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Selected Writings
Brian Senewiratne, Australia
Letter to UK Prime Minister
on the Critical Situation in Sri Lanka
20 May 2006
Honourable Tony Blair
Prime Minister, UK
10 Downing Street
London
Dear Mr Blair,
I am writing as the Patron of the Campaign for Truth and Justice which was
formed when I visited London in March 2006. I am expressing my concerns at what
is going on in Sri Lanka, not only in the Tamil North and East, but also in the
Sinhalese South.
I am a Sinhalese from the majority community. I am not a member of the
persecuted Tamil minority which has been facing serious problems at the hands of
the Sinhalese-dominated Sri Lankan Government. My only interest is humanitarian,
not political. I am a doctor of Medicine trained in your country (Cambridge
University and London University). I spent some 15 years in Britain and know the
British people well. I am quite certain that if they know the facts, as distinct
from Sri Lankan Government propaganda, they will be outraged.
Although Sri Lanka has had half a century to sort out its problems, the basic
problem was created by the British during 150 years of Colonial occupation
(1796-1948). If Britain was the cause of the problem, Britain must also play a
significant role in its solution. Unfortunately, this is not so. On the
contrary, Britain is becoming part of the problem, indeed aggravating it and
making it unsolvable.
I am not going to detail Sri Lanka’s colonial or post-colonial history – a
subject on which I have addressed several meetings in your country, which
included one on the Abuse of Democracy in Sri Lanka, a copy of which I will be
happy to send you. Here I will deal with just a few points relevant to the
current situation.
1. Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) was never a single entity. It consisted of three
separate Kingdoms (Nations) for hundreds of years, a Jaffna (Tamil) Kingdom in
the north, a Kandyan (Sinhalese) Kingdom in the centre and a Kotte (Sinhalese)
Kingdom in the south. It was the British who, in 1833 (the Colebrooke-Cameron
‘reforms’, so-called), ‘unified’ the country for the administrative convenience
of the colonial power. It was not merely a ‘unification’ but a centralisation of
power, including developmental power, in the Sinhalese South and later, in
Sinhalese political hands.
2. This colonial ‘experiment’ has failed (as it has in Malaya, India, and
numerous other former colonial countries). While the failure in Malaya and India
has been corrected (with the splitting of Malaya into Malaysia and Singapore (I
might add that Singapore is one thirtieth the size of Sri Lanka), and India into
Pakistan and India), the documented failure in Sri Lanka has not been corrected.
It is this that has led to the disastrous civil war which has decimated Sri
Lanka in the past two decades and is threatening the future and very survival of
the country.
3. There has been a serious and very deliberate developmental neglect of the
Tamil areas in the North and East at the hands of a succession of
Sinhalese-dominated Governments since Independence.
In addition to developmental neglect, there has been serious and progressive
discrimination of the Tamil minority in the use of their language (Tamil),
education, job opportunities and even the right to exist, at the hands of every
Sinhalese-dominated Government since Independence 58 years ago. This has been
done by almost every Sinhalese political party for political gain – some 74% of
the voters being Sinhalese.
4. A series of peaceful protests by the Tamils over three decades have been
unsuccessful in getting the Sinhalese-government to address these problems.
Peaceful Tamil protests have been crushed by armed force unleashed on the Tamils
by the State (the Police and the Armed Forces), and Sinhalese hoodlums sponsored
by the State.
A series of Pacts between Sinhalese political leaders and Tamil leaders have
been unilaterally abrogated by the Sinhalese leaders in the face of virulent
opposition by Sinhalese extremists and political opportunists who envisage
multicultural, multireligious and multi-ethnic Sri Lanka, as a Sinhala –
Buddhist nation. It is, in fact, the declared policy (even enshrined in the
Constitution) to make Sri Lanka into a Sinhala- Buddhist Nation. If that is the
policy (and it is), then there is no option to the establishment of a separate
Tamil State, Eelam. Eelam is not the creation of the Tamils but of Sinhala
ethno-religious extremism and chauvinism.
5. With the documented failure over three decades of peaceful protests to
achieve anything, and the crushing of peaceful protests by armed force of the
State, in the 1970s Tamil youths decided to exert the necessary pressure by
taking up arms. The Tamil Tigers are not the cause of the problem but the
result. The ‘cause’ has been Sinhalese anti-Tamil discrimination for political
gain.
6. Faced with progressive discrimination, the Tamil people in the North and East
voted overwhelmingly in the 1977 General Elections for a separate Tamil State,
Eelam. It is not the Tamil Tigers who have asked for a division of the county,
but the Tamil people, and for very good reasons. There is no evidence that the
Tamil people have changed their mind in the past 30 years. On the contrary, the
extensive violation of human rights to which the Tamil people have been
subjected by Sinhalese governments and the Armed Forces (99% Sinhalese), has
increased their resolve to free themselves from the ruthless regime which has
the temerity to call itself their “Government”.
7. The violence of the Sinhala-dominated government unleashed on the Tamils over
the past three decades is genocidal, as defined in Humanitarian Law and the UN
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide (which was signed by the
Sri Lankan Government). There is prima facie evidence, at the very least, that
what the Sri Lankan Government is unleashing on the Tamils is Genocide. I will
be making a Submission to the UN Human Rights Commission on this, a copy will be
sent to the EU.
8. Britain and several other countries have exacerbated the problem by supplying
weapons to one side (the Sri Lankan Government) and demonising and
banning/restricting the movement, of the other (the Tamil Tigers). It is
foreign-supplied bombs and shells, and foreign-supplied helicopters, bombers and
multi-barrelled guns that have decimated the Tamil people, their lives, their
homes and their property. What is being conducted is not just a war against the
Tamil Tigers but a war against the Tamil people in the North and East to force
them to accept a Sinhala-Buddhist nation. This ‘war’ now has genocidal
characteristics. If this is being supported by the British Government (which it
is), the British people must know about it.
9. I cannot see that banning one side to Peace negotiations (the Tamil Tigers),
makes any sense. Countries that have taken this senseless decision (which,
incidentally, Sri Lanka has not!), have opted out of assisting with peace
negotiations. What these silly decisions do is to strengthen the hand of
Sinhalese ethno-religious chauvinists and political opportunists in Sri Lanka,
which makes the job of the Sri Lankan Government that much more difficult, in
already difficult political negotiations. This is breathtaking international
irresponsibility.
10. The Sri Lankan Government claims that the problem is “Tamil terrorism”. Any
government’s condemnation of terror is credible only if it shows itself to be
responsive to reasonable, closely argued, persistent, non-violent dissent. No
Sinhala government since Independence in 1948 has been responsive to the
reasonable demands of the Tamil people who form 12.5% of the country, and more
than 90% of those in the North and East.
11. If negotiations are abandoned and Sri Lanka returns to war
(as demanded by Sinhala extremists), it will be the economic end of that
country, to say nothing of the destruction of Tamil lives and property in the
North and East, and the lives of poor rural Sinhalese youths who ‘volunteer’ to
join the Sri Lankan Armed Forces for their economic survival in poverty-ridden
villages. This conflict has already cost some 64,000 lives (most of them Tamil
civilians) and extensive damage to Tamil property. If war breaks out again,
Britain and others might be able to sell more weapons (to both sides) but will
have a case to answer for the destruction of Sri Lanka.
12. The Campaign for Truth and Justice, of which I am the Patron, is having a
public meeting in Trafalgar Square in London on 21 May 2006. I am asking that
this letter be circulated for signature by those who support the simple request
that the Tamil people in the North and East of Sri Lanka be freed to live their
lives with equality, safety, dignity and without discrimination and be allowed
to develop the area in which they live. This will mean that the Tamil people
must be freed from a brutal, irresponsible, and uncaring regime that has the
gall to call itself their “Government”. An Australian politician who has never
been to Sri Lanka added “…. you mean the Government of the Democratic Socialist
Republic of Sri Lanka. Excuse me while I laugh.” That summed it up admirably.
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