Speaking in Sri Lanka’s parliament last week Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK) parliamentarian S Shritharan called on the Sri Lankan president to enact a political solution that respects the identity and rights of Eelam Tamils.
In his speech, Shritharan highlighted how the 80-year struggle of Tamil people was caused by the Sri Lankan government’s policies, which forced Tamils to take up arms. He also spoke about how considering the violent history of war and suffering, Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Dissanayake failed to mention the struggles of Tamils at all, in his opening address to parliament last month. Shritharan reminded the president that he should take a look back into 2019 and the tenure of Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a man who also failed to mention political solutions for Tamils and was eventually forced to resign.
He went on to explain that one of the main reasons behind Sri Lanka’s financial crisis and the downfall of the economy, was the heavy defence spending that the state used to arm itself as it killed Tamils during the armed conflict.
Shritharan also addressed the history of failed agreements between the Tamil political leaders and former Sri Lankan presidents, including the agreement between S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike and S.J.V. Chelvanayakam, Dudley Senanayake and Chelvanayakam, Ranasinghe Premadasa and the LTTE (1989), and Chandrika Kumaratunga and the LTTE (1994).
“We Tamils respect Sinhala people’s identity, religion, ethnicity and language, and we expect the same from them,” he said. “But the Sinhalese must also understand that we are two different ethnic groups with uniqueness, and we accept equal rights, but not in the cost of Identity”.
He insisted that Tamil rights must be respected and then only the island be shaped in the right direction. Shritharan also quoted Abraham Lincoln’s words ‘As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master’, and said that there should be an island where that level of inequity exists.
"How can those whose rights have been stripped away ever be friends with those who have taken them?” he continued, speaking on accountability for atrocities committed against Tamils. “The judgement for the massacre was given by the killer itself. Is that a fair judgement?”.
Finally, he concluded by saying that the sacrifices of 4 lakh Tamil civilians and 60,000 Tamil freedom fighters will definitely open a new door for Tamils, just as it opened after 55 years for Anura Kumara Dissanayake, as he became the president of Sri Lanka.
Shritharan said that he would be open to speaking about the procedures of self-governance by Tamils in upcoming meetings.
See his full speech in Tamil below.