Tag: al qaeda

Chapter 3:
Indian Riddle and the SAARC Ripple

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Nothing sums up the Indian context to the UN Report (“Advisory Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka Allegations”) on Sri Lankan war than the two widely-held beliefs that lie at the opposite ends of the spectrum viz., India helped the rise of LTTE and India wanted the LTTE to be destroyed.

Maybe that explains the riddle surrounding the rather tepid reaction to the UN Report on Sri Lanka by India, a nation that has the single-biggest stake in the issue outside Sri Lanka. While the international human rights community and many nations went hammer and tongs at the island nation on its alleged war crimes, the Indian reaction probably marked the acute discomfort that the issue poses to its public diplomacy:

“The issues raised in the report need to be studied carefully. As a first step, we intend to engage with the government of Sri Lanka on the issues contained in the report.”

Really! And engage with the government of Sri Lanka how exactly? In the manner that it did during the last days of the war, by turning a blind eye to the excesses committed by the Sri Lankan army in broad daylight?

Gordon Weiss, former UN Representative to Sri Lanka, may have put the nail on India’s head when he said:

“I believe that [the] Indians were aware of the civilian casualties that were happening [in 2009], because they had pretty good intelligence inside [Sri Lanka’s] siege zone. If foreign governments knew what was going on this latter stage of the war and continued to supply arms, then I think it is a matter worthy of investigations in those countries.”

Further investigations would precisely be what India may not want at the moment. Not because it has any war skeletons in its own cupboard, but simply because it passively allowed too many bodies to turn into skeletons in Sri Lanka.

Almost as an indication of the ‘helpful inaction’ of India during the last days, when Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa was asked about India’s stand on the UN Report, he told a gathering of local heads of media institutions that “India has always acted with co-operation with Sri Lanka. Our relations have been good at all times”.

In India’s defense, though, it can be said that there is only so much that a nation can do in internal matters of another sovereign nation – unless you are the U.S. i.e. So, it had no option to believe Sri Lanka, when during the course of the war, President Rajapaksa assured the Indian government by means of many interactions between the two nations that he was awaiting the recommendation of the All Party Representative Committee (APRC) to finalise his course of action. The APRC, it may be remembered, was appointed in 2006 to address the underlying problems that were causing the civil war like situation in the island nation.

As it turned out, quite expectedly, in the triumphant hours of the elimination of the LTTE, the Rajapaksa government unceremoniously dumped the entire APRC process. India hasn’t said anything about that too – maybe in the fear of pushing Sri Lanka further in to the lap of China and Pakistan, who are gradually occupying the Lankan geo-political space that is slipping out from India’s grasp.

And the Indian fear is not totally unfounded, as can be seen in the Wanni, a land between Jaffna and Anuradhapura that is considered to be a historical heartland of Sri Lanka. It was also one of the sites of the most brutal army operations against the retreating LTTE and its supporters. Thousands of people in the Wanni are still in camps or under tents and have already weathered two monsoons in the aftermath of the war horror. But while the Lankan government is putting up quarters for the security forces personnel in the Wanni with building materials imported from China, India’s offer of building 50,000 houses for the displaced people is singularly stuck in the geo-political skirmish.

A big part of the present Lankan attitude towards India stems from the belief in the island nation of India playing a ‘double game’ with it on the issue of the war. Sri Lankans believe that last year, India had not supported the letter of the Non Aligned Movement (NAM) that had sought to oppose the decision of the UN Secretary General to appoint a panel of experts to advise him on the Sri Lankan war. The charge is that even today India remains an extremely influential country in the NAM arena and if it had so desired, it could have played a key role in forcing the world community to heed to NAM suggestion of not appointing the panel. But, apparently, it chose to wilt under western pressure.

Even now, after the release of the report, India has said nothing to soothe the Lankan nerves – unlike Russia, which has been unequivocal in its support for Sri Lanka.

Making it worse for India, Sri Lankans generally believe that Hardeep Singh Puri, India’s Permanent Envoy to UN, had met the Secretary General’s Advisory Panel before the finalizing of the report, but inspite of – allegedly – knowing the content of the report, did nothing to help the Lankan cause, in terms of the harsh tone of the Report.

The only possible ‘sympathetic reason’ cited by the locals is the never-ending friction that projects proposed or carried out by the Indian companies or government has been facing since the arrival of the Rajapaksa government.

But that is a minority view. The majority in the island – as probably in most SAARC nations – believe that India has always liked acting the Big Brother of the region and that it is trying to extract its pound of flesh from the Lankan government through its silence. If ever more ammunition was needed by the Lankans, Hardeep Singh Puri was an apprentice to the Indian High Commissioner of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) days, J N Dixit – a man despised in Sri Lanka because of his alleged approach of a ‘British Viceroy’.  

And yet, Sri Lanka can barely ignore India’s support in the matter. President Mahinda Rajapaksa had spoken to PM Manmohan Singh soon after the report had arrived. And inspite of the chill in relations, Colombo would be banking on India to bail itself out of the unfavourable spotlight. A fortnight ago, President Rajapaksa had told the Lankan media that India’s support was important in his government’s attempt to tackle the current impasse over the UN Report.

Part of the Lankan confidence stems from the belief that India actually wanted the elimination of the LTTE. Since India is said to have known exactly what was happening inside the so called `no fire zone’ (NFZ) during the gruesome last days of the war, the belief is that India (too) believed that a political solution for the Tamil community was feasible only after the decimation of the LTTE.

Agreeing with the above, Gordon Weiss had told BBC that

“The Indians were aware of the civilian casualties, because I believe they had very good intelligence sources inside the conflict zone”

…before adding that the Indians wanted to see the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam destroyed.

Interestingly, at the peak of the cold war, when Indira Gandhi was the Prime Minister of India, India was said to have watered the LTTE plant till its absolute nutrition. Unlike India’s association with the then USSR, Sri Lanka was closer to the U.S. So, when the the Tamil issue raised its head prominently in Sri Lanka, Indira saw it an opportune moment to drive home a point to Sri Lanka.

Narasimha Rao, former Prime Minister of India and the then Foreign Minister of India, organized peace talks in Thimpu ( Bhutan) in July-August 1985 between Sri Lankan all the Tamil groups aimed at bringing an end to the Sri Lankan civil war.

What followed was the so-called ‘Thimpu Declaration’, which broadly stated the following:

(1)          It is our considered view that any meaningful solution to the Tamil national question must be based on the following four cardinal principles:

(2)        Recognition of the Tamils of Ceylon as a nation

(3)        Recognition of the existence of an identified homeland for the Tamils of Ceylon

(4)        Recognition of the right of self determination of the Tamil nation

(5)        Recognition of the right to citizenship and the fundamental rights of all Tamils of Ceylon

The Tamil side was represented by the Eelam People’s Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF), Eelam Revolutionary Organization of Students (EROS), Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), People’s Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO) and Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF).

Expectedly, the Sri Lankan government rejected all but the last condition, claiming that the rest violated Sri Lanka’s sovereignty.

Around that time, the Indian government is said to have started giving military training to Tamil youth. So, in a manner of speaking, the LTTE and all other Sri Lankan Tamil groups had military bases in Tamil Nadu, the southern-most state of India. The idea was to escalate the LTTE and other groups’ activities and then use the handle on them as the negotiating leverage while settling the Tamil issue in Sri Lanka.

Like most misadventures, that too eventually became just that – a misadventure. And in the process, it cost the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, a former Prime Minister of India himself and, ironically, the son of Indira Gandhi, at the hands of the LTTE.

It is that assassination that ended the romance between India and the LTTE.

Unfortunately, the Tamil issue persisted – with India not knowing which way to go. So, while officially it went ahead with the listing of the LTTE as a global terrorist organisation and did precious little to stop the Sri Lankan army excess on the banned outfit’s cadres and citizen supporters, it played to the gallery in the state of Tamil Nadu by talking of the rights of the Lankan Tamils. Alas, as it often happens in cases of double-speak, the Indian state earned few brownie points from either side.

So, while the Sri Lankan side is gradually moving into the lap of China (alongside Pakistan), India is facing heat from all political parties in Tamil Nadu on the UN Report.

Tamil Nadu’s present Chief Minister, J Jayalalitha, recently asked the Indian government to take a stand “at least now (post the UN Report)”, so that the Sri Lankan President and the army chief etc are made to stand trial before International court of Justice:

“The sweet argument of the Sri Lankan government is involved in humanitarian relief efforts on a policy of “no hurt to innocent civilians” has been done to dust by the 214 page UN report.”

In fact, all the political parties of the state have been seeking Rajapaksa’s trial in the international court of justice for crime against (Tamil) citizens.

DMK, which has an alliance with the ruling regime in New Delhi, too stated the following in one of its resolutions:

“Indian government must take necessary action so that those responsible for war crimes in Sri Lanka are brought to book”.

PMK, a DMK ally, had long gone even step further, by asking the Indian government to support and take steps for formation of Tamil nation in the wake of the report!

At the same time VCK, another DMK ally, had demanded immediate convening of a special (Indian) parliament session to discuss the UN report “in the light of its significance for India as a powerful player in South Asia”.

Amidst the din of Tamil voices, comfort has come for the Indian government from the most unexpected quarters. LTTE leader Shanmugam Kumaran Tharmalingam (alias Selvarasa Pathmanathan, Kumaran Pathmanathan or simply KP), who took over the leadership of LTTE after the death of Prabhakaran and is presently in custody has said that his message for the Tamil diaspora (especially in the UK and Norway) and Tamil Nadu politicians is a simple one:

“The war is over, now help us rebuild and work for peace. 50 years ago, our people (Tamil Lankans) were first educationally and economically. Today, we are 50 years behind. For the purpose, the Indian government should engage with Sri Lanka in a manner that allows for a peaceful settlement, which gives a chance to Tamils in Sri Lanka to forget the past.”

Fortunately or otherwise, that’s the only thing that India can – or should – do at the moment.

The rest of the SAARC region is expected to pose pretty little problem to the Sri Lankan government on the issue. While Pakistan is an ally, with an ever increasing span of cooperation (under the watchful eyes of China and much concern for India), the rest of the member nations are covered well by the island nation.

While in Bangladesh just prior to the public release of the UN Report, President Rajapaksa thanked Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and the Government of Bangladesh for their steadfast support in combating separatist terrorism in Sri Lanka, and specifically for extending support to Sri Lanka at international forums, including the UN Human Rights Council.

Nepal, it may be remembered, too was on the same page during that UNHRC voting, and had bailed out Sri Lanka on the issue 2 years ago. With the Himalayan nation grappling with its own constitutional crisis at the moment, it is anyway not in much of a state to changes its stance on the Sri Lankan war at this juncture.

Maldives, apart from Pakistan, has been one of the most vocal defenders of the Rajapaksa government. The Maldivian foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem told journalists in Colombo last month that the UN report is “singularly counterproductive”. “The focus should now be on how the country can move forward”, he further added.

Giving him company, Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed’s Press Secretary Mohamed Zuhair emphasised that the Maldives saw the end of both the terrorist attacks and the civil war in Sri Lanka as “a very positive development.” He further added:

“The post-war was fluid. I’m concerned the UN report is a bit belated. Why say it now? Why not when the war was going on? My point is that this report only appeared after the war was over. We support the Sri Lankan government’s desire for peace and harmony, and any government that brought about that peace should be held in high honour.”

At the heart of the vocal support lies the truth of Sri Lanka being one of the Maldives’ key economic partner and the principal transit hub for both trade and tourists of the region visiting the country. Last November, President Rajapaksa extended a USD 200 million credit line to Maldives. Moreover, he even traveled to the Maldives to mediate a dispute between the ruling Maldivian Democratic Party and opposition Dhivehi Rayyithunge Party (DRP) in July last year! Continuing the bonhomie, Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed subsequently attended Rajapaksa’s swearing in ceremony.

Interestingly, and applying a different yardstick to a non-partner nation, the Maldivian Foreign Ministry only recently declared that it was severing diplomatic ties with the African nation because of “clear evidence that the Gaddafi regime is guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes.”

And then the South Asia nations portray the U.S. as the sole torch-bearer of double standards!

Rwanda is often cited as the UN’s greatest failure. Bosnia can surely be added to the list. Most indicators, unfortunately, suggest that the Sri Lankan war too would find its place in that list. And to think of it, the war belongs to a region where out of 8 nations, one is vying for a UNSC seat, while its fiercest rival – – with due help from a dubious (in the context of the region’s geo politics) player with a UNSC veto power – is burning midnight oil to facilitate the opposite.

// Series Concluded //

Chapter 2:
Post UN Report on War, it is War on the Report in Sri Lanka

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The Sri Lankan reaction to the UN Report (“ Advisory Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka Allegations”) on alleged war crimes committed by the two sides in Sri Lanka has been as emotionally violent as the war itself was physically.

Even before it was formally published, a leaked version of it appeared in the Sri Lankan media, leading to a cacophony of voices against the UN. Speaking in the Sri Lankan Parliament, the Minister for External Affairs Prof. GL Peiris said, “It is not a UN Report, but was constituted at the private initiative of the UN Secretary General. It has no investigative power, it is not a fact finding body. The Advisory panel has no formal nexus with the United Nations”. He further added that while “Colombo was involved in a reconciliation process with the Tamils, the Advisory Panel Report would sharpen the dividing lines between the Sinhala and the Tamil communities”.

Later, on May 1, barely a week after the release of the UN report, about 200,000 people came together in 11 rallies at Colombo Town Hall, carrying huge banners and effigies that poured tasteless scorn on the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, by calling him a monkey.

The fact that the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa was the principal architect of the raised temperature of country-wide protests became clear when he, amidst his 12-15 meter tall posters and a sea of Sri Lankan flags, addressed the protestors:

”There are certain international conspiracies that want to bring back the terrorism that we defeated. This is a take back of the victory we achieved with enormous dedication and patience.

During the war, we initiated a massive humanitarian operation to rescue more than 300,000 people from the clutches of the LTTE. We clothed them, fed them, gave them medicine, shelter, and help to resettle them.

Is this a crime or a violation of human rights?”

Completing the full picture of the ‘organising committee’ of the May Day protest were ministers of President Rajapakse’s United People’s Freedom Alliance.

Till the sun went down, the air in Colombo echoed with slogans such as “Ban Ki-moon, we don’t want you. We want our president”; supported in good measure by barely concealed disrespect for UN and the U.S. via placards that read “Banki is a Yankee. Go home” and “We reject the UN.”

As an interesting aside, here’s something for those protesters:

About 23 years ago, in 1988-90, Sri Lanka had regressed into such an all-encompassing violence that distinguished anthropologist Valentine Daniel had commented, “violence is no longer inter-ethnic, but intra-ethnic, with Tamils killing Tamils, Sinhalas killing Sinhalas and the State killing the most, Sinhalas and the Tamils”.

It was a period of that saw a cocktail of LTTE violence, the arrival of Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) into Sri Lanka and the consequent second uprising by the Janata Vimukti Peramuna (JVP), a Marxist-Leninist, Communist political party that first drew international attention in 1971 because of its revolt against the Bandaranaike government, in which about 15,000 – mostly youth – lost their lives.

The arrival of the IPKF was just the shot-in-the-arm that JVP could have ever asked for. It quickly put aside its communist ideology and jumped on to the massive Sinhala outrage against the Indian forces in their country. Riding on the wave of it being seen as a champion of Sinhalese nationalist feelings, the JVP began to hit violently at both the state machinery and those sections of civil society that opposed its ideas and methods. Based in Matara, in south Sri Lanka, the JVP murdered thousands of people and brought the entire nation to its knees through its violently-enforced general strikes. That continued for 2 years, till the Sri Lankan army gradually got the upper hand and captured & killed most of JVP’s higher leaders – and thousands of its own Sinhalese youth.

While the decimation of ‘Sinhala nationalist youth’ was going on at the hands of the Sri Lankan army, a young Sinhala politician left the shores of Sri Lanka, made a base in Geneva and pleaded fervently for UN intervention to save his Sinhalese friends.

That young politician was Mahinda Rajapaksa, the present Sri Lankan President.

Maybe the UN is no longer what it used to be!

Meanwhile, inspite of the outright rejection of the UN report by Sri Lanka, the fact remains that Sri Lanka is now facing renewed Western pressure to submit to an international probe over allegations that thousands (40,000, as per one estimate) of civilians were killed by the time the 25-year internal war ended in the island nation.

Although the report had nailed the LTTE, which – apart from all other violent crimes against humanity – kept about 300,000 of its own people captive as human shields and shot them from point-blank range when found suitable, the truth of the moment is that with the organisation now being decimated, any prosecutions by the international probe panel would hit only the Sri Lankan government! And that makes it the UN role even less palatable to the Lankans.

In an emotionally surcharged atmosphere, it has now become a world Vs. Sinhalese (Sri Lanka’s ethnic majority) scenario; with the report being seen as an attack on the country and its army.

Interpreted as a document that absolutely exonerates the LTTE, the government has opposed the report from the outset, while most government ministers and prominent Sinhalese have condemned it as ”one-sided” and ”baseless”. Sri Lanka had actually even refused entry for the three UN investigators and denied them permission to speak to senior government officials.

The Sri Lankan conviction lies in a pretty straight-forward belief:

“What the government did was protect innocent civilians from the clutch of terrorists.

Children who went to school were forcibly taken to fight during those days. Today, they play cricket. Students who wore cyanide capsules around their necks today learn chemistry.

Are these human rights violations or crimes?”

In fact, most Sri Lankans – belonging to the majority Sinhalese community anyway – express their bemusement at the prospect of their country facing war crimes inquiry for defeating an enemy that was declared a terrorist organisation by the U.S., UN and about 3 dozen other countries. For them, it is a clear case of double standards of the western nations – especially in the light of UN’s unmitigated disasters in places like Rwanda.

And yet, the country had clearly foreseen this. Maybe that explains why it was quick to form a Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) to look into the various aspects of the war and the future of the nation. The idea seemed simple enough – to pre-empt and ride over any international inquiry on the war crimes. For, if all the witnesses were to give their testimonies in front of international agencies, the Sri Lankan government would have come out looking very bad; and, who knows, maybe ended up facing war crime charges a la Bosnian genocide leaders.

So, following a mandate given by the Sri Lankan President, LLRC, under the Chairmanship of Chitta Ranian de Silva Esquire, President’ s Counsel and retired Attorney General, set out to inquire  and report on the following matters that may have taken place during the period between 21, February 2002 and19, May 2009, namely;

(i)      The facts and circumstances which led to the failure of the ceasefire agreement operationalized on 27,February 2002 and the sequence of events that followed thereafter up to the 19th of May 2009;

(ii)      Whether any person, group or institution – directly or indirectly – bears responsibility in this regard;

(iii)      The lessons we would learn from those events and their attendant concerns, in order to ensure that there will be no recurrence;

(iv)      The methodology whereby restitution to any person affected by those events or their dependants or their heirs, can be effected;

(v)      The institutional, administrative and legislative measures which need to be taken in order to prevent any recurrence of such concerns in the future, and to promote further national unity and reconciliation among all communities, and to make any such other recommendations with reference to any of the matte$ that have been inquired into under the terms of this Warant

In the opening statement itself, the Chairman of the commission had set the tone of the government favoured exercise:

As we are all aware, people of our country have gone through the traumatic nightmare of 30 years of war, which ravaged our motherland.  It is just one year back that our military forces were able to vanquish the most ruthless terrorist organization in the world.  Time has now come to consolidate the military victory by addressing the root causes of the conflict and to establish national unity and reconciliation.

In the same statement, he then outlined the procedure that the Commission proposed to adopt:

Sittings will be held in public, but of course if persons making representations before this Commission so require this Commission will hold sittings in camera.  All matters which affect the security concerns of this country also will be held in camera.  Otherwise the sittings would be open to the public.  Persons making representations are entitled to make their opening statements and thereafter the Commissioners could ask them questions for the purpose of clarification and also on matters which are relevant to the Warrant.  Members of the public are not entitled to ask any questions from persons making representations before this Commission.

It all sounded good on paper; alas somehow it just did not add up. For the opponents of the government anyway.

As the recently released UN Report highlights, the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) appointed by the President in May 2010 could never have been able to achieve the precise purpose “due to lack of independence and impartiality”. The UN Report clearly mentions:

“The LLRC is deeply flawed, does not meet international standards for an effective accountability mechanism and, therefore, does not and cannot satisfy the joint commitment of the President of Sri Lanka and the Secretary General to an accountability process.”

Giving credence to the doubts about its intentions, and despite claiming that the LLRC is being held in public, the Sri Lankan government blocked coverage of the hearings by international broadcasters like the BBC. Though, it was not too much out of sync with the regular practice of Sri Lankan government officials to accuse journalists, both foreign and domestic, of bias against the government.

Outrageous as it may sound, most Sri Lankan Tamils believe that the LLRC is a mere eyewash and was set up primarily under the direction of India’s intelligence wing, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), in order to have a face saver amidst extreme pressure from the politically important southern Indian State of Tamil Nadu!

That aside, the mute question about the LLRC is this: Can the victor be the sole arbitror in a conflict between the victorious and the vanquished? If not, then can the Tamilians in Sri Lanka have faith in the LLRC?

Most Tamilians don’t. But some do; and they do go to the LLRC to narrate their horrors in front of the commission – knowing full well of that the people across the table are the representatives of their ‘enemy’.

Fortunately for those deposing in front of the LLRC, even though the armed forces and other government agencies are restricting media outlets in the coverage of the hearings, Tamils who are living abroad do have the opportunity to record what the civilians have been giving in their testimonies – because the Commission hears the complaints in public, thereby allowing sympathizers of the Tamil cause to relay the statements to the world.

And they are indeed doing that.

On one hand, they have been successful in getting ‘diplomatic successes’ such as this Declaration by the European Union on the UN Report on Sri Lanka, they have been quite active in carrying out street protests too – the fear of which had forced the Sri Lankan President to abandon his UK visit around the time of the release of the UN Report. Earlier last week, scores of British Tamils staged a night long vigil in Trafalgar Square to protest against Sri Lankan government’s ‘inability’ to provide an impartial and independent investigation into the last days of the civil war.  “As Tamils we have been waiting for two long years seeking justice for our dead, injured and orphaned,” President of the Global Tamil Forum, Father S J Emmanuel said.

While public and organisational activities from both sides are at the peak, the UN, typically, is still in a comatose state. The most that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has said so far on the subject is that “he is ‘still deciding’ on what the UN’s next step should be following the report.

Not only is the silence going to earn him or the UN any positives, opinions are becoming even shriller in the wake of the status-quo. Vidar Helgesen, former Deputy Foreign Minister of Norway, said this week that it is the international community’s duty to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity. But even he couldn’t help hide his frustration by adding:

“As Sri Lanka has not ratified the International Criminal Court (ICC), the only way to engage ICC on Sri Lanka is through the UN Security Council.  I am not the best placed person to suggest how China and Russia could be convinced and how one could pass a resolution at the UN Security Council.”

May with the intention of plugging that one troublesome spot, Sri Lanka is now all set launch a pre-emptive offensive ahead of the UN Human Rights Council sessions that begins in Geneva on May 30 to ward-off any moves to trigger a debate on allegations of human rights violations during the last stages of the fighting against the LTTE. Plantations Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, Irrigation Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva and Attorney General Mohan Peiris have been assigned the task.

One of the principal parts of the campaign would involve tackling the issue of a video footage telecast by Britain’s Channel 4 (and even Al Jazeera in its program People & Power) that purportedly showed soldiers shooting LTTE cadres held in their custody. The Sri Lanka delegation plans to convince the international community of the dubious authenticity of the video by categorically stating that the video was filmed with high quality equipment, which could not have been available in the battle zone at the time. The people behind the video footage have claimed that the incident was filmed by a soldier on his mobile phone camera. Several other factors will be brought up to prove that the footage was bogus.

But even a bigger challenge, probably, for the Sri Lankan delegation would be to calm down the UN Human Rights High Commissioner Navi Pillay, who has been extremely belligerent in her demand for a follow-up action on the UN Report. How that would be achieved is anybody’s guess at the moment.

On the last occasion, during the 11th Special Session of the UN Human Rights Council on 26-27 May 2009, when the question of Human Rights situation in Sri Lanka was discussed, Colombo was able to muster the support of not only China, Russia and Pakistan, but also, quite interestingly, India. Moreover, the resolution of the time had come down heavily on LTTE, without questioning Sri Lanka on anything.

But it might be a lot trickier for it this time around, what with all the ‘evidence’ floating around in public domain. For the moment, the ball is in the UN Secretary General’s court, who says that the UN cannot act on the advisory panel’s recommendation to investigate, saying this could only happen if Sri Lanka agreed to a probe or if the UN Security Council or Human Rights Council voted to take action.

While Sri Lanka can count on unflinching support in the Security Council from Russia and China for its opposition to a probe, it remains to be seen whether it can muster enough backing at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

The UNHRC will be in session till June 17. The 47 member Council comprises Thailand (Chairman), Angola, Argentina, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chile, China, Cuba, Djibouti, Ecuador, France, Gabon, Ghana, Guatemala, Hungary, Japan, Jordan, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Malaysia, the Maldives, Moldova, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Uganda, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, the United States, Uruguay and New Zealand.

// End of Chapter 2 //

###

NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 3 – Indian Riddle and the SAARC Ripple

Chapter 1: Delayed Account of a Reluctant Outrage

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A 3-member Panel of Experts was appointed by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon to advise him about human rights violations during the last phase of the civil war in Sri Lanka. The UN released the report of the panel on April 26, 2011 in New York.
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Few amongst those outside the White House – and elsewhere in the U.S. – who were dancing, waving flags and chanting “U.S.A, U.S.A” at the news of Osama bin Laden’s elimination by U.S. Navy Seals in Pakistan would have known that two years ago, in 2009, people in Colombo and elsewhere in Sri Lanka were dancing in just the same manner, over the death of Vellupillai Prabhakaran, the founder of the dreaded Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (the LTTE or the Tamil Tigers).

In fact, it can be safely said that the crowd cheering Osama’s elimination would have been astonished beyond belief to learn that it wasn’t Osama, but Prabhakaran who had headed the only terrorist group in the world which boasted of an all-round military force – Tigers (infantry), Sea Tigers (sea wing) and Air Tigers (Air Wing)! The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in its January 10, 2008 report, had said that “LTTE is one of the most dangerous and deadly extremist outfits in the world and the world should be concerned about the outfit as they had ‘inspired’ networks worldwide, including the al-Qaeda in Iraq”.

And yet, again, how many on the streets of the U.S., the overstated leader of war on terror, would have heard of Prabhakaran?

But then, those everyday citizens can barely be blamed for the ignorance, when even their media and, more damningly, government had continually feigned ignorance of the steps leading to the killing of Prabhakaran, during which period, as per the recent UN report (see the bottom of the article), “tens of thousands lost their lives from January to May 2009, many of whom died anonymously in the carnage of the final few days.”

While publicly proclaiming innocence during the final days of the bloody conflict, the U.S. had absolutely no doubt about the orchestrators of, what has now come to be known as, the Lankan war crimes. As per a leaked U.S. Cable (via WikiLeaks) Ambassador Patricia Butenis had observed at the time of the conflict:

“… responsibility for many of the alleged crimes rests with the country’s senior civilian and military leadership, including President Rajapakse and his brothers and opposition candidate General Fonseka (the Sri Lankan Army Chief of the time).”

But it would be grossly unfair to aim the gun only at the U.S. The so-called international co-chairs of the Sri Lankan peace process— the U.S., the EU, Japan and Norway – largely remained silent even as more than 300,000 Tamil civilians were trapped and systematically slaughtered by both the Lankans and LTTE. Further, a UN Security Council Presidential statement, at the peak of the fighting, had failed to even mention anything about war crimes committed by the Rajapakse government, while being quick to demand immediate surrender by LTTE.

As the global community showed remarkable impotence during the final months of the Lankan war, the Rajapakse government was quick to break its pledge of stopping the use of heavy weapons and went ahead to use cluster bombs, tanks, heavy artillery and also air power across the LTTE stronghold, caring precious little for the presence of civilians or targets such as hospitals.

There were clear tell-tale signs of an ongoing and impending genocide. In an interview with Stewart Bell of the National Post newspaper of Canada, published on 23rd September 2008, the Commander of the Sri Lanka Army, General Sarath Fonseka had said:

“I strongly believe that this country belongs to the Sinhalese … but there are minority communities and we treat them like our people … They can live in this country with us. But they must not try to, under the pretext of being a minority, demand undue thing”

Similarly, an editorial in the right-wing Island, around the same time, made a mockery of all things human by making a rhetorical statement: “Who doesn’t know that war is synonymous with suffering?”

Alas, even as civilians were dying in hundreds every day, the world was busy weighing the many business and geo-political vantage avenues that Sri Lanka presents. The island nation’s strategic location in the Indian Ocean has long made it the epicenter of global one-upmanship. Of late, however, India’s reluctance to play any part in the Lankan conflict and USA’s fixation with the middle-east and home economy, inspite of perennial concern about China’s growing influence in the region, allowed Beijing to emerge as Sri Lanka’s largest donor and an unconditional supporter of the Rajapakse government’s war against LTTE. Chinese Jian-7 fighter jets, antiaircraft guns, JY-11 3D air surveillance radars and other supplied weapons are said to have played a pivotal role in the Sri Lankan military’s final success against LTTE.

Pakistan, Beijing’s friend on account of shared animosity with India, too walked along the dragon on its relations with Sri Lanka and raised its annual military assistance to Sri Lanka to nearly USD 100 million, while simultaneously supplying Chinese-origin small arms and training Sri Lankan air force personnel in precision guided attacks.

In return, Colombo gave the green light to Beijing for construction of a major port in the southern town of Hambantota. It fitted extremely well into China’s long-term naval strategy of defending its trade routes; and gave sleepless nights to India, which regards Sri Lanka as part of its regional sphere of influence.

While the game of larger inaction and specific collusion (by China, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) was being played out, the United Nations political organs and bodies, by UN’s own admission, “failed to take actions that might have protected civilians“.

In other words, not one government or agency, which had the power to make a difference, took any step to stop the grave human tragedy from occurring – till the bloody war was eventually won in a brutal fashion by the Sri Lankan army.

Quite like Osama, Prabhakaran was an evil man and had killed and maimed thousands of people – and hence deserved ‘justice’ at the hands of ‘law’. But the people who did not deserve to be a party to the ‘justice’ were thousands of Tamil civilians, who got caught between the Sri Lankan army and LTTE – and got killed at both ends. In 2009, as per international estimates, about 1200 non-combatants (Tamils) were getting killed each month!

Further, as is now known:

Between September 2008 and 19 May 2009, the Sri Lanka Army advanced its military campaign into the Vanni using large-scale and widespread shelling in three consecutive No Fire Zones, where it had encouraged the civilian population to concentrate, even after indicating that it would cease the use of heavy weapons. It shelled the United Nations hub, food distribution lines and near the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) ships that were coming to pick up the wounded and their relatives from the beaches.

The Government systematically shelled hospitals on the frontlines. All hospitals in the Vanni were hit by mortars and artillery; some of them were hit repeatedly, despite the fact that their locations were well-known to the Government. The Government also systematically deprived people in the conflict zone of humanitarian aid, in the form of food and medical supplies, particularly surgical supplies, adding to their suffering.

It has to be admitted – and without an iota of reluctance – that the aforementioned is just one side of the story; it does not include the unmentionable violent act by the Tamil Tigers – including confinement and point-blank shooting by LTTE of the very people that the terrorist group championed fighting for, Sri Lankan Tamils. (More of LTTE violence in the next part)

And yet, even as heinous war crimes continued from both sides, a divided Security Council was initially said to have been reluctant to address Sri Lanka’s war, much less call for an inquiry!

But as it happens in today’s world, the word not only does go out eventually, it gets really loud. Soon, the entire world was getting to know the inhuman story of human cruelty via news stories such as this one on Al Jazeera:

As more evidence of serious human rights abuses and massive civilian casualties in the five-month offensive (which ended the war) kept mounting by the minute, UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, under tremendous pressure from Human Rights activists and many government quarters, appointed an ‘Advisory Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka Allegations’ in 2010.

Comprising Marzuki Darusman, a former Indonesian attorney general, Yasmin Sooka, a South African human rights expert, and Steven Ratner, a US lawyer, the panel began its work in September 2010.

Over the next 6 months, the panel’s primary task was to stay clear of partisan sources (like TamilNet.com and some Sri Lankan government sources) of information on incidents & casualties. An internal group, named ‘Crisis Operations Group’ took figures from the Regional Director of Health Services as the baseline. Simultaneously, information from National Staff of the United Nations and NGOs inside Vanni, the ICRC, and other sources were used to cross-check and verify the baseline.

At the end of the process, the panel submitted its findings to UN Secretary General on April 12, 2011 in New York. A copy of the report (see the bottom of the article) was made available ‘in its entirety’ to the government of Sri Lanka on 12 April; but the government refused to respond to the UN offer of publishing the Sri Lankan response to the panel’s finding alongside the report (see the bottom of the article).

In its report (see the bottom of the article), the panel has come down heavily not just on both the Sri Lankan government and LTTE, but also on the role of U.N. itself, for failing to speak out forcefully enough on civilian casualties during the fighting.

The Panel, the report (see the bottom of the article) says, found ‘credible allegations’, which if proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law were committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Here are the respective indictments of the two warring sides in the report (see the bottom of the article):

Credible allegations that comprise five core categories of potential serious violations committed by the Government of Sri Lanka:

(i) Killing of civilians through widespread shelling;
(ii) Shelling of hospitals and humanitarian objects;
(iii) Denial of humanitarian assistance;
(iv) Human rights violations suffered by victims and survivors of the conflict, including both IDPs and suspected LTTE cadre; and
(v) Human rights violations outside the conflict zone, including against the media and other critics of the Government.

Credible allegations against the LTTE associated with the final stages of the war reveal six core categories of potential serious violations:

(i) Using civilians as a human buffer;
(ii) Killing civilians attempting to flee LTTE control;
(iii) Using military equipment in the proximity of civilians;
(iv) Forced recruitment of children;
(v) Forced labour; and
(vi) Killing of civilians through suicide attacks.

Following up on the ‘charge-sheet’, the panel also made some pointed recommendations to all the concerned parties – principal aspects of which include investigations on the alleged war crimes by an international panel, short and long term accountability measures by the Sri Lankan government and even a comprehensive review of the actions (or the lack of it) of the U.N. during the war and the aftermath.

Significantly, the panel also recommends reconsideration of the Human Rights Council’s May 2009 Special Session Resolution (A/HRC/S-11/l.1/Rev.2) that congratulated Sri Lanka for ending the war, rather than calling for an investigation into mass civilian casualties.

While the reaction from Sri Lanka (which we would discuss in depth in the next part of this series), expectedly, was swift and resounding in its rejection of the report (see the bottom of the article) as being ‘biased and flawed’, the UN has – so far – sounded extremely guarded and, I may add, a little helpless on the subject.

In a rather defensive tone, the UN General Secretary said that the report (see the bottom of the article) was released ‘as a matter of transparency & accountability’ and that he hoped that ‘UN Member States would study it closely’ – thereby indirectly stating his inability to move any further on the case.

But, Human Rights Watch has protested Ban Ki Moon’s view that he lacks authority to personally order an international probe into possible war crimes in Sri Lanka, as recommended by the panel. It is joined by international human rights groups in urging further investigation of the report (see the bottom of the article).

The stark truth, however, is that while the Security Council may have come together to ratify NATO intervention in Libya, members like Russia and China are clearly against Ban Ki Moon getting any further inside Sri Lanka.

What does not help the matters for him is the growing chorus of shrill voices emerging from various quarters, after the tabling of the report (see the bottom of the article).

Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said she hoped that the “disturbing new information (carried in the report) will shock the conscience of the international community into finally taking serious action”.

Equally scathing, in a press release, was Amnesty International. “Almost two years after the end of the conflict, this UN report finally exposes the Sri Lankan government’s whitewash in its efforts to deny justice to the war’s victims,” said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific Director.

Similarly, Gordon Weiss, a former UN official in Sri Lanka who has written a book on the conflict, said the report (see the bottom of the article) has exposed a “frontal assault on international law that demanded accountability”. Equating it with the globally-condemned violations in the Bosnian war, he asserted that “the UN didn’t do enough” and that the report (see the bottom of the article) makes the world body culpable of “failing to use the available casualty figures”.

Expressing support to the report (see the bottom of the article) of the Panel of Experts, the European Union urged the Sri Lankan government to “recognise the constructive objectives of the report”, and encouraged it to “engage with the UNSG on its contents”.

Unusually usurping the acid tongue from USA, UK Foreign Office welcomed the Panel report and, amidst other things, made the following strong observation:

The serious nature of the allegations in the report underline that these allegations, and the issue of accountability for them, must be resolved before a lasting reconciliation can be achieved in Sri Lanka.

The U.S., on the other hand, was more measured in its reaction. In her statement, Susan Rice, the US Permanent Representative to the UN said:

The report highlights the need for an independent and full accounting of the facts in order to ensure that allegations of abuse are addressed and impunity for human rights violations is avoided. We strongly support the Secretary General’s call for the Sri Lankan authorities to respond constructively to the report and underscore our belief that accountability and reconciliation are inextricably linked.

Amidst tongue-lashing from all quarters, Sri Lanka got the lone international voice of comfort from its partner in the dark alley, China. The official Chinese release on the subject tersely mentioned:

China believes that the Government and people of Sri Lanka are capable of handling all relevant issues. We hope the international community can support and coordinate the endeavor of the Sri Lankan Government.

India, which is having to walk a tightrope over the issue because of its massive stake in the rehabilitation of Tamils in Sri Lanka on one hand, and strategic compulsions arising out of China’s dogged support to Colombo on the other, has merely said that it is “willing to engage Sri Lanka on the contents of the UN report”. The docile reaction may be unsurprising, but it still remains utterly disappointing – for, if there is any country that can make a difference in Sri Lanka, it remains India.

With human rights groups and some governments on one side, UNSC members like China and Russia on the other and absolute reluctance on part of the country that has the biggest stake in Sri Lanka and can play a direct role in any solution – India, it would be interesting to see how the UN Secretary General manages to walk the tightrope.

Experts suggest that one option for Ban Ki Moon would be to set up a commission of inquiry either at the International Criminal Court or another judicial body – as a possible first step toward a war-crimes prosecution. But with China definite to exercise its veto power on the matter, this may not work. All the same, other experts say that may other mechanisms too are at Ban’s disposal, if so wishes to explore.

Alan Kennan, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group based in London argues, “We think that the secretary-general has the authority under the UN charter to initiate a fact-finding body that could deepen the panel’s work”

Whatever may be the outcome, the following quote by Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, Sri Lankan Rights Campaigner, seems to sum up the whole scenario:

“The real issue here seems to be whether the two sides became the mirror image of each other, in trying to win a war. And that whether the end justified the means”

Read the complete 214-page report here:
Advisory Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka Allegations

// End of Chapter 1 //

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NEXT WEEK:
Chapter 2 – Post UN Report on War, It’s War on the Report in Sri Lanka