Fear and loathing in the Eastern elections

The results from the recently held Eastern provincial council elections have been brandished by Sri Lanka as a sign of wavering Tamil demand for self rule, and more perversely, that Tamils are now content with Sri Lanka’s rule. However, rather than signal a weakening of Tamil aspirations, the elections clearly revealed the true nature of the Sinhala state’s governance in the Tamil homeland; a mixture of violence, threats, intimidation and colonisation. The elections were a far cry from the free and fair expression of Tamil sentiments that they were trumped up to be. Instead, as became clear through the campaign, they were marked by ongoing incidents of violence against candidates and voters with hundreds of government thugs dispatched to the Tamil homeland for the purpose. The well documented and choking colonisation of the East also served its purpose – providing a reliable Sinhala vote base for Rajapakse’s UPFA. The brazenness of the intimidation during the campaign even prompted R. Sampanthan, the infamously timid leader of the TNA, to appeal to President Rajapaksa for “free and fair” elections to be allowed to take place. The appeal predictably failed and Sampanthan has recently released a statement slamming the “UPFA campaign of terror” and stating that it "violated all norms of democracy and good governance". The purpose of the Sinhala state’s violent electoral campaign was very clear. Tamil voters were warned of “unpleasant consequences” if they opposed the UPFA and told in no uncertain terms that they voted for the TNA at their own risk.

Boycott, divestments and sanctions call against Sri Lanka

Tamil Nadu based writer and poet Meena Kandasamy has called upon India to impose a boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Sri Lanka, as " one of the solutions to the continued oppression against Tamils by Sri Lanka". Writing in Tehelka she stated that "there is no denying the fact that massive international pressure alone can halt the ongoing cultural and structural genocide against the Tamils in Sri Lanka" and called upon India to "sever all diplomatic relations with its island neighbour" and organise a widespread boycott against Sri Lanka. See her full piece here . Extracts have been reproduced below. “A visiting football team sends out the superficial message: all is well in Sri Lanka. It does not reveal that 4,000 university teachers have been striking for the past two months demanding better wages and greater spending on education, or that the government ordered the closure of all universities last week. It conceals a genocide that claimed 1 lakh Tamil lives in 2009 and a structural racism that marginalises minorities. In enthusiastically supporting the sporting spirit, even sections of the media fail to note that the football team had no permission to play in Tamil Nadu.”

The cycle of oppression

The appeals of Tamil Nadu fishermen associations to stop all protests against Sri Lankans for fear of reprisal attacks by the Sri Lankan Navy is a tragic reflection of their terrorised plight and the Indian government's impotence on the issue. What should have been a demand on the Indian government to fulfil its responsibility and guarantee the safety of its civilians against the Sri Lankan navy, has instead been usurped by sheer terror. Of course this fear is a very real one - attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen have no doubt escalated in response to anti-Sri Lankan activism by Tamils in Tamil Nadu. Indeed the very next day, five Tamil Nadu fishermen were reported to have been attacked by the Sri Lankan Navy. However, what must be made clear is that the attacks were one of the precursors to the recent anti-Sri Lankan protests, not the after effects.

The Dialectics of Genocide - Interview with Lokeesan

Writing in the Kindlemag, Meena Kandasamy interviews a Tamil journalist who reported from Vanni during 2009. Lokeesan was the Vanni correspondent for TamilNet during that time, and is currently living in exile. See here for full interview entitled 'The Dialectics of Genocide'. Excerpts of Lokeesan's interview reproduced below: Meena Kandasamy: How different was your work, from the kind of reporting that Lasantha, or any of the dissenting Sinhala journalists were doing? Lokeesan: "Lasantha had all the facilities available to the media – internet, phone, email, camera, everything. But where we...

'Human rights should always trump short-term, partisan political interests'

Writing in The Australian, the executive director of the Human Rights Law Centre Phil Lynch states that Australia must do more to protect asylum seekers and re-evaluate its relationship with Sri Lanka. Extracts have been reproduced below. See the full piece here . "It is well documented that the Sri Lankan government was responsible for mass human rights violations towards the end of the civil war in 2009. The Australian government has not done enough, either at the international level or through our bilateral relations, to ensure that these crimes are independently investigated and that perpetrators are held to account." "Serious human rights violations did not end in Sri Lanka with the cessation of the civil war. Arbitrary arrest, detention and even torture remain systematic and widespread, particularly against the Tamil minority." "In recent months, evidence has emerged that asylum-seekers returned to Sri Lanka are at particular risk of rights violations. Human Rights Watch has documented at least eight cases in which people who unsuccessfully sought asylum in Britain were returned to Sri Lanka and endured serious abuses, including torture and rape. There have been similar claims by Tamil asylum-seekers returned by Australia. This corroborates a May 2010 report by the Edmund Rice Centre that claimed asylum-seekers returned to Sri Lanka were detained and assaulted by Sri Lankan police." "Despite this, Australia works closely with Sri Lanka - including through financial assistance and intelligence co-operation - in preventing people from fleeing the country. The Sri Lankan Department of Immigration and Emigration receives Australian aid, and Australia's last federal budget included almost $11 million to deploy Australian police officers to Sri Lanka and elsewhere to "combat people-smuggling"." "At best, this undermines the spirit of the Refugee Convention, which gives people the right to flee persecution and seek protection. At worst, it involves Australia, at least indirectly, in exposing people to torture and other serious human rights violations. It is time for Australia to recalibrate its relationship with Sri Lanka to put human rights at the core."

Tamil Civil Society Memo to the TNA regarding the Eastern Provincial Council Elections

Tamils have consistently made it clear that a unitary constitution and a provincial council system within the confines of a unitary constitution are incapable of fulfilling their political aspirations. In this regard it is notable that Tamil political parties with a Tamil Nationalist dispensation had chosen to boycott the two provincial council elections that took place in our homeland in the past (1989 and 2008). There can be no doubt that a Tamil political party with a Tamil Nationalist dispensation can never run a provincial council autonomously, something that even Tamil parties aligned...

Black July and the efficacy of safe haven mechanisms

Address by Jan Jananayagam of Tamils Against Genocide (TAG) at Black July remembrance event in London, 2012. This year, as every year in the past 29 years, we have come together to remember and reflect on a watershed event in the history of the Tamil nation: Black July was the most damaging of a series of pogroms since independence against the Tamil people in Sri Lanka. Contemporaneously Black July was acknowledged as an act of genocide by international observers including the international commission of jurists and the British media. It is crucial to acknowledge that Black July was not a one...

Indian proscriptions and Sri Lanka’s ethnic crisis: a policy of failure

The intemperate attacks against the Tamil Diaspora that accompanied India’s predictable decision to re-proscribe the LTTE earlier this month reflects more than anything the dismal failure of India’s attempts to shape a political solution to the island’s ongoing and escalating ethnic conflict. Indian approaches to the Tamil crisis in Sri Lanka have long been driven by the belief that the LTTE and particularly its senior leadership remained the singular obstacles to an equitable political solution to the conflict. To this end the Indian political and military establishment provided unqualified support for Sri Lanka’s military efforts to crush the Tamil struggle. However, three years after the end of the war and the military destruction of the LTTE, amidst Sri Lanka’s horrifying slaughter of Tamil civilians, the prospects of a political solution to the ongoing ethnic conflict are by all accounts remote.

'Mahinda and Tamil Diaspora’s Olympian competition in London'

The Tamil writer, J.S.Tissainayagam, writes in the online site, Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS). Published 19th June 2012. See here for original article. Reproduced in full below: Commentators who view the world through a human rights lens are unhappy. They believe the Tamil Diaspora successfully blocking Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse from addressing the Commonwealth Business Forum in London violated his rights. They also query what right the Diaspora as ‘LTTE supporters’ have to denounce Rajapakse as a war criminal, when the LTTE is accused of similar misdemeanours...

‘International justice is here to stay’

Writing in the Guardian, Geoffery Robertson QC, who served as an appeal judge for the UN Special Court for Sierra Leone, has commented on the Charles Taylor verdict, noting that as the former Liberia leader is jailed, more "despots" will follow. Excerpts have been reproduced below. See his full piece here . “ International criminal justice grinds slowly, but it can grind exceedingly small. Charles Taylor was first indicted in 2003 for crimes against humanity, in a UN court over which I presided. Then, he strutted the world stage as a head of state. Ghana refused our request to arrest him when...

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