By Col R Hariharan
The month of July had been an eventful one for Sri
Lanka both internally and externally. The three major developments included the
thumping success of President Mahinda Rajapaksa in the local bodies’ elections
in the country except in the Northern Province, the building up of pressure on
India-Sri Lanka relations and the fall out of Mrs Hilary Clinton, U.S.
Secretary of State’s visit to India and its impact on U.S- Sri Lanka.
Local authorities election
The ruling coalition United Peoples Freedom
Alliance (UPFA), led by President Mahinda Rajapaksa, scored a thumping victory
in the elections for local bodies held on July 23. The President’s continued
popularity was underscored with the UPFA capturing 45 of the 65 local bodies
for which elections were held. The main opposition parties the United National
Party (UNP) and the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) failed to capture a single
local authority. This would show that opposition parties were yet to bounce
back from their parliamentary poll defeat.
However, in the Northern Province main Tamil
opposition party the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and the middle of the road
Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) captured 18 and 2 local authorities
respectively in the electoral districts of Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mullaitivu and
Digmatulla. The UPFA could secure only the two local bodies of Kayts and
Velanai, the pocket boroughs of its Tamil partner – the Eelam Peoples
Democratic Party (EPDP).
There are probably two reasons for Tamil
electorate’s firm rejection of the UPFA despite President Rajapaksa’s personal
campaign in the North. Tamil population’s unhappiness over Rajapaksa’s
dispensations in the North in the post war period; as spelled out by
Sumanthiran, a Tamil MP, not known for any sympathy to the LTTE. He had
catalogued a long list of excesses by the authorities including land grabbing
and illegal settlement of Sinhalas. The intimidation tactics
adopted by the ruling coalition United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) also
probably put off the Tamil voters could be the second reason for UPFA debacle.
During the run up to the election all over the island, the oppsoition had
accused the UPFA of intimidatory tactcis against opposition parties and misuse
of official machinery. In the North, there were allegations of EPDP cadres and
Army personnel coercing the public to support the ruling coalition. Army men
and goons were also used to disrupt TNA meetings. Journalists were threatened.
Even in the post election period, two foreign media men were beaten up and
Kuhanathan, news editor of the Jaffna Tamil daily ‘Uthayan’, was critically
injured when suspected thugs of EPDP beat him up with iron rods.
The election results have emphasized that President
Rajapaksa has to arrive at a political equation with the TNA to bring the North
to the national mainstream. However, the President’s camp does not appear to be
reconciled to do this. In a recent interview President’s brother Basil
Rajapaksa, an influential leader in the UPFA, not only refused to see the TNA
victory as a rejection of government policies by Tamil people, but accused the
TNA of damaging the reconciliation process during the election campaign.
India-Sri Lanka relations under stress
The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Ms Jayalalithaa’s
strident demand for holding Sri Lanka accountable for its failure to meet Tamil
aspirations and war crimes has found widespread opposition support. The Sri
Lanka issue is being brought up by the main opposition party the Bharatiya
Janatha Party (BJP) in the monsoon session of Indian parliament. The BJP wants
strong action by Indian government on this count. The Communist Party of India
(Marxist) has also taken up the litany. The mood in Tamil Nadu is getting ugly
as over 30 fishermen were reported injured when Sri Lankan navy attacked them
in continuing confrontations between the two sides. Recently, 25 Sri Lanka
soldiers who were sent for training at the Madras Regimental Centre, Wellington
in Tamil Nadu had to return home after public protest was mounted over their
presence.
The
recent one to one meeting between visiting U.S. Secretary of state Mrs Hilary
Clinton and Ms Jayalalithaa at Chennai underlines the Tamil Nadu leader’s
rising importance in the national political scene. The Sri Lanka issue was one
of the subjects the two leaders had discussed. The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister’s
Secretariat’s press release at the end of Ms Clinton’s meeting with Ms
Jayalalithaa was even more explicit. It said: "During the discussion on
the issues concerning Sri Lankan Tamils, the Hon'ble Chief Minister of Tamil
Nadu Selvi J. Jayalalithaa stated that even though the war in Sri Lanka was
over two years ago, the Sri Lankan Tamils in the Jaffna area are still in camps
and unable to go back to the original places where they used to live. The US
Secretary of State Ms. Hillary Rodham Clinton shared the concern of the Chief
Minister of Tamil Nadu and said that the US Government is looking at some
innovative and creative ideas in breaking the impasse and enabling the Sri
Lankan Tamils in camps to get back to their own homes. [Italics added]
Whilst discussing the Sri Lankan refugees in Tamil Nadu, the Hon'ble Chief
Minister explained that they have been provided with all the facilities that
are available to the local citizens by the Government of Tamil Nadu.”
At present the Congress party-DMK relations are
under severe strain over the 2G scam and the Indian Prime Minister Man Mohan
Singh has little option but maintain cordial relations with Ms Jayalalithaa. So
India’s Sri Lanka policy is likely to come under more pressure from her in the
coming months for taking proactive action. In this context, India’s outgoing
Foreign Secretary Mrs Nirupama Rao’s comment on war crimes video in an
interview in Headlines Today TV channel on July 30 is interesting. She said
“they [Sri Lanka] have to look at it carefully. As per the video, there were
human right violations during the last few days of the war…” This would
indicate the days of “silent pressure” India was said to be exercising on Sri
Lanka on the subject may well end soon.
After initially shunning any contact with Ms
Jayalalithaa, in a belated damage control measure, Sri Lanka appears to
be taking measures to improve its relations with the new Tamil Nadu Chief
Minister. The Sri Lankan High Commissioner in India Prasad Kariyavasam
accompanied by the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner in Chennai Krishnamurthi
met with her and handed her an invitation from President Rajapaksa to visit Sri
Lanka. In the letter the President invited her to see for herself the progress
made so far in the Northern Province on the rehabilitation of Tamils affected
by war.
U.S. Sri
Lanka relations
Sri
Lanka’s continued indifference to international concerns over its human rights
has again drawn flak. The finding of police of the body of Pattani Razeek, a
human rights activist who disappeared last year, has triggered yet another
outcry. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) has urged Sri
Lanka to "expedite" investigations and prosecute those involved in
the crime. UN records show there were 5,653 cases of "enforced and
involuntary disappearances" in Sri Lanka which remain unsolved.
The Sri
Lanka issue continues to figure prominently in the U.S.’s agenda for South Asia.
This was clear from Mrs Clinton’s agenda during the Indian visit and her
meeting with Ms Jayalalithaa. U.S. has delivered a demarche to Sri Lanka that
it wants the final report of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission
(LLRC) discussed at the 19th sessions of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva
in March 2012. Though Sri Lanka has not responded to it so far, this would be
an unpleasant experience for it to agree to the U.S. request. Regardless of
this, Sri Lanka will have to take into consideration growing convergence
between India and the U.S. on issues relating to Sri Lanka. The U.S. Assistant
Secretary of State Robert Blake who accompanied Ms Hilary Clinton during her
visit to New Delhi and Chennai, commenting on this had told a questioner:
“We're very much on the same page. I think we both feel that more needs to be
done to encourage reconciliation, and more needs to be done on things like
devolution of power, the election of a new provincial council in the north, and
some of these important accountability issues.”
The U.S.
mood was evident when the Channel 4 video on war crime was screened for U.S.
Congressmen. Close on its heels, the House Foreign Affairs Committee in
Washington adopted a resolution to ban aid to Sri Lanka. The Committee passed
H.R (House Resolution) 2583, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for Fiscal
Year 2012. This legislation among other things includes a section on cutting
aid to Sri Lanka unless it improves its “accountability for those involved in
violations of human rights and war crimes at the end of Sri Lanka's civil war
in May 2009, including by any remaining members of the Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam.” Other conditions for release of aid include establishment of a
mechanism to account for events that occurred at the end of the war,
information on the fate of missing persons, release of those in detention,
withdrawal of emergency regulations and improved climate for media. The
ban has to be ratified as a law.
According
to media reports Sri Lanka stands to lose $ 13 million dollars (SLRs 1.4
billion) in development assistance from the United States if a ban on aid
becomes law. Altogether US AID has sought US$ 55 million (Rs 6 billion) for aid
programmes for the fiscal year 2012 (October 1, 2011 to September 30, 2012).
Already
another resolution is before the US Congress calls for an independent
international investigation into alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka.
Overall,
Sri Lanka is likely to face a difficult period, both internally and externally,
in the coming months. The unfortunate part is the process of ethnic
reconciliation could become even more difficult if President Rajapaksa whips up
nationalist elements against international criticism instead of taking actions
to address their concerns. As International Crisis Group in its latest report
on Sri Lanka said “Sri Lanka is further from reconciliation than ever.”
Written on July 31, 2011
Courtesy: South Asia Security Trends, Vol 5 No 7 August 2011
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