Home Archives for 2009

China’s interest in naval base: Gwadar or Hambantota or elsewhere?

“ Pakistan would be only too happy to respond positively to any Chinese request for naval base facilities at Gwadar. The only inhibiting factor for China would be the bad security situation in the area due to the ongoing Baloch freedom struggle. From the point of view of security, Hambantota could be ideal for the Chinese, but would the Sri Lankan Government agree to any such proposal if it comes from Beijing?”
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By B.Raman

(December 31,Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) Ships from the Chinese Navy patrolling the seas on anti-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden area for over a year now could not go to the rescue of De Xin Hai a Chinese bulk carrier with a Chinese crew of 25 members transporting coal which was hijacked by a group of Somali pirates 400 miles North-East of Seychelles and taken to the waters off Somalia in October last.

Their demand for ransom was initially resisted by the Chinese. How can China, which views itself as a power on par with the US, pay ransom? The Government-controlled media in China gave its people very few details of the hijacking, but those, who had been following the incident through the Internet, were certain that the Chinese would not cave in. They were hoping and expecting that the Chinese Navy would emulate the example of the US, Dutch and French Navies, whose special forces had rescued their seamen from the custody of the pirates during 2009. The US Navy’s Sea Air Land Commandoes (SEAL) had rescued the master of the US ship “Maersk Alabama” in an operation on April 4,2009. There were similar instances of intervention by the naval special forces of Holland and France.

Independent experts outside China were not hopeful of the Chinese Navy’s ability to intervene. They were certain that the Chinese Navy would ultimately have to cave in to the demands of the Somali pirates. The Jamestown Foundation, a prestigious American think-tank based in Washington DC, had predicted that China was unlikely to use its special forces in a rescue operation because it had too few ships in the area and its ships had no combat experience, especially in dealing with pirates. Moreover, there was the danger that while a botched-up operation could embarrass the Chinese Navy, a successful operation might worry Asian nations who have territorial disputes with China.

While Chinese Internet surfers and bloggers were eagerly waiting for news of the rescue of the Chinese bulk carrier and its crew by the Chinese Navy vessels patrolling in the area, news came from international shipping circles, which monitor the activities of the pirates, that the Chinese authorities managed to get back their ship and crew from the pirates on December 28,2009, after air-dropping sacks containing US $ four million on board the ship from a helicopter. The pirates collected the money and left the hijacked ship, which is now reported to be on its way back home.

The Chinese Government has so far not told its people that it paid a ransom in order to get the ship and its crew back. The “China Daily” News merely told its readers that the ship had been “successfully rescued”.

Their embarrassing experience with this incident has brought home to the Chinese the limitations from which their Navy suffers. One of the lessons mentioned by their experts is that the Chinese Navy could not hope to be the equal of its US counterparts unless it had overseas bases in areas of concern. Another lesson is that their ships on anti-piracy patrol feel handicapped due to the absence of a base in the area being patrolled by them where they can go periodically for refueling and re-stocking and for rest and recreation for their crew.

In an interview over the State radio on December 28,2009, Rear Admiral Yin Zhou, an expert of the Chinese Navy, said: “"I believe that a relatively stable, relatively solid base for resupply and repair would be appropriate. Such a base would provide a steady source of fresh food, along with facilities for communications, ship repair and recreation. Any definite decision to establish such a base would have to be taken by the Communist Party. Supplying and maintaining the ( Chinese) fleet off Somalia was challenging without such a base. Other nations were unlikely to object.”

He did not say where such a base could be located, if the Party ultimately accepted his suggestion. China already has two options before it---- Gwadar on the Balochistan coast in Pakistan and Hambantota in Sri Lanka. It has already constructed for Pakistan a commercial port at Gwadar, which is now being managed by a Singapore company. During a second stage, it is proposed to construct a naval base for the Pakistan Navy there. This could serve the purposes of the Chinese Navy too. The Chinese are helping Sri Lanka in the construction of a modern commercial port at Hambantota. There is presently no talk of a naval base there.

Pakistan would be only too happy to respond positively to any Chinese request for naval base facilities at Gwadar. The only inhibiting factor for China would be the bad security situation in the area due to the ongoing Baloch freedom struggle. From the point of view of security, Hambantota could be ideal for the Chinese, but would the Sri Lankan Government agree to any such proposal if it comes from Beijing?

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. He is also associated with the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )

“The program lasted for more than one hour. The entirety of the program was about the reason as to why the people of the country should express their gratitude to Mahinda Rajapaksha by voting for him.”
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(December 31, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Today’s (31st December 2009, 7 am Sri Lanka time) ‘Subharathi’ program was completely devoted to election propaganda in favour of one of the candidates, Mahinda Rajapaksha, with direct and indirect adverse and damaging references being made throughout the program against another candidate, General Sarath Fonseka. The program called people to vote for Mahinda Rajapaksha at the election on the 26th as an act of gratitude by the people of the country to their greatest leader.

The program producer was Sumith Bandara and the two persons interviewed during the program were Venerable Walpola Piyananda, a monk based in the United States, and Anagarika Dharmasekara. The theme of the program was on gratitude. It was meant to be a discussion of the Buddhist approach to the understanding of gratitude. However, the program was a cheap propaganda piece expressing adulation to Mahinda Rajapaksha and extorting people to vote for him as an act of gratitude. The other candidate, General Fonseka, was portrayed as an ungrateful person who should be shunned.

Though meant to be a religious discussion, in fact it was entirely a political discussion clothed in Buddhist language, making references to Arahath Mahinda and Sangamitha. Mahinda Rajapaksha was elevated in the discussion to the same status, and also compared with historical personalities such as Dutugamunu and other great kings. It was a piece of the most vulgar form of political propaganda.

The program lasted for more than one hour. The entirety of the program was about the reason as to why the people of the country should express their gratitude to Mahinda Rajapaksha by voting for him. Even the questions from outside through telephone were organized in a way to exemplify the virtues of Mahinda Rajapaksha and to portray General Sarath Fonseka as a villain.

During an election, the use of state media for propaganda on behalf of one of the candidates is a direct violation of the election law. The election commissioner should call for the recording of the program to be sent to him and should take further steps to ensure that the directors of the SLBC be warned against abusing the state media for election propaganda directly or indirectly. The ‘Subharathi’ program on the 30th of December (yesterday) was also designed for similar purposes.

The SLBC directors should initiate a disciplinary inquiry into the conduct of the program producer Sumith Bandara and the program directors that are conducting the ‘Subharathi’ program, and prevent these persons from carrying out any other programs during the period of elections. While pending inquiries, the employees of SLBC should be interdicted.

All opposition candidates should watch for the abuse of state media. The organizations monitoring the elections should monitor this aspect, and take these matters up with the election commissioner and in their reports.

-SLBC Watch

Korean Buddhists (Quietly) helping their neighbors

- Let’s all take a lesson from Good Hands, shall we? I think we can all apply it to some corner of our minds or lives where we still have judgments, still have attachments, and still think we can give under the guise of “give-and-take.”
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By Dr. Stephen Long

(December 31, Los Angeles, California , Sri Lanka Guardian) I just returned a few days ago from a visit to South Korea where I had the very good fortune to meet Ven. Wol Joo, the prime monk and leader of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism. There are approximately 15 million members and 5,000 branch temples in his organization, and he is a very powerful figure in that energetic society. The President comes to visit him (not the other way around), and it is very rare for a Korean – even rarer for a foreigner – to meet this esteemed religious leader – much less have the opportunity to have tea with him three times, as we did.

We were also his guests for the weekend at a “Temple-Stay” experience in a 4th century mountain temple/national treasure called Guemsan, which is an architectural work of art. “Temple-Stay” is the way Ven. Wol Joo and the Korean Buddhists share their religion with others: invite them to experience it first-hand by living with the monks, getting up and meditating with them at 3:00 a.m., and doing chores on the temple premises. It snowed the entire weekend we had our Temple-Stay, and seeing snow-covered bamboo and passing through the “not-two” gate were high points I’ll never forget.

I also had the honor of meeting Ven. Ilgam, one of the brightest spiritual lights I have ever met, and who undoubtedly was, he decided, my brother in a previous rebirth. He was in charge of our Temple-Stay at Guemsan (and Director of the Temple-Stay Center), and I had the privilege of meditating with him and conversing with him at length – using only our eyes and hearts. I also met Mr. Nam-Jae Lee, the Managing Director of Good Hands, an NGO funded by Ven. Wol Joo and the Jogye Order; he was also part of our Temple-Stay group, and I was delighted to learn about the humanitarian projects sponsored by this prosperous Buddhist order.

The general mission of Good Hands is: to provide international relief services when needed, to provide safe drinking water where needed, to educate children in poverty-stricken areas and provide for their health care, to sponsor agricultural development projects, and to provide humanitarian support for North Korea. Mr. Nam-Jae Lee is a former pro-democracy activist from the infamous Kwangju/President Jeon era of the early 1980’s; he now channels his energies and metta into Good Hands projects in seven countries – and is expanding to additional countries over the next two years (including Bangladesh, Colombia, Ethiopia, and Tanzania). His father was a Buddhist monk, and his brother followed him on this path. Mr. Lee would also like to become a monk one day, but his current commitment to Good Hands supersedes any personal agenda. He is indeed a remarkable, dedicated individual, and I look forward to being his friend for many years to come.

I am writing this article because I find Good Hands to be the ideal NGO, one that truly sets an example – indeed the gold standard – for all others, regardless of scope, size, or country of origin. Good Hands very modestly refrains from blowing its own horn, and its low profile makes it little-known in the international community. The whole notion of NGO has left a bad taste in the mouths of most Sri Lankans after the LTTE terrorist experience (I recall writing about a few of these in earlier columns), but I am very happy to report that there is a model out there that I hope everyone else will emulate: Good Hands from Korea.

Good Hands was founded in late 2003, and began its humanitarian activities in Cambodia. It started by constructing village wells (called “Living Water” projects), building and repairing school facilities in backward areas, and quarantining individuals who were risks to community health. Since that time it has constructed and opened several kindergartens, primary schools, and other facilities for youth in Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, post-tsunami Sri Lanka, Siberia, and Mongolia.

It has set up micro businesses in Russia for needy Korean families, and opened a Korean school in the maritime province of Siberia for Korean children. It developed an economic aid program in Mongolia that improved water resources.

It has also set up two agricultural micro businesses in Sri Lanka. These are mushroom farms that help poor women in Matara earn a decent living to support their families. In addition to the kindergarten it built for Sri Lankan children, Good Hands also provided several water tanks for the tsunami-affected people in the South, and constructed a multi-use village hall in a tsunami refugee camp. I’m sure the good people of Sri Lanka have expressed their thanks to their friends at Good Hands for their generous contributions.

In Kenya, Good Hands established a “Living Water” project, and a program to educate the public on health and hygiene. It also set up an agricultural program in Kenya that helps villagers achieve sustainability. In Nepal they are currently rebuilding an old and damaged school facility; and in Myanmar, Good Hands rebuilt a school and provided rice for communities affected by Cyclone Nargis in 2008.

Good Hands seems to have done more for Cambodia than any other country in its outreach program – possibly because it was its first recipient country. They built schools and kindergartens in Kkurangyau, Kunai, Pumkunai, Younghwa, and Angkor Chey villages. The project that impresses me the most is “Living Water 1000,” a program to build 1,000 wells to supply drinking water to over 200,000 poor Cambodian villagers who previously suffered from fatal diseases related to contaminated water. Next month Ven. Wol Joo will travel to Cambodia along with Ven. Ilgam and Mr. Lee to celebrate the completion of their 1,000th well, a project that took five years. By the way, these wells are environmentally-friendly, and all are hand-operated; most of them are in areas that still don’t have electricity.

Ven. Wol Joo also supports several “comfort women,” the sex slave survivors of the Imperial Japanese forces of WWII who are now in their 80’s and 90’s. The Jogye Order funds a home for these lone women called “House of Sharing” near Seoul. It is next to a small museum exhibiting the paintings the women do for psychological and emotional therapy, and displaying other artifacts from that shameful era in history that has yet to be apologized for by the Japanese Government. More to come on this issue…

I visited House of Sharing with my colleagues from America and Seoul; we were doing research for a feature film on the subject of comfort women, and we wanted to personally meet some of the survivors while a few of them are still alive. One of the surviving women came over and gave me a big hug and proudly told me (through a translator) that she had had the privilege of donating her last remaining money to pay for the 1,000th clean-water drinking well in Cambodia. Needless to say, I was moved to tears, as were all of us. We made friends with the kind old ladies that day, and they insisted we stay for dinner and see their rooms – something that has never happened when others had visited before. It was because of our reported acceptance by these women that Ven. Wol Joo became curious about our group, and wanted to meet us the following day. It was a lucky moment for all concerned.

The great thing about Good Hands is that hardly anyone knows about them. They go about doing their good works quietly, and they leave no footprints when they are gone. They have a “no strings attached” policy, they ask for absolutely nothing in return, and there is never a whisper of religious proselytizing. They go to these countries to practice dana, the Buddha’s generosity, and have no attachment to outcome – other than to be remembered for their metta, their universal benevolence for all.

Let’s all take a lesson from Good Hands, shall we? I think we can all apply it to some corner of our minds or lives where we still have judgments, still have attachments, and still think we can give under the guise of “give-and-take.”

Sectarian terrorism in Pakistan during 2009

“This resulted in Al Qaeda joining hands with the Pakistani Taliban and Punjabi organizations such as the LEJ and the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM) in attacking the Shias in the Kurram Agency of the FATA, where there are a large number of Shias and in the Dera Ismail Khan area of the NWFP.”
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By B.Raman

(December 31, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) The year 2009 ended with two attacks by suicide bombers on processions to mark the culmination of the period of Muhurrum observed by the Shias of Pakistan. Fifteen persons were killed in the first incident at Muzzafarabad, the capital of Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK), on December 27. Forty-two were killed in the second incident in Karachi on December 28.

Sectarian clashes between Shias and Sunnis occur frequently in the Northern Areas consisting of Gilgit and Baltistan, where the Shias constitute the largest single sectarian group. To counter the growing influence of Shia sectarian organizations such as the Tehrik-e-Jaffria Pakistan and its militant wing called the Sipah Mohammad, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) had over the years encouraged and helped Sunni extremist organizations such as the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan and the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LEJ) to set up a presence in the Gilgit area. This has led to periodic clashes between the two communities.

The POK itself, where the Shias are in a very small minority, was till now relatively free of anti-Shia incidents. The attack on a Shia procession in Muzzafarabad has, therefore, comes as a surprise. One possible reason could be the anger of the Sunni organizations of the POK over the recent decision of the Government of President Asif Ali Zardari to upgrade the political status of the Northern Areas in order to make it a de facto separate province without giving it the de jure status of a separate province. This amounted to a rejection of the long-standing demand of the Sunni leaders and political organizations of the POK to merge the Northern Areas with the POK. The Shias were strongly opposed to it. It is quite likely that the attack on the Muhurrum procession at Muzzafarabad was in retaliation for this decision of the Zardari Govt to virtually recognize the separate status of the Kashmiri Shias in Pakistan.

Anti-Shia incidents and targeted assassinations of Shia professionals in Karachi have been a frequent occurrence ever since Pakistan became independent in 1947. When Pervez Musharraf was in power, a large number of Shia doctors were killed in Karachi by Sunni extremists. Sindh and the Baloch majority districts of Balochistan are the only areas of Pakistan where the extremist ideology of the Deobandi-Wahabi sects have spread the least. The majority of the Sunnis in these areas follow even today the more tolerant Barelvi sect and have kept away from the Deobandi/Wahabi groups. The Barelvis have more cordial relations with the Shias than the Deobandis and Wahabis. This has made both the Barelvi Sunnis and Shias of these areas the targets of periodic attacks by organizations such as the LEJ and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). In 2006, the entire leadership of the Barelvi Sunni Tehrik in Karachi was wiped out in a terrorist attack by a Sunni suicide bomber.

Since 2007, the sectarian strife in Pakistan has been rendered more virulent by certain developments such as the following:

(a). In an interview disseminated in December,2007, by As-Sahab, the propaganda wing of Al Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, its No.2, accused Iran of stabbing the Ummah in the back by allegedly colluding in the US occupation of Afghanistan and Iran. He said: “Iran stabbed the Muslim Ummah in the back and recorded a historic mark of shame against itself and against the Shites who follow it. The effects of this stab will stay in the memory of Muslims for a long time to come.”

(b). Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban suspected that the Pashtun Shias of the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas and the Dera Ismail Khan area of the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) were colluding with the Americans in their operations against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. They nursed similar suspicion against the Hazaras of Balochistan, who are Shias.

This resulted in Al Qaeda joining hands with the Pakistani Taliban and Punjabi organizations such as the LEJ and the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM) in attacking the Shias in the Kurram Agency of the FATA, where there are a large number of Shias and in the Dera Ismail Khan area of the NWFP.

The "Post", a Pakistani daily published from Peshawar,, reported as follows on December 31, 2007: "A delegation of notables from Kurram Agency has appealed to President Pervez Musharraf and Chief of Army Staff Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani to stop the ongoing violence that has resulted in the loss of more than 100 lives and billions of rupees' worth of property. Haji Latif Hussain, President, Kurram Welfare Society, said the residents had been fighting the Taliban infiltrating from Afghanistan, North and South Waziristan and Al Qaeda operatives in the area who were thousands in number. He added over 70 people had been killed in furious clashes during the last 45 days. "The armed forces of Pakistan are playing the role of silent spectators instead of countering the attackers and protecting the residents under attack," he said. Latif Hussain said Al Qaeda fighters had occupied various areas of Kurram Agency and blocked the main road from Peshawar to Parachinar, resulting in a shortage of basic commodities. "There is an acute shortage of medicines, food, electricity and water," he added. The Kurram Welfare Society President said that as a result of the war, hundreds of women, children and the elderly had taken refuge in Peshawar while over a hundred students who were unable to move to their native areas because of the war had been forced to stay in Islamabad. Mehdi Ghulam from Kurram Agency said Alizai, Balyamin, Tangi Amro Khail, Arravali, Santikot, Singk, Burqi and Pevar were under Taliban and Al Qaeda attacks while dozens of injured were waiting for their death in the Parachinar hospital owing to a shortage of medicines.”

Muhammad Hussain Turi, Secretary of the Ittehad-e-Ummat Committee, said: "We are not only fighting for our lives and the area but also for the sovereignty of our country. We are fighting the international war against terrorism on our borders by shedding our blood but, instead of helping us, everyone is creating trouble for us by trying to stop us from defending our area." Turi appealed to the President and the Chief of the Army Staff to issue a directive to the army to intervene to save the lives of thousands of people. The Turis of Kurram, like the Hazaras of Afghanistan and Balochistan, are Shias.

Gull Ishrat, member, Kurram Welfare Society, said: "We are fighting the battle of the Pakistan Army against those who managed to escape from Swat, Bajaur, North and South Waziristan and Afghanistan and are involved in furious attacks on the Pakistan Army."

The clashes picked up fresh intensity since the beginning of July, 2008, reportedly resulting in over a thousand fatalities on both sides. The Shia leaders of Karachi strongly protested against the failure of the Pakistan Government and Army to protect the Shias in these areas. On September 1,2008, the Shias of Karachi held a large demonstration to protest against the attacks on the Shias of Kurram and Dera Ismail Khan by Al Qaeda and the Taliban and threatened to take out a long march of the Shias from Karachi to these areas if the Govt. did not stop the atrocities on the Shias in those areas by Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the LEJ.

This made matters worse for the Shias all over Pakistan and particularly in the Pashtun tribal belt with many murderous acts of terrorism against the Shias during 2009. Among the major acts of terrorism against the Shias during 2009 before the Muzzafarabad and Karachi attacks were the following:

* January 4 : At least seven people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up in front of the Government Polytechnic College near a Shia imambargah on Multan Road in Dera Ismail Khan.
* January 26 : At least five people were killed in a bomb blast in Dera Ismail Khan. Hussain Ali Yousafi, Chairman of the Hazara Democratic Party, was shot dead in Quetta.
* February 5: 32 people were killed when a suspected suicide bomber blew himself up amidst a crowd of Shia worshippers outside a Dera Ghazi Khan mosque. Police said the blast targeted dozens of people converging on the Shia Al Hussainia Mosque after dark, shortly before a religious gathering.
* February 20: A curfew was imposed in Dera Ismail Khan and the army called in to quell riots immediately after a suicide bomber killed at least 30 Shias and injured another 157 who were attending a funeral in southern Dera Ismail Khan district. Witnesses said police ran away when gunfire broke out after the blast at the funeral of Shia leader Sher Zaman – who was gunned down a day earlier.
* March 2: A suicide bomber killed five and injured 12 people at a Shia girls’ religious school in the Pishin District of Balochistan.
* March 5: One person was killed and 19 others injured when a hand-grenade hurled by unidentified elements at the worshippers exploded in the Ameer Hamza mosque in Dera Ismail Khan. In Peshawar, unidentified elements blew up the mausoleum of the most-revered mystic poet of the Pakhtun land Rahman Baba.
* March 27: 76 persons were killed and over 100 injured in an apparent suicide attack on a mosque on the Peshawar-Torkham Highway in Jamrud in the Khyber Agency.
* April 5 : A suicide bomber blew himself up at a Shia religious gathering in an Imambargah in Chakwal , killing at least 22 people and wounding 60.
* June 5: At least 40 people were killed and another 70 injured when a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a mosque in Hayagai Sharqai village in the Upper Dir District.
* June 12: A leading Sunni Barelvi cleric, Sarfraz Ahmed Naeemi with anti-Taliban views, and six others were killed by a suicide bomber at the Jamia Naeemia madrassa on the Allama Iqbal Road in the Garhi Shahu area of Lahore. In Nowshera, five worshippers were killed and 105 others injured when a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden van into a mosque in the Cantonment area on the Grand Trunk Road. The TTP claimed responsibility for the suicide attacks in Lahore and Nowshera.
* December 18: A suicide bombing occurred just outside a mosque in Taimergara in Lower Dir District.At least 12 people, most of them policemen, were killed and 28 wounded.

Jihadi terrorism in Pakistan was the outgrowth of anti-Shia terrorism encouraged by Zia ul-Haq after the success of the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979 in order to intimidate the Shias. Most of the jihadi terrorist leaders of Pakistan occupying important positions in the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI) and the JEM had initially been members of the anti-Shia Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan and the LEJ. After it captured power in Kabul in 1996 with the help of the ISI, the Afghan Taliban under Mulla Mohammad Omar indulged in a wave of violence against the Hazaras. The Shura of the Afghan Taliban, which now operates from the Pashtun majority areas of Balochistan, including Quetta, its capital, has been trying to intimidate the Hazaras of Balochistan.

The Mohajir Shias of Karachi and Hyderabad in Sindh are largely migrants from India’s Uttar Pradesh, the then undivided province of Bombay and Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh and their descendants. In the late 1980s and the early 1990s, the ISI tried to weaken the leadership of Altaf Hussain, the Mohajir leader, who now lives in exile in the UK, by making overtures to the Mohajir Shias, but when they remained loyal to Altaf the ISI instigated the Sunni extremist organizations to attack the Shias. When the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) did well in the elections of December 1988 after the death of Zia, the Army then headed by Gen.Mirza Aslam Beg and the ISI then headed by Lt.Gen.Hamid Gul opposed Benazir Bhutto from becoming the Prime Minister on the ground that her mother Nusrat Bhutto was a Shia. Ultimately, she became the Prime Minister on strong US backing.

The post-2007 escalation in anti-Shia violence has been due to Al Qaeda, the TTP and the LEJ, which is now allied with Al Qaeda. It is difficult to explain the Army’s silence and inaction in the face of this escalation. No campaign against jihadi terrorism in Pakistan can succeed unless anti-Shia terrorism is eliminated. Hardly any attention is paid to it by any Government----whether headed by the Army or by the political parties.

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )

Why we vote for the President

By Tissa de Silva

(December 31, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Mahinda Rajapaksa as a very good manager selected the best in the country for the highest priority project for Sri Lanka for which he was appointed by the people of Sri Lanka as President. The war of 39 years - He coordinated all aspects of the project from keeping the people happy to sacrifice their every day needs, keeping away the pressures brought by our international interests, diplomatic actions, supply of logistics to the Defence Force and above all to maintain the enthusiasm of the mothers and fathers to send their sons and daughters to the warfront, in ever increasing numbers.

We vote for successful completion of the project in relatively short period of less than three years of a war which had divided Sri Lanka de-facto for 30 years.

Rajapaksa has removed the fear and lack of security from the minds of the people. This is a basic human right for the people. The removal of fear has been confirmed in the past eight months. This has also brought in the investment for the country in our march towards a prosperous nation. It has brought a financial boom to the investors in the share market who for many years have voted with the right wing market forces represented by the UNP. But today because of the prosperity brought to them they will vote for Mahinda Rajapaksa for a stable government.

Rajapaksa has set an example to all of us that unity of the country can be cemented by being conversant in two languages - Tamil and Sinhala.

History has shown that whenever the country was divided, foreign invasions took place. This is how we lost our independence to foreign interests and were close to it many times during the past 30 years.

Rajapaksa has commenced the economic and social integration of our people which is the greatest challenge for a united Sri Lanka. It will provide opportunities to all including engineers, scientists, medical practitioners and many skilled hands. They need not seek jobs abroad. This has been demonstrated in the past four years, even with a war in hand. People need Rajapaksa to continue this development process for the next term of presidency so that the country will achieve an economic take off which will automatically get accelerated for a prosperous Sri Lanka.

The alternative

Sarath Fonseka, has been sponsored by two opposing fractions Viz the JVP and the UNP. Not only these two political ideologies expressed by these two parties, being poles apart they have been killing one another using the young who worked for them with the illusion of a utopia.

Fonseka, if in power will find an ungovernable country. This would be an excuse for him to take over completely using the military to back him and to bow down his opponents. Commencing with the UNP and JVP, this would result in a military dictatorship as we have often found in Pakistan and Bangladesh where the military takeover is based on poor governance and corruption.

Fonseka who would find the people are opposed to his military discipline and government for which he is used to for 40 years, would seek foreign assistance to stay in power. We will lose our independence as foreign interests would exploit the land and people. We have seen this in many countries, particularly Africa and Latin America. It will happen to Sri Lanka under a government led by Fonseka with all the powers given initially by the present Constitution.

Fonseka's love for military power was shown explicitly in the days following the victory in May. He wanted to increase the strength of the Army under his control from 200,000 to 300,000. What was his intention?. Was it not to use increased military power to take over the Government and rule the people? The wisdom of Rajapaksa curtailed this, at the correct time to save our fragile democracy being meddled by many from the west. Fonseka cannot be trusted by the words he has uttered.

(December 31, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) President Mahinda Rajapaksha has himself said that he is the only president who called another election before two years, but now many more details have been released on what the President has been doing for these past four years. According to reports his average personal expenses amount to nineteen million, one hundred thousand Sri Lankan Rupees every day. The Sri Lanka Guardian now will reveal all available details about the corruption in the Rajapaksha regime;

• Hedging Deal – Petroleum Chairman – Asantha De Mel – Exam passed ‐ None– Cricketer‐ Shiranthi’s relation – losses to Sri Lanka Rs. 230 Billion ( Rs. 230,000 Million) Chairman lost his job by virtue of a supreme Court order. The S.C. order to sell petrol at Rs.100 not complied yet (current price of a Petrol liter is Rs 130/‐).

• Loss on National Carrier Air Lanka for 2007‐2008Rs. 10,000 Million (10 Billion) – Chairman Nishantha Wicremasinghe (Shiranthi Rajapaksha’s Brother) – Exam Passed GCE O/L

• Loss on Mihin Air for 2007‐2008 Rs. 4,000 Million (4 Billion) – Chief Executive Mahinda’s Sajin Vas Gunawardena – Exam passed GCE O/L

• New 2008 Budget allocation for Mihin Air Rs. 1,000 Million (1 Billion)

• Air port project Weerawila cancelled. Initial cost on feasibility study Rs 500 Million.

• Mig Deal – through “King’s cousin” Udayanga Weeratunga (Exam passed – GCE O/L Sri Lankan Ambassador – Russia ‐ purchase of 4 Mig fighters which were not air worthy from Belimissa holdings at a price Rs. 400 Million more than the last published price.

• All defense purchases through Lanka Logistics ‐ Chief Executive Officer Jayantha Wicremasinghe – Exam passed GCE O/L– Mahinda’s Sister Gandhini’s Brother in Law the owner of ‘Akuressa Palace’ (also Chairman Bank of Ceylon Gamini Wicremasinghe’s Brother.)

• VAT Scam – Loss to the Country Rs. 35,000 Million. (Rs. 35 Billion) Inland Revenue Department – Minister of Finance – Mahinda Rajapaksha

• Hanbantota Man made Safari Park to be created at a cost of Rs. 16,000 Million (1.6 Billion) This makes no sense as the Natural Safari Park is next door in Yala.
• Kerawalapitiya power plant cost US $ 400 Million. Actual cost US $ 200 Million. Planned for 300 Mega Watts built for 200 mega watts.

• Kerawalapitiya power plant. (Additional Losses) Cost per day to CEB Rs 70 million. Per year Rs 25, 550 Million (25.5 Billion) Initial agreed purchasing price per unit Rs 18. Current purchasing price Rs 40/‐ Loss to the CEB from a unit Rs 22/‐

• Uma Oya Project.‐ projected value US$ 265 Million enhanced value US $ 545 Million. Increase of US$ 280 Million. Rs. 28 Billion ( Rs. 28,000 Million). Two reservoirs that are built have an extent of only 50 acres. Victoria project has an extent of 7,500 acres. Minister–Chamal Rajapaksha – President’s brother

• Cabinet of Ministers have approved purchase of 35 Gantry Cranes at a price US $ 600,000 higher than the last purchase price. This purchase has not been effected yet. (Minister in Charge; Chamal Rajapaksa‐ President’s brother)

• Contract signed with Dilhan Wicremasinghe Shiranthi’s brother’s son (Chairman Air Lanka) to supply branded computers to all divisional Secretariats at a cost of US $ 16 Million (price per computer Rs. 150,000/=). He supplied all unbranded computers which are available at unity plaza at Rs. 50,000/=. Amount robbed Rs. 1,200 Million

ROBBED AND WASTED AMOUNT SUMMARY

• Hedging deal - Robbed and wasted amount Rs. 230,000 Million 230 Billion

• Air Lanka - Wasted and robbed amount Rs. 10,000 M 10 B

• Mihin Air - Wasted and robbed amount Rs. 5,000 M 5 B

• Mig Deal - Robbed amount Rs 4,00M 0.4 B

• Weerawila Air Port - Wasted amount Rs 500M 0.5 B

• VAT Scam - Robbed amount Rs. 35,000 M 35 B

• Safari Park - Wasted amount Rs. 16,000 M 16 B

• Kerawalapitiya - Robbed amount Rs. 23,000 M 23 B

• Uma Oya project - Robbed amount Rs. 28,000 M 28 B

• Computers for divisional - Robbed amount Rs. 1,200 M 1.2 B

• Purchase of Gantry - Cranes total amount robbed Rs. 24,150 M 24 B

• Fly Over contracts - Total amount robbed Rs. 3,500 M 3.5 B

• Kerawalapitiya (Additional Losses) - Robbed amount Rs 25,550M 25.5B

• Road Development in - North amount robbed Rs. 28,000 M 28 B

Remember that Gigantic Mahaweli Project with the construction of Victoria,Kothmale, Randenigala, Rantambe, and Maduru oya cost the Nation only Rs. 50,000 Million (50 Billion) when the US $ was equivalent to Rs. 35.

WHAT CAN WE DO WITH THIS MONEY?

��To increase the monthly salary of all the government servants
for one year Rs. 126 Billion.
��To pay the deposits of Golden Key depositors‐ Rs. 26 Billion.
��To pay the money of depositors of Sakvithi scam‐ Rs. 4 Billion.
��To pay the money of depositors of the other financial institutions Rs 10 Billion.
��To double the pension of the pensioners Rs. 3 Billion.
��To pay increased interests for government servants who
have deposited their terminal benefits and are dependent on the interest‐ Rs. 10 Billion
��To reduce Milk powder price for 1 year by 50% ‐ Rs. 10 Billion
��To re‐introduce the school uniform to all children – Rs. 5 Billion.
��To give electricity free to all places of worship‐ Rs. 1 Billion
��To give a living allowance to all 100,000 who have lost jobs in the
garment industry, and to all 500,000 who are expecting jobs, Rs. 36 Billion.
��The number of Samurdhi grantees are 1427,322. To give Rs.2000 to
each family per month, the cost is Rs.2850 million.
The cost for one year is Rs. 34.2 Billion.
��To give fertilizers to all farmers on a subsidiary rate Rs 10 Billion
��To give fertilizers to all small tea cultivators on a subsidiary rate Rs 2 Billion
TOTAL AMOUNT Rs 290.2 Billion | Balance Amount Rs 140.1 Billion

Executive Presidency the problem

By Prof. Chula Goonasekera

(December 31, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Once again the time has come to elect our next President. Taking their opposing places on the battleground are an experienced politician and an amateur politician. This letter explains why I am prepared to take the gamble and vote for the amateur, despite my being a senior government servant.

In the past 60 years since Independence, we have seen a political seesaw – Left to Right, Right to Left. Politicians and political processes give the public more and more subsidies and perks to their favourites in return for their vote and support.

Once elected, the politicians have eaten into the country’s reserves to keep their promises. Now that there are no more reserves left, the politicians are obtaining more and more loans, holding future generations to ransom. The result is that we are 20 times poorer than our former Asian rival Singapore, which was once our equal in terms of per capita earnings, back in the early years of our Independence.

With time, our political battles have become more and more expensive and intense. With negative balance-sheets at the end of expensive political campaigns, the winning politicians have no alternative but to regain the financial losses incurred whilst in power. Naturally, the only way to close the gap was to legitimise bribery (e.g. commissions) and corruption.

The public trust in the civil service has dropped. The civil service is seen as lethargic, irresponsible, inefficient and unaccountable. The new presidency was created in the late ’80s to “legitimise” the political processes. This is why most politicians are rallying round the President. They are abandoning their electorates, forgetting the values they once stood for, dropping lifetime friends and even joining their former enemies in order to stay in power.

Politicians should be leaders, but today most of them have become “feeders” – feeding on the nation. They freely spend the hard-earned money of the national workforce, often in wasteful exercises. The financial burden politicians represent is huge, and it is expanding at the expense of the nation. If one nominal ministerial portfolio was scrapped, the revenue saved could fund the education of 500 students at a national university.

Most of our national services have suffered because of parasitic politicians and portfolios. Today, the country can afford to give only 3 per cent of our population a university education; in developed countries the number exceeds 50 per cent.

In Sri Lanka, the highest ranking government officer earns between US$20 and 25 a day. In developed countries, officers of similar rank earn 10 times more. Why is the government keeping salaries so low?

We are a nation with a large debt, mostly accumulated through unproductive, incomplete and wasteful projects. Yet we support a jumbo Cabinet and hold frequent elections, and conduct massive election campaigns at national expense.

I salute the JVP for their stand in the upcoming election, despite their appalling history and being on the ruling side. They want the Presidency abolished, which reflects their maturity, wisdom and commitment to the nation.

Education, law and order, discipline and peace are the essential ingredients for development. The big question is whether an amateur politician can provide these?
The General is a retired officer who has been a loyal and disciplined officer all his life. While in office, he demonstrated his professional ethics. For example, while in office, he never spoke loosely, never divulged national secrets. He is not a politician, but he will carry out the tasks assigned to him with 100 per cent loyalty.

We can be sure he will uphold discipline, law and order and democracy. He has already demonstrated this in his own Army. He will not have to serve any party or individual once elected. No politicians will be spared, as the determining factor will be the unbiased public vote. He will achieve his targets. As a military officer he demonstrated that he could achieve his targets within a given time.

My only request to the General is that he increases our children’s opportunities for a university education. We should accommodate at least 20 per cent of the students who qualify at the Advanced Level examination. That would be the best foundation for our development as a nation. We may not live to see the results, but somebody will remember.

We know what resulted in countries where there was indiscipline and corruption, such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and Myanmar. Dear General, this nation needs no subsidies. Our people need the opportunity to learn, work and earn a decent wage in a free and peaceful environment. Their careers should be based on their skills, quality, performance and experience.

Your task is to make this opportunity available by establishing a true democracy, law and order, and equity. The brain drain will then stop. There will be no need for separate solutions for minority communities. We will all be one nation. The impediment to this is not the person of the President but the executive presidency in its current omnipotent form.

“Sri Lanka has pioneered nonalignment and will remain committed to nonalignment. We have a special relationship with India and shall continue to build on this. India is the closest and the biggest neighbour of Sri Lanka. Anyone professing otherwise does not know the history of India-Sri Lanka relations.”
…………………………………

By Kallol Bhattacherjee
Courtesy: The Week

(December 30, Kochi, Sri Lanka Guardian) South Asia is not new to army generals debuting in politics. But Gen. Sarath Fonseka’s emergence as the challenger to the power of President Mahinda Rajapaksa has added some much needed break to the Rajapaksa overdose in Sri Lankan politics. Like a clever politico, Fonseka has already acquired the politically correct tone. Gone are the bombastic pronouncements for which he was known. Excerpts from a telephonic interview with the challenger:

What are the grounds of your opposition to President Rajapaksa?

The biggest challenge is saving democracy in Sri Lanka. The war was fought against the LTTE in the name of the entire Sri Lankan nation. But it is the family of President Rajapaksa that is taking all credit for defeating the LTTE. They have also emerged as hugely corrupt. No business in Sri Lanka is immune from political interference today. If anyone wants to build a bridge or a building, you have to please the president and his family members.

But your record as a military leader appears anti-Tamil.

I wonder how you form this opinion. I am criticising the president for his failures in addressing the issue of the internally displaced persons efficiently. So many soldiers lost their lives in the war. Now it is our responsibility to address the fallout of the war effectively. I promise to resettle the Tamils in their homes if I come to power.

There was a rumour that you were planning a coup to overthrow President Rajapaksa.

The president of Sri Lanka has been panicking about the army. Rajapaksa has behaved in an unstatesmanlike manner by downgrading the army. After the victory over the LTTE, the armed forces were becoming more professional. He has stopped it. He has become a dictator. Senior people are not given authority.

It is said that you are miffed with Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

The Rajapaksa brothers are building up a family arrangement. They want a share of all new enterprises in Sri Lanka. They want their dynasty to rule the country forever. The finances of the country are also at their mercy. Most of the things in the country are controlled by the president.

What will be your foreign policy initiatives?

Sri Lanka has pioneered nonalignment and will remain committed to nonalignment. We have a special relationship with India and shall continue to build on this. India is the closest and the biggest neighbour of Sri Lanka. Anyone professing otherwise does not know the history of India-Sri Lanka relations.

But it is said that you harbour anti-India sentiments.

I never had any problem with India. I have been a friend of the Indian armed forces, which have helped us in the past. So there is no question of harbouring anti-India feelings.

Who are your friends in India?

I know National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan well. I hope to meet Sonia Gandhi sometime soon. My last visit to India took me to Mumbai. Hopefully, I shall return for a more extensive visit to India soon.

What are the other Indian factors in your life?

I am not a very social person and in the last three years I have not had any free time to pursue my private interests. But I like old Bollywood films like Aradhana, Abhimaan, Milan and Mother India. I like old Hindi film music, too. Whenever I have time, I go out swimming.

Have you tried to establish contact with politicians in Tamil Nadu?

I have not worked on that front yet. I would like to establish a channel of communication with Tamil Nadu politicians.

Will you be accepted in Tamil Nadu?

Why not? My fight was not against the Tamils. It was against the LTTE.

Spoils of war

“If Ranil Wickremesinghe is able to get the die hard UNP vote bank to go to the polling station and the JVP gets the grass roots campaign into gear, which they are famed for, President Rajapakse has a fight on his hands. But the die will be cast if the Tamils vote for the general. If that becomes a reality, he may win.”
…………………………………

By Lal Wickrematunge

(December 30, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) For little Sri Lanka, 2009 was a year of celebration and heart break. The aftermath of an improbable victory against the LTTE brought a massive wave of support from the Sinhala majority to President Mahinda Rajapakse. The Tamils were dumbfounded. In a near thirty year period of the LTTE’s dominance, the Tamil community, though not by choice, looked upto the LTTE to bring about devolution or some semblance of self rule in the North and East of the country. With the end of the war, a vacuum has been created even amongst the Tamil moderate polity. This has yet to be filled.

Large cut-outs and posters of the president flanked by his brothers and the heads of the tri-forces appeared on the skyline of this tiny resplendent island. That President Rajapakse was deified would be an understatement. Meanwhile the equally popular commander of the army, Sarath Fonseka was being retired. The general was irked and whispers were emanting from informed persons that he was a very disappointed man. An astrologer who predicted that there would be serious changes in the political firmament in the country with the advent of a new face was promptly arrested and later released.The cut-outs and posters depicting the general, even in the company of the president, began to come down, only to be replaced by more of a solitary president and his siblings.

The cracks deepened before long and the left wing JVP made initial forays to rope in the general into politics together with the now ousted Mangala Samaraweera, a former minister of foreign affairs and telecommunications in the Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunge government in which President Rajapakse was the prime minister. Mangala Samaraweera was the architect in spearheading the victory of President Rajapakse in his first term when he led the campaign with the JVP, but was soon sidelined and family members of the Rajapakse clan jostled and took control of the most important positions in the Rajapakse government of 2005.

President Rajapakse had been coercing members of the United National Party of the opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, to defect to the government ranks and were promptly rewarded with ministerial portfolios. That President Rajapakse ruled over the largest cabinet of ministers (over a hundred) was not lost on the hapless public, now burdened with the fall out of a global recession and rising prices.

( (C) Lal Wickrematunge )

Though many expected Ranil Wickremesinghe to run for the presidency when it was hinted that the president would call for one after four of his six years (he is legally entitled to do so), in a deft move the joint opposition thrust General (Retd) Sarath Fonseka as their common candidate.The rudderless opposition was given a new lease of life. The United National Party, bruised and battered by the provincial council elections, was up beat. The fractured JVP was jubilant. The very slogan on which President Rajapakse campaigned (the war victory) had now, at best, to be shared. A shocked government resorted to lampooning a war hero which turned the sympathy factor in favour of the retired general. People started questioning the government: “If they could treat the general in this fashion, how would they treat us?”’

That General Fonseka was asked to quit his official residence when he did not have a house fit enough to live, annoyed the public. The general was thus portrayed to be an honest officer as against a century of corrupt ministers led by one family. A hint at a possible coup by the general and the response by the Indian government in helping the current regime was soon found to be hoax. Initial reports show that President Rajapakse will not have a cake walk at this election. The respective polls show a close fight and only in the coming weeks, a clearer picture if at all would emerge. General (Retd) Sarath Fonseka drew first blood when he filed and publicised his declaration of assets when handing over nominations on the December 17. The president failed to do so.

The government’s bashing of the West to appease the local market has come to haunt them in the form of the European Union withholding the GSP plus facility, through which as many as 7000 products were exempt from duty to the EU countries. The suppression of the media at the height of the war continues, but now it’s for political benefit. As many as eleven journalists have been murdered, over twenty have been abducted, assaulted and scores have fled the country. Self censorship and the resultant apathy have surprised more democratic nations and this island in now scraping at the bottom of the barrel where freedom of expression is concerned.

This election is going to be bruising battle between two patriots and the island is going to emerge fractured after the election. Already, charges and counter charges are being traded. The minority Tamils are more confused. Both front runners are prime movers in the war against the LTTE. It was the absence of the Tamil vote at the behest of Velupillai Prabhakaran that saw President Rajapakse defeat Ranil Wickremesinghe at the last Presidential elections.To abstain at this election would be unthinkable, but they are between a rock and a hard place. Having been confined to camps against their will, they are disillusioned.

If Ranil Wickremesinghe is able to get the die hard UNP vote bank to go to the polling station and the JVP gets the grass roots campaign into gear, which they are famed for, President Rajapakse has a fight on his hands. But the die will be cast if the Tamils vote for the general. If that becomes a reality, he may win. Will General Sarath Fonseka abolish the all-consuming powerful position of the Executive Presidency ( President Rajapakse also promised to do so in his Mahinda Chintanaya manifesto in 2005) and concentrate on removing corruption if he wins, or will it be “more of the same” if President Rajapakse wins a second term? The answer will be known by the January 27, 2010.

The writer is managing editor of the Sri Lankan newspaper ‘Sunday Leader’

Two CWC seniors pledge support to Fonseka

(December 30, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Two senior members of the Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) have announced their support to the opposition’ s common candidate General (Retd.) Sarath Fonseka.

CWC National Organiser R. Yogaraja and N. Satchithananthan, the Deputy Minister for Education said they are resigning from the CWC and will join the UNP to extend support to Gen Fonseka.

Mr.Yogarajah said the present leadership of the CWC has no power to work for his people and the aspirations of the estate sector people have not been met by this government.

He added that even though the President promised a political solution to the north east problem, we feel that this has been forgotten by the government. ”We want to support a government that will give a political solution to the problems of these areas,” he added.

“The history of the big Sri Lankan families in the rural areas is a history of enormous cruelties to the poor. The poor know this. Today the difficulty is to find rural labour for the richer families who need it.”
...................................

By Citizen Somapala

(December 30, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) There is nothing to be shocked or scandalized about in the fact that one family is running the country, according to Jackson Anthony, who spoke to the ‘Subharathi’ programme of the National Service of the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation today (30th of December 2009).

It was a long and detailed discussion on views of history according to this Jackson. According to Jackson Anthony’s version, in the entire history of Sri Lanka up to the time when the British colonial powers introduced their systems of administration, the country was run by powerful families. Brothers, sisters and others running the country, according to him, is the Desheeya way of doing things.

What is wrong, according to Jackson, is that due to Western influence this great tradition of the local families ruling the people has been lost. Now, after many years of failed politicians at last the true tradition of the local Sinhala people is being rediscovered by a charismatic local leadership which has brought the great dream of the Sinhala people back again. This great dream is that one family can rule the entire nation.

What is wrong with that? That is how, according to Jackson, the country has always been run in the great days of pure Sinhala tradition. During those wonderful days the power was transferred from a brother to a sister and from father to son. Jackson gives a long list of how this has happened based on the ‘Mahawamsa’ and other Sinhala narratives.

'One family running the country according to Jackson is the real Sinhala style. And this is what the people themselves have discovered and the people will be happy with this system.' (Picture from: An Historical Relation of Ceylon by Robert Knox)

Jackson bitterly criticises the tremendous damage done by the British through various commissions which introduced various reforms into Sri Lanka. These reforms, according to Jackson, were done because the British could not keep a sufficient number of British administrators in the country and therefore they trained the local people with Western mentalities. These people adopted various Western traditions such as the laws, the administrative mechanisms and the parliamentary system and the like.

None of these things are things of the soil. They do not fit into Sri Lanka. The earlier prime ministers and other prominent politicians came from this tradition of people who were trained by the British. Therefore, they could not be true leaders of Sri Lanka. Now things have changed. Now the people from the rural setup have risen to the top and they run the country according to the style of the ancient times.

One family running the country according to Jackson is the real Sinhala style. And this is what the people themselves have discovered and the people will be happy with this system.

The entire programme over the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation is an interpretation of history in order to suit the political propaganda of the government. It was a direct election campaigning effort where reference to history is made in order to answer charges against the present government.

One of the major charges of the opposition against the government is that one family is taking over all the important positions in the government and is therefore abusing power. In using this programme Jackson Anthony answers this question and asks, what is wrong with this? This is how things were done in the past and this should be a better tradition than the more westernized tradition of equality and the imposition of rules against nepotism.

Nepotism, according to Jackson, is the national tradition. Therefore there is nothing wrong with this and this is the ideal way to run things.

In this interpretation of history according to Jackson, in Sri Lanka there were no exploiting classes. The ruling elite were not exploiters of the rural poor. The whole system of caste which was entrenched within the Sri Lankan system is not an important aspect in the history according to Jackson. The tremendous traditions of the exploitation of the poor and of the lands by some few rich families throughout the country for their own benefit is also not part of his history of Sri Lanka.

What Jackson misses in his historical analysis is that Sri Lanka’s rural poor have abandoned this whole system and by various means have migrated out of that village.

The village system is what Jackson thinks is the ideal situation. Throughout the country the rural people have looked for other means of living than being subjected to their rural masters who benefitted from everything that the poor people did.

The history of the big Sri Lankan families in the rural areas is a history of enormous cruelties to the poor. The poor know this. Today the difficulty is to find rural labour for the richer families who need it.

The abuse of the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation to carry out blatant and crude propaganda during an election period should be a matter of concern not only for the opposition but also for the election commissioner as well.

Previous Column: An inquiry needed into Lanka Logistics and Technologies Ltd.

Counter –Terrorism: Lesson from Detroit

By B.Raman

(December 30, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) One has to await the findings of the enquiries ordered by President Barack Obama and the hearings to be held next month by the Congressional Oversight Committees on the human, systemic and technological failures which enabled Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab, a 23-year-old Al Qaeda trained Nigerian student, to get into a flight of the North-West Airlines of the US at the Schiphol airport in Amsterdam with a concealed explosive device and unsuccessfully try to blow it up as it was about to land at Detroit on December 25,2009.

The human and systemic failures resulted in his being allowed to board the aircraft at the Schiphol airport despite the fact that his father, a reputed banker of Nigeria, who had reportedly come to know of his son’s presence in Yemen since August,2009, had met separately an official of the US State Department and of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) posted in Nigeria and shared with them his concerns over the religious radicalisation of his son. However, he apparently did not tell them that his son was in Yemen. Had he done so, they might have possibly shown greater concern over the information than they seem to have done.

The officers of the State Department and the CIA did what was expected of them. It has been reported that the State Department official immediately conveyed the information to his headquarters in Washington DC and the CIA officer to his headquarters . Both the headquarters passed the information on to the National Counter-Terrorism Centre (NCTC) under the Director, National Intelligence.

While the information conveyed by the father of the Nigerian was thus promptly shared by everyone who was in receipt of it with all those responsible for counter-terrorism in Washington DC, the failure still occurred because none of those in receipt of the information subjected it to an action-oriented analysis and assessment in order to decide what action was called for on that information. Did it call for the cancellation of a two-year visa issued to the student by the US Embassy in London in June 2008? Did it call for an advisory to the North-West Airlines and to the security authorities at the Schiphol airport not to let him board the flight and to subject him to a special physical security check?

It would appear that neither the State Department nor the CIA nor the NCTC posed these questions to each other and examined what follow-up action was called for. All they did was to add the information to their database of 550000 names of persons who had come to adverse notice but against whom the evidence was not strong enough to warrant non-issue or the cancellation of the visa and/or the denial of permission to board a flight to the US.

The lesson: Information alone serves only a limited purpose unless it is subjected to an action oriented analysis and assessment followed by joint action by all concerned. The absence of joint action oriented analysis and assessment of terrorism-related information was one of the major deficiencies in the US system pointed out by the National Commission which went into the 9/11 terrorist strikes in the US homeland. One of the reasons the NCTC was set up in 2004 was to address this deficiency. Despite the NCTC being in position for five years now, this deficiency has again come to notice.

The second lesson relates to the need for proper scrutiny of a visa application. This has been repeatedly stressed by counter-terrorism experts since 9/11. Despite this, one keeps coming across instances of poor scrutiny. The poor scrutiny of the visa applications of David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana of the Chicago cell of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) by the Indian Consulate-General in Chicago enabled them to obtain a visa for coming to India and prepare the ground for the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai. Similarly, a poor scrutiny of the visa application of Abdulmuttalab by the US visa officer would appear to have resulted in his obtaining a US visa despite his reputation as someone sympathetic to the Taliban. Around the same time, he had applied to the British for a renewal of his student visa to enable him to continue studying in the UK. The British visa officer, who scrutinised his application, immediately noticed that he had given a false particular about his educational institution and rejected his request.

The third lesson relates to the inadequacies of the technological means presently available to the physical security officials which come in the way of their detecting explosive devices concealed in private parts of the body. In the past, narcotics and gold smugglers used to evade detection by concealing the narcotics or gold in their private parts. Now, terrorists have started doing so with explosive devices. How to deal with this? This is a question needing urgent attention by physical security experts and scientists.

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )

Did the Tiger change its strips for a white Flag?

- Defence secretary Gothabaya Rajapaksa, and President Premadasa, got to know what happened only when "it was all over".
.................................................................

By Gam Vaesiya, Ontario, Canada

(December 30, Ontario, Sri Lanka Guardian) Probably the most important outcome of Sarath Fonseka's misadventure into the political arena has been his opening up a post-mortem of the Tiger leadership. Although Fonseka may reduce the "walk-over" majority commanded by Rajapaksa, the final outcome of the election is fairly evident to everyone except those who have become mesmerized by the mismatched Mangala-Ranil-Tilvin kaleidoscope.

There is already enough information available to the discerning observer to piece together the likely evolution of events which had developed its own momentum, well beyond the control of the many players who were involved.

The strategy of the LTTE.

A number of academic observers (e.g. Gamini Keerawella, Gerald Peries) have noted that the final strategy of the LTTE was to create an impossible humanitarian situation - a grave humanitarian crisis- that would warrant Kosovo-style international intervention in the Sri Lankan conflict. The LTTE systematically planned this scenario by holding two hundred and fifty thousand ordinary men, women and children with them and hoped to keep them till such an eventuality took place. Even before the fall of Killinochchi (ancient name: Giraanikka), many well-to-do Tamils had paid their way out. But the vast
majority had no option but to retreat with the Tigers. Highly placed diplomats of three western nations, several officials of the UN, two British journalists, and at least two parliamentarians of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) were involved, together with a vast array of Tamil academics, businessmen and activists in western countries, to bring about this plan to fruition. Interestingly, there was no serious support for this plan from highly placed Indian officials.

Nadesan, the LTTE political spokesman, rejected all calls by the government to lay down arms and surrender. The LTTE firmly believed that these Tamil people herded in place would remain with them till the end. But, as soon as the Sri Lankan forces broke the earth bund and lifted the siege, the people deserted the LTTE. Some prominent LTTE members, e.g., Daya Master surrendered using the channels that were put in place by the military, in spite of LTTE suicide squads and sharp shooters which attacked likely surrendees. On a number of occasions, esp. during 15-17th May, the Tigers pretended to be surrendees and then attacked, killing and injuring hundreds of civilians and fellow LTTEs trying to flee.

Once it became clear that the strategy based on expecting a ``humanitarian crisis'' had failed, the LTTE leadership began to use the diplomatic and parliamentary channels that had be put in place to attempt a safe passage for the LTTE leadership. However, although mechanisms for surrender were in to place and although they were function reasonably well, as seen by the number of high-ranking LTTE cadre who safely surrendered, the LTTE leadership did NOT want to make use of them. The leader of a cyanide cult cannot possibly surrender. Reports of interviews and interrogations with IDPs suggest that Prabhakaran did not wish to surrender, but instead expected to be escorted out. Another plan had been for some of the leadership to meet up with suitably placed special envoys, while Prabhakaran himself would try to ``disappear'' in a clandestine escape. A makeshift hospital, an ambulance as well as sea crafts had been made ready near ellamullivaaikkaal (Valbatugala) and it was reported to have been put at the disposal of the LTTE leader. This was meant to be the location for foreign rescue officials to receive and accompany Prabhakaran who demanded to be treated at the level of a head of state. There was no question of his biting the cyanide capsule or showing any semblance of surrender. It was to appear as a negotiated evacuation only.

Thus proposal to surrender with white flags etc., seems to be mostly a general romantic picture evoked by various parties in Colombo, including the MP Chandrakanthan who was in contact with the Rajapaksa administration. It did not involve the army commanders who were directly in the Valbatugala (Vellamullivaaikkaal) area. The Rajapaksa administration believed that the modalities of surrender already existed, as indeed surrenders of various cadre were happening on a continuous basis, and saw no need for new modalities. If indeed a party of LTTE leaders had moved forward with the intention of surrender, it is almost certain that the tiger leadership, equipped with cell phones and communication equipment with a global reach could have attempted to send messages that would be easily picked up by army electronic eves-droppers or visual observers. If such a surrender was the objective, it is clearly more important to coordinate with the immediate ground commanders on site, rather than with Nambiar, Marie Covin, Chandrakantha or Palitha Kohona. Also, if a party moved forward with white flags, the Tigers who are reputed for photographic and cinematographic records of all kinds of historic scenes would have at least taken a cell phone picture of the event and transmitted it to western reporters, diplomats and ``KP'' (Selvarasah Pathmanathan) who are said to have been in touch with them almost constantly.

Unexpected arrival of the special squads.

The unexpected events in the unfolding of the drama were two fold. Events unfolded much faster than anticipated. The British, French and Norwegian diplomats did not secure a special status for the LTTE leaders to evacuate, while the UN envoy Nambiar arrived too late to do anything. Meanwhile, the LTTE leadership seems to have taken steps to AVOID the positions manned by the 58th Division of Shavendra Silva, or the 59th Division of Prasanna Silva who were on the Thibbatugala beach. Either of these divisions would have arranged for their safe surrender, as they had been accepting surrendees for several days by then. Instead, the LTTE leadership had a number of plans which included (i) Sneak through the army cordon, possibly using the ambulance, or use do-or-die" support from Ramesh and Ilango who were to remain ready to fire and fully armed, while accompanying the group led by Nadesan. Meanwhile Prabhakaran would remain incognito in a third group. (ii)If they were to meet up with the soldiers of the 58th or 59th Division, Nadesan would negotiate and ask for an honourable diplomatic-level escort to evacuate Prabhakaran.

However, instead of meeting with the 58th or 59th divisions, they stumbled on the army special units attached to the special forces of the Golf, Echo and Delta squads. They noticed the armed second group consisting of Ramesh and Ilango and their men. This write has NOT been able to find any evidence of Nadesan and others in the lead group carrying white flags. It is very likely that the special forces soldiers would have challanged them as well as Ramesh, Ilango and their men. Where were they moving with armed support? If they were looking to surrender, they should have marched towards the 58th or 59th Division posts on the beach. This was an unexpected misadventure, and the Tigers were in no position to fight the special squads or claim that they are attempting to surrender.

Special squads were deployed to cover strategic escape routes, precisely to prevent clandestine rear-guard action or secret escape by the LTTE. The special squads operated away from the surrender lines. The LTTE leaders, and their armed body guards (Ramesh, Illango et al.) succumbed to the fire of the special forces.

General Fonseka's attitude.

While all this was happening, General Fonseka was in China. On December 20th 2009 "The Sunday Leader" published a clarification by Fonseka on his previous statements. Fonseka stated that :

"As Commander of the Army during the final stages of the war, I did not receive any communication that some LTTE leaders were planning or wanting to surrender. I was not told at any stage they wanted to do so and that some kind of an agreement had been reached that they must come out carrying pieces of white cloth".

It is entirely according to protocol that foreign missions pass through the Defence secretary and the Foreign Ministry rather than go directly to the Commander of the armed forces. What attitude would General Fonseka take if he had been in Colombo and if he had been consulted by the Defence secretary – as he surely would have been. Fonseka too would have assured everyone that the modalities for surrender already exist, and that many top LTTE cadre like Daya master had already surrendered safely.

If the ex-General Fonseka attempted to blame the commander of the 58th or59 th divisions, that would be completely pointless as there is evidence that Nadesan and his group never attempted to go to the surrender posts of these divisions. If they did carry white flags, is would be inconsistent with the stand taken by the LTTE leadership which claimed that this was an honourable evacuation arranged under the auspices of the UN. It does seem established that Nambiar had been told that it is already too late for him to do anything,. It is also clear that the British and French diplomats, as well as the UN iplomat probably did not realize that a pitched battle was going on. They had been informed that a``humanitarian crisis'' is unfolding, and that it is simply a matter of their driving into Nandakadola and evacuating the LTTE leadership which is marooned behind the army lines!

The story of the white verti

Given the level of electronic communication that was being used, and given the well known fact that Army intelligence, and perhaps foreign intelligence, were monitoring all the electronic conversations and radio communications emanating from Nadakadola, it is indeed surprising, and beyond credibility that the proverbial ``white cloth'' becomes the modality for surrender. During the IKPF-LTTE battles, when the Tiger cadre were to be arrested, they blew themselves up. There has never been any examples of deployment of white clothes. During the Premadasa era, some 600 Sinhalese policemen surrendered to the LTTE, unarmed, and there too no white cloth was used as the modality of surrender. It should also be remarked that the policemen who surrendered were murdered in cold blood by the LTTE.

Defence secretary Gothabaya Rajapaksa, and President Premadasa, got to know what happened only when "it was all over".

When and where did the story of the white cloth appear first in print?

I give up. Learnasia has a learning impediment

By Rajpal Abeynayake

(December 30, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Perhaps it is too late now for the UNP to turn the clock back on flawed strategy that has animated its early campaign for the 2010 presidential election. But the UNP is not a learner party, even though led ideologically these days by Learnasia statisticians and lead economists. These Learnasia prototypes have a remarkable ability to be so full of themselves, that they cannot see beyond their squat spectacle-perch noses.

The early 2010 campaign of the UNP showed signs that the party had one strategy in the main for the election, which was to chase-up and secure the Tamil vote with whatever strategy that could be improvised.

Nothing inherently wrong with that modus operandi, unless of course it is done in typical UNP fashion — full of hubris and bombast, but backfiring at the rear-end with a thunderously deafening report.

What the Learnasia types did not learn was that linear thinking does not apply in matters of electoral dynamics.

The UNP’s monumental failing in this election has been so basic that it can be summed up in one paragraph:

The UNP Learnasia bureau has assumed that the same dynamic that obtained four years ago applies at this presidential election: ie: that the votes for the UNP+JVP and the UPFA would fall into the two respective columns almost equally, making the Tamil vote the deciding factor on 26th January 2010.

This assumes that Mahinda Rajapaksa who was a virtual political nobody at the last election despite having been the prime minister for a short while, has not grown in stature after four years of incumbency in which Prabhakaran’s terrorists were trounced. But, Mahinda Rajapaksa in his post-war incarnation is bound to gain votes and add to his column at this 2010 outing.

Several SLFPers who didn’t vote for him in 2005 will have no hesitation voting for him this time, Mahinda now being the dominant force in the SLFP, whereas he was not even the leader of the party at the last outing. Several neutral swing voters who thought Rajapaksa was a political tyro four years ago, are bound to vote with him this time as they may feel that despite his monumental failings in good governance, he has a good report card, and presidential stature, having finished a 30 year old war that previous presidents only struggled with.

With Mahinda’s column expanding, the UNP should have to be in active contest for Sinhala votes, and even Sinhala hard-line votes, which the UNP appears to take for granted because a war hero is running. Instead, in wooing Tamil votes at the cost of all else, the UNP seems to have alienated - - perhaps irreparably now — the core Sinhala majority electorate.

Now, to further extrapolate on this basic postulate —— Educated lunatics

that all UNP strategists are myopic, be they lead economists or bottom rung losers (...interchangeable really..) is obvious from the fact that they never did a reasonable post-mortem of the last presidential elections in late 2005.

You wouldn’t miss an elephant in a narrow alleyway if it stands ten feet in front of you - - but the UNP elephants would. They are on wishful denial about the fact that the UNP performed abysmally under Ranil Wickremesinghe’s leadership in 2005. They have assumed as they are wont to, under the ideological weight of pro-Tamil Diaspora and pro- NGO thinking, that what really robbed them of the election last time around was Prabhakaran’s ban on Vanni voter participation in December 2005.

The UNP’s educated lunatics and rich and lazy lounge lizards have therefore conveniently forgotten the fact that their candidate lost the “South’’ so baldy that he lost every single electorate of the majority Sinhala areas except Colombo town Galle town and Kandy town, in 2005.

If this was a parliamentary election under the first past the post system, the result would have been a washout for Ranil Wickremesinghe’s UNP, which would have been reduced to smattering of seats, almost exclusively from the North and the East.

What really lost the election for the UNP last time around was its candidate’s wretched performance in the majority Sinhala heartland, where he was able to win only in three major towns, losing every single electorate in the rest of the map, thus making his victory dependent on the Tamil votes which never came.

Now, this was in a match up with a candidate who barely had the support of his own party, and who was, in this particular outing, struggling for funds compared to the cash flushed UNP. Moreover, this was a candidate who was a relative political tyro, being essentially an unknown quantity having never been closely identified with the previous governing elite Kumaratunge cabal, let alone having had a shot at actually governing, in contrast to Wickremesinghe who virtually ran the country for a short interregnum, because when he was elected prime minister, the then president’s party had lost the election and therefore its legitimacy to govern.

Considering that past history, the UNP’s priority in this election would have been plain to a five year old —- court the core Sinhala vote, consolidate on candidate Fonseka’s war-hero image, so that a strengthened Mahinda Rajapaksa who had expanded his vote base in all of the Sinhala electorates that he won last time, could be defeated in at least 80 per cent of the core Sinhala constituencies.

Not strange, that this recent past needs to be emphasized so strenuously to morons of the calibre you now get in the UNP, in kissing-comfort with the Sunday Leader dunces.
To whom else would you have to take pains to explain that it’s clever to prioritize on winning among the majority Sinhalese, even at the risk of losing among the minority Tamils?

The math would have been basic to a kindergartner, but the Learnasia within the UNP cannot learn it, even if they are punched in the face with the reality. Forgetting all of these fundamental electoral dynamics, from the get-go the UNP assumed a linear pattern for this election, which is that the block votes for Mahinda and Fonseka being taken for granted in the Sinhala majority areas, the Tamil votes would narrowly decide the outcome.

Hence, the heavy pandering to Tamil interests from the outset, it can be reasonably assumed, from a UNP coached Fonseka....

He said he would go beyond the 13th amendment. He said he would initiate war crimes inquiries. Finally, he is said to have said, via a journalist’s quote or otherwise, that Gotabaya ordered the killings of LTTE surrendees, the inference being that he was fair in contrast to Mahinda and his men to the LTTE, which, it has been assumed, most Tamils silently support.

The UNP’s mad dash for Tamil votes is perhaps spurred on by the anxiety that Mahinda Rajapaksa stands to win in large swathes of the north and the east due to concentrated development efforts, post-war, in these areas, though he is by no means guaranteed the northern and eastern vote, as was testimony from the local election outcome recently in the north.

The silver lining for the UNP in all of this is that the JVP vote would add to its candidate’s column this time around in the Sinhala south.

The late Anura Bandaranaike once said that the SLFP cannot win without the JVP, adding that the math had proved this beyond doubt. Well, J.R. Jayewardene once thought that the UNP is invincible under his PR. Bill Gates once said that 2 GB would be “more than enough memory for any home computer user ha ha’’, so thank you.

The size of the post war Rajapaksa boost, cannot be underestimated. His image has swelled almost fiendishly as an impish deliverer of goods, who did something in contrast to other presidents — win the war, while keeping anti national forces in the international community at bay. They also see that he did all of this wearing the national costume, speaking

Family bandism

Sinhalese at the UN and international forums, and gamely beating the Ruhuna drum.
Though corruption has grown and family bandism is endemic, and the constitution is in the dustbin, his growing stature has counter-balanced the negatives eerily, and kept him quite competitive to say the least.

The UNP, even with the JVP, cannot take the majority Sinhala south for granted.

If the UNP backed Fonseka loses all the Sinhala electorates in the country expect the three key Green towns at this outing, he’d have enough time on his hands after January to curse the UNP’s linear thinkers who undermined his most valuable asset, the image of the war-hero —- in a mad rush to court the not so pivotal Tamil vote.

Now, if the UNP can turn the page, and woo the Sinhala vote by not going out on a limb as they have done so far for the Tamil vote, and then win this election by winning the Sinhala majority base, I will take the credit for giving them the key to their victory in this column written on this pivotal week, barely three Sundays before the balloting on 26th January 2010. Amen!

The UN’s butterfly effect

"The Government wasn’t sure how far the so-called international community would go either, come to think of it. Whether Gotabhaya Rajapaksa would have planned a more careful offensive if he had known that he had all the time in the world is difficult to say, but things could hardly have ended up more rushed."
..................

By Kath Noble

(December 30, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The United Nations has done a lot of foolish things in Sri Lanka over the years, but the response from its Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Killings to Sarath Fonseka’s interview in the Sunday Leader is amongst the dumbest.

There was no reason for Philip Alston to do anything. Whether or not we believe that the Defence Secretary ordered field commanders in the final stages of the war to execute senior members of the LTTE if they attempted to surrender, which is what Sarath Fonseka claimed, he offered no evidence. He didn’t even have a very persuasive explanation for making the allegation. A journalist embedded with the troops in the Vanni had mentioned it, he said, presumably having been told by Shavendra Silva or an officer under his command, unless Gotabhaya Rajapaksa was in the habit of giving instructions from Colombo via loudspeaker. Sarath Fonseka hadn’t bothered to investigate while he was Army Commander or Chief of Defence Staff, despite the seriousness of the matter, choosing instead to make it public during his election campaign. How curious. What’s more, by the time Philip Alston got around to typing his letter, a clarification had been issued reassuring the world that soldiers had not killed anybody illegally.

None of that really matters. What is important is that even the most intellectually challenged of us could have predicted that the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Killings demanding an explanation for his comments from the Government was going to influence voters in favour of Mahinda Rajapaksa.

This country is still at war, mentally speaking. Most people are so grateful for the defeat of Prabhakaran that they would defend the leaders responsible no matter what they were accused of, especially if the accusers are foreign. It is perfectly understandable. The war went on at great cost for a very long time and Sri Lanka didn‘t get much help from abroad to finish it. On the contrary, the Government had to fight almost as hard on the diplomatic front as it did in battle with the cadres in the Vanni. This won’t be forgotten quickly.

The Government knows this very well. Indeed, it has used every statement about war crimes to its advantage, convincing people that there is still a threat to be faced.

Only the most paranoid elements of the JVP would suggest that Philip Alston actually intended to bolster the President‘s campaign. The UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Killings, we can only conclude, is worse than an idiot.

It is yet another example of the failure of the group that self-identifies as the international community to understand how it can help the people it wants to. The unforeseen consequences of its actions regularly work in the opposite direction to the one in which it hopes to push the country.

Going through the latest report by the University Teachers for Human Rights about the final stages of the war reminded me of a similar thought I have been attempting to share with such people ever since the awful days in which those hundreds of thousands of civilians were trapped by Prabhakaran in Mullaitivu.

Unlike what often seems to be the majority of people in Sri Lanka, I believe the main concern of the foreign governments who shouted themselves hoarse at that time was exactly what they claimed. This is not because I accept the idea of their inherent benevolence, which would be naïve in the extreme, but because nobody has come up with a sufficiently convincing reason for their wanting to prolong the existence of a terrorist organisation that also caused problems in their own countries, both directly through violence against their citizens of Sri Lankan origin and indirectly due to its involvement in drug and gun running and the like. The international community, as I may as well call it myself so that its members know who I mean, was interested primarily in saving the lives of Tamils.

At worst, it wanted to avoid looking unmoved. This was the only thing it achieved.

It may actually have killed people. Although most of the world knew perfectly well that the United Nations wasn’t going to send troops to impose a ceasefire, for entirely selfish reasons that I explained at the time, this was not the case here. Large numbers in Sri Lanka on both sides of the conflict thought there was a fairly good chance, however they viewed the prospect of an international rescue mission. Part of this misjudgement was due to the experience with India two decades ago, but much stemmed from the noisy rhetoric of the West. People thought its leaders were serious.

Most importantly, this included the LTTE. We cannot know what strategy Prabhakaran would have followed if he had understood that he was alone in his struggle, but there is a chance it would have been less bloody. The idea of keeping civilians back as a human shield was to make advances by the Army so costly that the Government would be forced into negotiations. So many young people were plucked from their families and sent to the frontlines with less training than a Colombo security guard to increase the death toll still further. It was pretty grim, and the anger it provoked amongst Tamils on the ground was unprecedented. At the very least, Prabhakaran’s field commanders might have felt more inclined to challenge him if they’d known that help wasn‘t on the way.

This idea is supported by the report of the University Teachers for Human Rights. They blame the Government for not making better use of the crisis in which the organisation found itself after the fall of Kilinochchi, but it could have been a lot easier.

The Government wasn’t sure how far the so-called international community would go either, come to think of it. Whether Gotabhaya Rajapaksa would have planned a more careful offensive if he had known that he had all the time in the world is difficult to say, but things could hardly have ended up more rushed.

Coming back to investigations of war crimes, we find ourselves in a rather similar position. Outside Sri Lanka, the majority of people find it very hard to believe that a case will ever be pursued seriously. Here the reverse is true.

This means that proper discussion of what happened in the final stages of the war isn’t possible. People will continue to talk of a humanitarian operation that killed a lot of terrorists but not many others. They will be unable to admit the obvious fact that all conflicts are terrible and appalling things happened in this one as well. They will have to go on pretending that their strategists were more brilliant than all the others. Nobody will be allowed to say ‘never again’, even. The victims will have to keep quiet. It will go down in local history as a thoroughly positive experience.

There can be no doubt that this will make reconciliation more difficult. Those who were present in the Vanni know how they suffered, after all.

It seems particularly unfortunate now that Sarath Fonseka is standing against Mahinda Rajapaksa for the presidency, thereby depoliticising the issue. They are equally responsible for what happened in the Vanni, whoever we think deserves most credit for the overall victory, so the Opposition would not be able to use any negative stories to promote itself at the expense of the Government. We know that the UNP would not have done any better, from past experience. It could be a genuinely national debate.

Philip Alston ought to be working to support the genesis of such a process, rather than helping to ensure that it never happens. His mandate as the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Killings is an important one, and there are many ways in which he could help Sri Lanka to improve its record going forward, but he won’t get very far without using his brain. Good intentions simply aren’t enough.

Let the United Nations pay attention, too.

(The writer can be reached at kathnoble99@gmail.com )

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