the militant organizations established
their offices, information centres, and military camps in Madras and
other parts of Tamilnadu from which their military operations
commenced.
{6} Known as `Annexure C' of the All Party Conference of January
1984, this document proposed a union on regions within the unitary
constitutional framework of Sri Lanka, the devolution of substantial
legislative and executive power to the regions and measures that
would ensure to the Tamil people an adequate representation at the
central government level. The government was originally opposed to
any concept of regions; they thought that the district, (the present
administrative unites, of which there are 23 in Sri Lanka) should
form the units of devolution. In the course of negotiations,
however, it was agreed that the nine provinces - each composed of a
number of districts - should be the units of devolution.
{7} In November 1886 Gandhi and Jayewardena met in Bangalore where
further discussions resulted in the December 1986 proposals, These
provided for the exclusion of Amparai, a mainly Sinhala district,
form the eastern province so that the province would demographically
have a Tamil majority; in addition, there was to be a strengthening
of the institutional linkages between the northern and eastern
provinces and a second stage of constitutional development when the
two provinces could come together, provided the people so decided.
These proposals were finalized by 19 December but proved inadequate
in the eyes of the Tamil militant groups, particularly the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) which had by then become
dominant among them.
{8} This article was written in October-November 1987.
References
Abeysekera, C. & Gunasinghe. N. (eds) - "Facets
of Ethnicity in Sri Lanka", Social Scientist Association,
Colombo, 1987.
Abeysekera, C. - `Ethnic Representation in Higher State
Services' in "Ethnicity and Social Change", Colombo, 1985.
Bandaranayake, Senake - `The Peopling if Sri Lanka' in
"Ethnicity and Social Change", Colombo, 1985.
Bastian, Sunil - `University Admission & the National Question',
in "Ethnicity and Social Change", Colombo, 1985.
Coomaraswamy, Radhika - `Myths without conscience: Tamil and
Sinhalese Nationalistic Writings of 1980's', in "Facets of
Ethnicity in Sri Lanka", Colombo, 1987.
Gunawardena, R.A.L.H. - `The People of the Lion' Sinhala
Consciousness in History and Histography in "Ethnicity and
Social Change", Colombo, 1985.
Jayawardena, Kumari - "The Rise of the Labour Movement in
Ceylon", Durham, N.C., 1972. - "Ethnic and Class Conflicts in
Sri Lanka", Colombo, 1986.
Kodikara, Shelton - `Internationalisation of Sri Lanka's Ethnic
Conflict', Paper presented at a Social Scientists Association
Seminar, 1983.
Social Scientists Association (SSA) - "Ethnicity and Social
Change in Sri Lanka", Colombo, 1st printing 1984, 2nd printing
1985.
Siriwardena, Reggie and Coomaraswamy, Radhika -
`Ethno-Populism', paper presented at the International Center
for Ethnic Studies, Colombo, 1987.
|
