The United States Congress imposed military assistance to Sri Lanka and called for the Secretary of State to submit a report on the alleged crime against humanity during the last phase of the 30-year-old civil war there.

The Senate and House Conference report of the 2010 Appropriations Bill published on Friday December 11 directed the Secretary of State to submit a report supplementing her report on October 21 on crimes against humanity in Sri Lanka detailing whether any measures have been taken by Colombo and international bodies to investigate such incidents, and evaluating the effectiveness of such efforts, according to Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency.

A section in the Bill, which deals with US financial assistance to Sri Lanka, restricts any military assistance to Colombo until the Secretary of State certifies to the Committee on Appropriations that Sri Lanka is suspending and bringing to justice members of the military who have been credibly alleged to have violated internationally recognized human rights or international humanitarian law. The Senate is expected to pass the 2010 Appropriations Bill this weekend, PTI added.

While the report welcomed the defeat of the Tamil Tigers, PTI said the report  expressed concerned over the displaced Tamils who are still detained in closed camps, as well as other persons who have been imprisoned or are being prosecuted for publicly reporting attacks on civilians.

According to PTI, the Congressional report expressed further concern at the lack of credible steps taken by the Sri Lankan state to promote reconciliation among Tamils and other minority ethnic groups.

The conference agreement includes a provision directing the Secretary of the Treasury to instruct the United States executive directors of the international financial institutions to vote against financial support for Sri Lanka, except to meet basic human needs, unless certain requirements are met, reported PTI.

"...If all conditions are met by Sri Lanka, then the Secretary of State should ensure that any military assistance to Sri Lanka be used to support the recruitment and training of Tamils into the Sri Lankan military, Tamil language training for Sinhalese military personnel, and human rights training for all military personnel," the 2010 Appropriations Bill said.

A top US envoy visiting Sri Lanka praised Sri Lanka for progress so far in its post war efforts but warned more needs to be done.

Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs Robert Blake who was on a three-day visit starting Monday December 7 to discuss political matters and reconciliation said the US was willing to extend more aid to Sri Lanka provided there was progress in political reconciliation and human rights.

"The United States welcomes the recent progress by the government of Sri Lanka," Blake said, referring to the return of hundreds of thousands of refugees from camps that drew international condemnation because people were not free to leave.” Blake told reporters in Colombo after meetings with the president and senior government officials.

"Everyone agrees that there is still a tremendous amount of work to be done,"

"Killings and abductions have come down. That is certainly welcome. We still need progress on press freedom and ... political reconciliation." Blake said.

Blake's visit came after the US Senate's Foreign Relations Committee urged President Barack Obama not to "lose" its relationship with the strategically located island nation as China and India have gained increasing sway.

The report urged the Obama administration to not to focus on the human rights violations alone but recalibrate its approach to post-war Sri Lanka to include more economic, political and security aid to protect U.S. interests and offer incentives for Sri Lanka to improve its rights record.

However, Blake, who was the ambassador in Colombo until May, said he was not aware of the report's recommendations and made it clear that accountability was a key priority for the Obama administration, at least for now.

“An important element of reconciliation is safeguarding and protecting the rights of all Sri Lankans. In practice this means…people who have violated the rights of others should be held accountable for their actions.”

Also, unlike the Senate report which avoided any reference to a political solution for the Tamil National question or power sharing, Blake, told reporters that a power-sharing arrangement should be implemented to ensure that all Sri Lankans participate in the democratic process.

“In all my meetings with Government and non-governmental leaders, I expressed my country's hope that the Government and opposition will work together to develop a consensus on reconciliation and power-sharing arrangements that can be implemented to ensure that all Sri Lankans can participate fully in the democratic process and that democracy can be restored in northern Sri Lanka, so Tamils and others in the North can enjoy a future of hope, dignity, and opportunity.”

During his visit Blake, visited Manik Farm in Vavuniya, the largest camp for Internally Displaced People (IDPs) run by the Sri Lankan government, and met some IDPs who had recently returned to Mannar district in North-western Sri Lanka.

Video footage that appears to show Sri Lankan troops committing war crimes by summarily executing captured Tamil Tiger fighters on the battlefield was not fabricated, as claimed by the Sri Lankan Government, an investigation by The Times found.

The video of the alleged battlefield executions, which was aired on Channel 4 in August, shows a naked man, bound and blindfolded, being made to kneel.

Another man, dressed in what appears to be Sri Lankan army uniform, approaches from behind and shoots him in the head at point-blank range.

“It’s like he jumped,” the executor laughs. The camera then pans to show eight similarly bound corpses.

A 10th man was also shot in the same way towards the end of the video with men in the background gloating over the killings.

It is impossible to confirm when and where the filming occurred or the identities of the men shown, noted the Times.

Channel 4 stressed in its original report that it could not verify the authenticity of the video which it received from a group called Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka.

The group claims the video footage was taken in January by a soldier using a mobile phone.

The United Nations said at the time that it was viewing the footage "with the utmost concern" but could also not verify the video.

The Sri Lankan government has claimed that it has “established beyond doubt” that the footage was fake. It denies that the video shows soldiers shooting unarmed, naked men.

An analysis for The Times by Grant Fredericks, an independent forensic video specialist who is also an instructor at the FBI National Academy, suggests otherwise, the Times report said.

He found no evidence of digital manipulation, editing or any other special effects. However, subtle details consistent with a real shooting, such as a discharge of gas from the barrel of the weapon used, were visible, the report said.

“This level of subtle detail cannot be virtually reproduced. This is clearly an original recording,” said Mr Fredericks, who was previously the head of the Vancouver police forensic video unit in Canada.

There was also strong evidence to rule out the use of actors. “Even if the weapons fired blanks, the barrel is so close to the head of the ‘actors’ that the gas discharge alone leaves the weapon with such force it would likely cause serious injury or death,” Mr Fredericks told The Times.

The reactions of those executed was consistent with reality, he added. “The victims do not lunge forward . . . [they] fall backward in a very realistic reaction, unlike what is normally depicted in the movies.”

In Mr Fredericks’s opinion “the injury to the head of the second victim and the oozing liquid from that injury cannot be reproduced realistically without editing cuts, camera angle changes and special effects. No [errors] exist anywhere in any of the images that support a technical fabrication of the events depicted,” he said.

The Sri Lankan Government conducted its own investigations into the video in September and concluded that the footage was “done with a sophisticated video camera, dubbed to give the gunshot effect and transferred to a mobile phone.”

Mr Fredericks’s research showed that code embedded in the footage appeared to match with software used in Nokia mobile phones. He said: “The recording is completely consistent with a cell phone video recording and there are no signs of editing or alterations.”

The strong evidence that the footage does show real executions could reinforce international calls for an independent war crimes investigation, reported The Times — something that the Sri Lanka Government has resisted.

The Times UK report closely matches the key findings by the US Colorado-based Image and Sound Forensics (ISF) experts who performed the analysis on behalf of US pressure group Tamils Against Genocide (TAG).

Colorado ISF's report, parts of which appeared in the Sunday Leader, had previously confirmed, "[t]he video and audio of the events depicted in the Video, were continuous without any evidence of start/stops, insertions, deletions, over recordings, editing or tampering of any kind."

Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on extra-judicial, summary or arbitrary executions had earlier declared the video investigations by the local 'experts' appointed by the Sri Lanka Government as "not impartial."

However, Philip Alston's assertion that UN will conduct its own investigations on the authenticity of the video has not materialized.

Meanwhile, TAG spokesperson when contacted by TamilNet said, "While we have published the summary of the findings, ISF is due to provide TAG a detailed technical report detailing the analysis carried out." 

Tens of thousands of Tamils gathered in London Friday, November 27, to commemorate Remembrance Day. Organisers estimate that over 50,000 individuals made the effort to attend the Excel Centre event and pay their respects to those who had made the ultimate sacrifice for the Tamil national struggle.

Carrying red roses, gloriosa lilies (Karthikaipoo: Tamil Eelam national flower) and lamps, British Tamils filed into the main venue, at the Excel Centre in East London, where large cut-outs of Tamil Eelam were displayed on either side of the stage.

The annual commemoration began with a moment of silence in memory of those who gave their lives in the Tamil national struggle.

The traditional lamp was lit by Mr K Varnakulasingham, the father of Murugadas, who self-immolated in front of the United Nations in Geneva earlier this year to draw attention to the slaughter of Tamil civilians in the Vanni.

When the doors opened at 11am, there were already more than 8,000 Tamils waiting to enter the venue. By the time the flame of sacrifice was lit, at midday, over 15,000 Tamil filled the hall, with another 10,000 waiting outside to file in and pay their respects.

The organisers had to urge people who had already paid their respects to leave so that others could enter the main hall. Even as late as 5pm, as many people were leaving the venue to head home, others were making the effort to come in and pay their respects after a day of work.

The flame of sacrifice was lit by Mrs R Sathananthan, the mother of a fighter who died in the Tamil national struggle, while everyone in the hall held a lit candle.

A pre-recorded speech by renowned poet Kasianandhan was broadcast, in which he spoke of the losses of the past year, but stressed that this should not be understood just as a year of loss, but also as a year of opportunity.

The chief address was delivered by Professor Thieran from Tamil Nadu, India. Director Seeman had also recorded an address to the London crowd, which was well received.

Many local politicians also addressed the gathering. Barry Gardiner, Labour MP for Brent North, requested the Tamils to form a transnational government as the next step in the politicization of the struggle. Other parliamentarians to address the event included Susan Kramer, (Liberal Democrat, Richmond Park), Siobhain McDonagh (Labour, Mitcham and Morden), Virendra Sharma (Labour, Southall) and Lee Scott (Conservative, Ilford North). A message of support from Joan Ryan (Labour, Enfield North) was also read.

Prospective parliamentary candidates also addressed the gathered Tamils, including Dr Rachel Joyce (Conservative, Harrow West), Heidi Alexander, (Labour, Lewisham East), David Gold (Conservative, Eltham North), Toby Boutle (Conservative, Ilford South) and Andrew Caralambous (Conservative, Edmonton).

Councillors Keith Prince (Conservative, Redbridge Council), Ranjit Dheer (Labour, Ealing Council) and Dora Dixon-Fyle (Labour, Southwark Council) also addressed the event, as did Prof Bryan Woodriff, Parade organiser and member of the Hampton Royal British Legion.

During the events, there were dramas, poems, and many songs to commemorate the sacrifices made for the Tamil cause. The event concluded at 6.30 pm, as attendees filed out of the Excel Centre to head home.

The Advisory Committee for formation of the Provisional Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (PGTGE) held an awareness day in London on Sunday December 4 to meet with the Tamil media and Tamil community organisations in the UK to provide an overview of the progress made by the committee in defining the organisational structure and interact with British Tamil organisations.

The London event follows two similar public events held by the organisers of the PGTGE in Osla, Norway and Zurich, Switzerland.

The awareness day consisted of a press meet held at the Radisson Edwardian Hotel in Heathrow followed by an interactive session with the British Tamil organisations.

Professor Rev A.J.C Chandrakanthan from Canada, Professor Nadaraja Sriskandarajah from Australia, Ms Karen Parker from USA, Prof. Peter Schalk from Sweden, Dr N Jeyalingam from USA, Dr A.L. Vasanthakumar from UK, Professor M Sornarajah from UK from the Advisory Committee who were in London for consultation sessions attended the awareness event whilst the Coordinator of the Advisory Committee Mr. Visuwanathan Ruthrakumar participated in the press meet through a video link.

Prof. Sriskandarajah welcoming the guests to the event said the PGTGE is being formed to give voice to the Eelam Tamils who have been made voiceless and added since its formation the advisory committee has made significant progress and are on target for presenting their proposals to Mr. Ruthrakumar in the first week of January 2010.

Prof. Chandrakanthan introducing the committee members said whilst the war is over the struggle continues. He further said the PGTGE is the need of the hour and is based on the principles of 1976 Vaddukottai resolution.  

Commenting on the strength of the Diaspora community, Prof. Chandrakanthan said in 1976 there wasn’t a large Tamil Diaspora community but today the Tamil Diaspora spread across the globe is one million strong. As host countries of the Diaspora community upholds and respects democracy, we the Tamils also should follow this norm.

Prof. Chandrakanthan added that the PGTGE is a people’s effort for the people and will act as a proxy for the people of Tamil Eelam who are prevented from thinking, speaking and moving freely. 

He concluded his introductory speech declaring PGTGE as an effort by the people for the people to form a secular state of Tamil Eelam.

Prof. Sornarajah in his speech said the PGTGE has precedence and cited the British East India Company as an example of a transnational organisation ruling over territory and cited the Jewish, Kurd, and Palestine Diasporas as examples of a community in exile striving to establish a state from outside.

Prof. Sornarajah then provided an overview of some of the guiding principles of the PGTGE.

The PGTGE, according to Prof. Sornarajah, will have two chambers, a Senate and an Assembly with elected members.

The Assembly members from the Tamil Diaspora spread across the globe will be elected through a proportional representation system, with the country hosting the largest Diaspora Community sending the highest number of Assembly members.

The Senate will be tasked with upholding the guiding principles og PGTGE including the Vaddukottai resolution – the founding principle of PGTGE; equality for all people; welfare of the Eelam Tamils, Diaspora Tamils and global Tamils; Provision of health facilities for Tamil Eelam people; Promotion of Tamil Eelam economy and development of industry and infrastructure through transnational organisations; Forming and promoting foreign relations between Tamils and other Nations to build a climate  that is conducive to Tamil Eelam; Setup a think tank to develop strategies to assist in the formation of Tamil Eelam; Prosecution of war crimes; prosecution of any persons or organisations transgressing Tamil Eelam people; empowerment and betterment of Tamil Eelam women;

Prof. Sornarajah also stated a permanent secretariat will be setup to coordinate all activities of the PGTGE.

According to Ms Karen Parker who provided overview of PGTGE election process, elections for assembly members will be conducted nationally in all countries with a significant Tamil community presence and Country Working Committee announced by the PGTGE will coordinate all logistical process relating to the election in their host country.

This would include formulating of the electoral process such as deciding between a filing fee or minimum signature for candidates; ensuring the candidates meet the required criteria; organising of electoral observers to ensure credibility and transparency; ensuring voter confidentiality and adhering to the Advisory committee guidelines.

Prof. Peter Schalk in his speech highlighted the plight of Tamil children in Sri Lanka’s concentration camps. Describing the detention of children in camps as a human rights issue that requires the urgent attention of the world, Prof Schalk said he has compiled a list of 1172 children with names and camps where they are detained.

The list has the details of 536 girls and 636 boys of which 300 are under 5 years old and the youngest just 1 month old. 

Mr. Ruthrakumar in his speech said the Tamils have faced untold suffering and unprecedented losses this year, with tens of thousands of people killed by the Sri Lankan security forces in the space of few months, 30,000 according to international sources and 50,000 according to Tamil sources.

Mr. Ruthrakumar further said the whereabouts of 20,000 who surrendered, after trusting pledges by the international community, is unknown and no international rights or relief agency has access to these people.

Whilst the Tamil military power has been weakened, Mr Ruthrakumar said the Tamil Diaspora is strong and in the political space they will be operating they have advantage of setting their own rules.

Mr Ruthrakumar concluded his speech urging all Tamils to strengthen the PGTGE and to continue to work together to create a independent Tamil Eelam, a task the Tamil National Leader Hon. Velupillai Pirapaharan and the history has placed on the shoulders of the Diaspora Tamils.

The US House of Representatives passed a motion calling on the Sri Lankan government to respect its commitments to care for and ensure the speedy return of civilians displaced by the fighting.

H. Res. 711 resolution, passed in the US House of Representatives Thursday, November 5, by a vote of 421 to 1, also drew attention to the approach of the 180 day deadline within which the Sri Lankan government had promised to release all the detained Tamil civilians.

That period is due to end on November 23, 2009.

Fewer than 20% of those detained have been released as of Oct. 23, 2009.

The resolution also emphasized that "the United States supports the rapid release and voluntary return of all civilian IDPs as a critical element of national reconciliation in Sri Lanka."

The resolution called on the Government of Sri Lanka to allow freedom of movement for "IDPs to leave their camps voluntarily and return in safety and dignity to their homes or, where that is not possible, to live with host families or move to open transit sites."

Congress resolved that the IDP camps needed to be 'truly civilian,' not military.

They also said it was imperative that NGOs and observers, including the ICRC have 'full access' to the camps by.

The Congress also urged the Sri Lankan government to “engage in dialogue with Tamils inside and outside Sri Lanka on new mechanisms for devolving power, improving human rights and increasing accountability."

Many Congressmen including Rep. Howard Berman, the head of the Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Danny Davis, who visited all areas of Sri Lanka following the tsunami and who co-sponsored the resolution along with Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee, spoke in support of the resolution before the vote was taken.

The resolution was described as 'non-controversial and non-partisan,' and attracted 32 co-sponsors from both parties.

Isolationist Rep. Ron Paul of Texas was the only one to vote against the resolution.

The resolution marked increasing signs of impatience by the international community with the slow pace of release of the Tamils detainees held against their will in military run internment camps, commented TamilNet.

A young boy was drowned in broad daylight this week. Though not a single newspaper carried it, I’m told B. Sivakumaran was his name. He was “believed” to be mentally retarded and known for throwing stones at passing vehicles and trains. Approximately 100 people watched him die. One even managed to capture on film the final five minutes of his life.

That five minutes of footage could have been of a possible rescue by one of the 100 or so spectators.  Or, that five minutes of footage could have been shot at the same time a call for assistance was made to the nearest Police Station, by someone present in the crowd. This was the heart of Bambalapitiya after all, and Sri Lanka is not short of mobile phones. But instead, the five minutes of footage shows us the gory, pathetic end of a young life, for no apparent reason.

The spectators watched on intently.

Three to four men surfaced out of the water, as if from nowhere, and began to advance towards the boy, who by then was fast retreating. Two men armed with large wooden poles (more like thick tree branches) continued to advance on the boy, and thrash him, one brutal stroke at a time. The spectators watch on. The boy kept trying to head towards the shore. He even brought his hands together in a desperate plea for mercy. His persecutors however, showed no sign of it.

The spectators continued to watch.

The more he pleaded, the more vicious the attack became. Closer and closer they inched to him, thrashing him unmercifully each time he surfaced. This went on for five minutes, until at last the deed was done. He resurfaced no more.

The spectators watched on, transfixed.

A friend said to me that maybe people didn’t want to get “involved” because they thought it was some “underworld” rift. That’s a damning indictment on us, our society. This video is proof that we’ve reached a point where our “fear” overrides a sense of humanity.

I sense a pattern of sorts here.

The deafening silence on the IDP issue for example. Everyone knows they’re suffering, some even care. But, our “fear” of a “possible” threat to our lives by the “possible” re-emergence of terrorism justifies our silence. Our inaction. Isn’t it strange to have a State half-heartedly respond only when threatened by the International Community to set these people free? Doesn’t it seem strange at all that a Government must be held to ransom to look after its own people? Our paralyzing fear of dissent and our sheer capacity to rationalize the violent fate of those who do dare to is another facet of our ‘Spectator State.’

If cold-blooded murder can take place in the heart of Colombo in broad daylight, in front of a crowd, we can only wonder what happened on bloody battlefields in the Vanni, with no one left to tell the tale.

A recent US report into alleged war crimes committed during the last days of the war in Sri Lanka has necessitated the need for an independent probe, said the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW).

The "report should dispel any doubts that serious abuses were committed during the conflict's final months,” said Brad Adams, HRW’s Asia director.

"Given Sri Lanka's complete failure to investigate possible war crimes, the only hope for justice is an independent, international investigation," he added.

"Concerned governments should use the US State Department report as a clarion call for an international investigation. There are no more excuses for inaction," he said.

"The Sri Lankan government cannot get away with hiding what it did to civilians during the war," Tom Malinowski, Washington advocacy director for HRW, told IPS.

"And this report helps to show that. It compiles all of the information out there about what happened and it turns out there's a lot of sources."

"If their goal was to win the war and not allow the world to see what was happening to civilian caught in the crossfire then they failed," Malinowski went on to say.

"Human Rights Watch's own research into the fighting found that both sides repeatedly violated the laws of war," said HRW.

"The LTTE used civilians as human shields, employed lethal force to prevent civilians from fleeing to safety, and deployed their forces in densely populated civilian areas. Government forces indiscriminately shelled densely populated areas, including hospitals. "

"Both parties' disregard for civilian life resulted in thousands of civilian casualties."

Human rights groups have complained that the Sri Lankan government has failed to take appropriate action to investigate the allegations of war crimes committed earlier in the year.

"In the absence of any domestic steps to investigate these terrible offences there does need to be, in our view, an international inquiry," said Malinowski. 

"Sri Lanka refugees, we have lived in forest for one month. Please, sir, please take us to a country. It's OK if it is not Australia. It's better if any other country trades us. We can't live in Sri Lanka."

These were the desperate words of 9 year old Brindha, as she pleaded on Australian television.

She is one of the 255 men, women and children who have been stranded in waters off the Sunda straits of Indonesia since last month.

They were attempting to flee from Sri Lanka and make their way towards Australia, where they could claim asylum, before they were intercepted by Indonesian authorities.

The desperate Tamil civilians aboard the boat staged a hunger strike last week, as they attempted to persuade Australian authorities to allow them to seek asylum.

The hunger strike lasted 52 hours before authorities eventually persuaded them to cease.

A wooden board with the words "We are Sri Lankan civilians, Plz save our lives" scribbled onto it, is on display aboard the ship.

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has so far been unmoved and said that their individual cases should be processed by the United Nations.

In reference to the hunger strike he commented that he would not be swayed by "any tactics deployed by any particular person".

"There are still Tamil people in Sri Lanka who are dying every day. This is why most of these people here have fled from genocide in Sri Lanka and trying to find a future somewhere else... We're just people without a country to live in," said Alex, spokesman for the group.

"But the situation in our country right now, I'm telling you, Tamils do not have an opportunity to survive in Sri Lanka," he said.

The group of asylum seekers are still aboard their boat, which has docked the West Java port of Merak in Indonesia and are refusing to leave the vessel.

According to the spokesman there are 195 men, 31 women, and 27 children on board, each of whom reported to have paid $15,000 USD in order to be smuggled out of Sri Lanka, amounting to nearly $ 4 million USD in total.

The conditions of the boat have been described as far from adequate with there being just one toilet on the boat for all on board.

One of the inhabitants, Varshini from Jaffna, is on board with Marthavan, her seven-year-old son, and Amirtha, her four-year-old daughter. She said her children believed they would see their father soon.

She has yet to tell them that he was taken away by Government affiliated paramilitary forces, while they were sleeping 18 months ago.

"There are still many more Sri Lankans who need help," said Alex, at a press conference organised by the asylum seekers last week.

Alex and his fellow civilians are still refusing to leave the boat until they meet a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) official to explain the asylum procedure and give assurances about their future.

"If you had no place to go, if you had no country of your own, what would you do and how long would you stay in a boat before you were promised to enter a country that will give you asylum? How long will you go? How desperate will you be?" said Alex.

"We're not only suffering back home we're suffering here. We have no choice."

"We have no country to go back to."

Ronnate Tissainayagam, wife of Sri Lanka jailed journalist, Jayaprakash Tissainayagam, accepted the Peter Mackler Award for courageous and ethical journalism, named for a 30-year veteran of Agence France-Presse who died last year, at a ceremony at the National Press Club Friday, AFP reported.

Tissainayagam was honored by the US branch of Paris-based media rights group Reporters Without Borders and Global Media Forum, a company founded by Mackler to train journalists and non-profit organizations to use the media as a tool for social change, AFP report added.

"For the last 20 years my husband has endeavoured to pursue the goals that Mr. Mackler believed in as a journalist," AFP quoted Tissainayagam's wife as saying.

"Like Peter, my husband was never too busy to encourage those who wanted to learn to write and has helped many in journalism," she said. "Today my husband is continuing to teach me courage and grace in difficult times.

"For him, no matter what the circumstances are, there is no excuse for unkindness," AFP quoted Ronnate Tissainayagam as saying. "No matter what the circumstance, fellow human beings must be treated with dignity."

On World Press Freedom day, President Obama cited Tissainayagam’s case as an example of what can happen to journalists who displease governments intolerant of criticism. Obama should call for his release and for Sri Lanka’s uprooted civilians to be returned to their homes.

Boston Globe in an editorial called an irony that Tissainayagam was thrown into prison for his writings that the Sri Lanka Government called have "creat[ed] communal disharmony" when "280,000 Tamil civilians displaced by the government’s victorious war against the separatist Tamil Tigers are currently suffering and dying in flooded, ill-provided camps" which is a real cause of disharmony."

Yet even in victory the Sri Lankan government seems unable to define peace or outline a political solution to the long-standing cultural and political grievances of the Tamil minority, which makes up 12 percent of the 21.3-million population. A process of national reconciliation anchored in federalism and multiculturalism can succeed only if human-rights abuses by all parties are independently investigated. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has acknowledged that civilian casualties were "unacceptably high," especially as the war built to a bloody crescendo.

The continuing air of martial triumph in Sri Lanka, though, is making it difficult to heal the wounds of war through three essential "Rs": relief, recovery and reconciliation. In fact, the military victory bears a distinct family imprint: President Mahinda Rajapaksa was guided by two of his brothers, Gotabaya, the defense secretary who authored the war plan, and Basil, the presidential special adviser who formulated the political strategy. Yet another brother, Chamal, is the ports minister who awarded China a contract to build the billion-dollar Hambantotta port, on Sri Lanka's southeast.

In return, Beijing provided Colombo not only the weapon systems that decisively tilted the military balance in its favor, but also the diplomatic cover to prosecute the war in defiance of international calls to cease offensive operations to help stanch rising civilian casualties. Through such support, China has succeeded in extending its strategic reach to a critically located country in India's backyard that sits astride vital sea-lanes of communication in the Indian Ocean region.

Sinhalese nationalists now portray Rajapaksa as a modern-day Dutugemunu, a Sinhalese ruler who, according to legend, vanquished an invading Tamil army led by Kind Elara more than 2,000 years ago. But four months after the Tamil Tigers were crushed, it is clear the demands of peace extend far beyond the battlefield. What is needed is a fundamental shift in thegovernment's policies to help create greater interethnic equality, regional autonomy and a reversal of the state-driven militarization of society.

But Rajapaksa, despite promising to address the root causes of conflict, has declared: "Federalism is out of the question." How elusive the peace dividend remains can be seen from Colombo's decision to press ahead with a further expansion of the military. Not content with increasing the military's size five-fold since the late 1980s to more than 200,000 troops today, Colombo is raising the strength further to 300,000, in the name of "eternal vigilance." Soon after the May victory, the government, for example, announced a drive to recruit 50,000 new troops to help manage the northern areas captured from the rebels.

The Sri Lankan military already has more troops than that of Britain or Israel. The planned further expansion would make the military in tiny Sri Lanka larger than the militaries of major powers like France, Japan and Germany. By citing a continuing danger of guerrilla remnants reviving the insurgency, Rajapaksa, in fact, seems determined to keep a hyper-militarized Sri Lanka on something of a war footing. Yet another issue of concern is the manner the nearly 300,000 Tamil civilians still held by the government in camps where, in the recent words of U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, the "internally displaced persons are effectively detained under conditions of internment."

Such detention risks causing more resentment among the Tamils and sowing the seeds of future unrest. The internment was intended to help weed out rebels, many of whom already have been identified and transferred to military sites. Those in the evacuee camps are the victims and survivors of the deadly war. To confine them in the camps against their will is to further victimize and traumatize them.

Sri Lanka's interests would be better served through greater transparency. It should grant the U.N., International Red Cross and nongovernmental organizations at home and abroad full and unhindered access to care for and protect the civilians in these camps, allowing those who wish to leave the camps to do so and live with relatives and friends. Otherwise, it seriously risks breeding further resentment.

Then there is the issue of thousands of missing people, mostly Tamils. Given that many families are still searching for missing members, the government ought to publish a list of all those it is holding — in evacuee camps, prisons, military sites and other security centers. Even suspected rebels in state custody ought to be identified and not denied access to legal representation.

Authorities should disclose the names of those they know to be dead — civilians and insurgents — and the possible circumstances of their death. Also, the way to fill the power vacuum in the Tamil-dominated north is not by dispatching additional army troops in tens of thousands, but by setting up a credible local administration to keep the peace and initiate rehabilitation and reconstruction after more than 25 years of war.

Any government move to return to the old policy of settling Sinhalese in Tamil areas is certain to stir up fresh problems. More fundamentally, such have been the costs of victory that Sri Lankan civil society stands badly weakened and civil liberties curtailed. The wartime suppression of a free press and curtailment of fundamental rights continues in peacetime, undermining democratic freedoms and creating a fear psychosis.

Public meetings cannot be held without government permission. Sweeping emergency regulations also remain in place, arming the security forces with expansive powers of search, arrest, detention and seizure of property. Individuals can still be held in unacknowledged detention for up to 12 months. For the process of reconciliation to begin in earnest, it is essential the government shed its war-gained powers and accept, as Pillay says, "an independent and credible international investigation . . . to ascertain the occurrence, nature and scale of violations of international human-rights and international humanitarian law" by all parties during the conflict.

Pillay has gone on to say: "A new future for the country, the prospect of meaningful reconciliation and lasting peace, where respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms can become a reality for all, hinges upon such an in-depth and comprehensive approach."

Unfortunately, Colombo still seeks to hold back the truth. Those who speak up are labeled "traitors" (if they are Sinhalese) or accused of being on the payroll of the Tamil diaspora. Last year, a Sri Lankan minister accused the U.N. undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs, John Holmes, of being on the rebels' payroll after Holmes called Sri Lanka one of the world's most dangerous places for aid workers.

The media remains muzzled, and a host of journalists have been murdered or imprisoned. Lawyers who dare to take up sensitive cases face threats. Recently, a well-known astrologer who predicted the president's ouster from power was arrested. And this month, the U.N. Children's Fund communications chief was ordered to leave Sri Lanka after he discussed the plight of children caught up in the government's military campaign.

Rather than begin a political dialogue on regional autonomy and a more level-playing field for the Tamils in education and government jobs, the government has seen its space get constricted by the post-victory upsurge of Sinhalese chauvinism opposed to the devolution of powers to the minorities.

The hardline constituency argues that the Tamils shouldn't get in defeat what they couldn't secure through three decades of unrest and violence. Indeed, such chauvinism seeks to tar federalism as a potential forerunner to secession, although the Tamil insurgency sprang from the state's rejection of decentralization and power-sharing. The looming parliamentary and presidential elections also make devolution difficult, even though the opposition is splintered and Rajapaksa seems set to win a second term.

Reversing the militarization of society, ending the control of information as an instrument of state policy and promoting political and ethnic reconciliation are crucial to postconflict peace-building and to furthering the interests of all Sri Lankans — Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims. So also is the need to discard the almost mono-ethnic character of the security forces. Colombo has to stop dragging its feet on implementing the constitution's 13th amendment, which requires the ceding of some powers to the provincial or local level.

Sadly, there is little international pressure on Colombo, despite the leverage offered by the Sri Lankan economy's need for external credit. The U.S. can veto any decision of the International Monetary Fund, but it chose to abstain from the recent IMF vote to give Colombo a $2.8 billion loan. In the face of China's stonewalling at the U.N., Ban has been unable to appoint a special envoy on Sri Lanka. A U.N. special envoy can shine an international spotlight to help build pressure on a recalcitrant government. But on Sri Lanka, the best the U.N. has been able to do is to send a political official to Colombo this month for talks.

It is thus important for the democratic players, including the United States, the European Union, Japan and Norway — co-chairs of the so-called Friends of Sri Lanka — and India, to coordinate their policies on Sri Lanka. If Rajapaksa continues to shun true reconciliation, these countries should ratchet up pressure on Colombo by lending support to calls for an international investigation into the thousands of civilian deaths in the final weeks of the war.

The International Criminal Court has opened an initial inquiry into Sri Lankan rights-abuse cases that could turn into a full-blown investigation. Sri Lanka, however, is not an ICC signatory and thus would have to consent — or be referred by the U.N. Security Council — for the ICC to have jurisdiction over it. As world history attests, peace sought through the suppression and humiliation of an ethnic community proves to be elusive.

If Rajapaksa wants to earn a place in history as another Dutugemunu, he has to emulate that ancient king's post-victory action and make honorable peace with the Tamils before there is a recrudescence of violence. It will be a double tragedy for Sri Lanka if making peace proves more difficult than making war.

Brahma Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the independent, privately funded Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, is on the international advisory council of the Campaign for Peace and Justice in Sri Lanka.

What Ranil, Mangala and Mano Ganesan said on 3 September at a Platform for Freedom Press Conference on the IDP issue was fairly widely covered in the print and electronic media, but three other contributors, Siritunga Jayasuriya, Nimalka Fernando and Herman Kumara failed to attract coverage. They were more sharp and interesting, but not being parliamentarians, I guess, less news worthy. I will focus on them to redress this imbalance. But first a Mangala snippet which was both catchy and accurate; he defined the Vanni interns as FDPs (Forcibly Detained Persons) insisting that calling them internally displaced persons (IDPs) was simply not true.

First, let me have my say. It is my view that it is the FDP issue that will have more severe repercussions on the relationship between the Tamils and the government and on Sinhala-Tamil relations than the hotly canvassed political package uproar. Astute folks are pretty well reconciled that nothing will happen in the foreseeable future about devolution, thirteen plus, minus or zilch, and home-grown solutions. It’s going to be the same old unitary state and constitution, with or without some superficial tinkering, until and unless something dramatic happens, such as the change to a left government; and that’s not on the cards.

But between two and three hundred thousand people of one community, held in indefinite and illegal detention by the hegemonic state of another community, well that’s tertiary stage cancer and its repercussions are going to be far, far more serious than people seem to realise. I give it three more months and if the FDPs are not all released from forcible detention, then the gulf will again widen to distrust similar to the post 1972-Constitution, post Vattukkotai Resolution, or intensifying LTTE periods. The gulf will become unbridgeable again. In a word, it’s the FDPs stupid, not the package that will hinge, or if you prefer unhinge, Tamil consciousness.

Siritunga’s take on it: For those who need some background, Siritunga is the leader of the United Socialist Party (USP), a non government left party and as presidential candidate in 2005 he polled 36,000 votes, certainly much more than I expected. I have been closely associated with him politically from 1970 when he was a key leader in the Vama or left tendency in the LSSP which matured into the NSSP in 1977. He parted company with us on the Indo-Lanka Accord and 13th Amendment which he opposed while we (the majority in the NSSP) gave these measures our conditional support. Nevertheless, he and I have remained personal friends. The USP has fraternal ties with international Marxist currents in many countries but I am not aware what its active membership within the country is.

As a Sinhalese Marxist he expressed shock at the inadequate response in the South to the fact that such a large number of Tamils could be held in illegal detention for over 100 days. “Imagine the uproar in the country if two to three lakhs of ordinary Sinhalese people had been held behind barbed wire like this”. How much longer is this going to continue he inquired? And this inquiry continued to the heart of the matter. “These people have lived under LTTE Administration for nearly two decades. Of course a large number of them or a family member would have worked in that Administration, many would have associated with the LTTE, and to be perfectly frank, most would have supported or been sympathetic to the LTTE point of view”. This goes to the heart of the government’s conundrum; if the government intends to hold everybody who is or was sympathetic to the LTTE indefinitely, then it will have to hold some hundreds of thousands of people forever. The real problem is not a few thousand ex-cadres, the problem is hundreds of thousands who, come on be sensible about it, must have been pro-LTTE.

I think it is inevitable that he comes to the same conclusion as I have done in my third paragraph, but from an inside the camps perspective. I asserted that the FDP issue is destined to be the crucible in which the fires of broad ethno-political conflict will light up again. Siritunga says “If you hold people like this you are operating a farm for breeding the next generation of LTTEers, by whatever name they sprout. Is the government trying to breed another one lakh of terrorists?”

Insensitivity and secrecy: Nimalka introduced a women’s and welfare perspective as one would expect from a person of her background. Initially though she made a comment that was news to me. Most of the food, dry rations and other essential needs of the FDPs are provided by UN agencies and NGOs she said.

It is not GoSL but these organisations that foot the bill; the work in the camp is done by NGO volunteers and GoSL’s expenses, other than paying for the military, are small. Nimalka’s main grouse however was framed in these questions. “Do mothers have the right to take a fevered child to hospital? Can a woman who is bleeding seek emergency medical help?” The questions are rhetorical, the answers obvious.

Why must the military be in control of the camps, why not civilian agencies? Herman Kumara of the Fishermen’s Welfare Association was quite pointed in his repetition of the question on many people’s mind. Why can’t visitors enter the camps? Why are journalists barred? Why are international agencies kept out? Why is it taking the courts so long to make a straightforward order to allow members of parliament to visit the camps? As Mangala added “I can walk into any prison at will and meet any criminal, but I am not allowed to meet these people held in detention for no reason.” The reasons offered for this paranoid secrecy varied from the need to hide human rights violations to calculations relating to the upcoming elections. I think it will be some time before the real reason comes seeping out. 

In a significant decision, the Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi, on Saturday, September 26, said he would take steps to ensure that the Centre granted citizenship to the more than 100,000 Sri Lankan Tamil refugees living in the state if they desired so.

He made the announcement at a function bringing down the curtains on the year-long centenary celebrations of C N Annadurai in Kancheepuram, the DMK founder’s birthplace. Earlier, the DMK passed a resolution requesting the party chief to take steps to ensure that the Tamil refugees in the state were given the option of citizenship under the Indian Citizenship Act.

As many as 73,572 refugees have been staying in 115 camps across Tamil Nadu and more than 30,000 reside outside the camps in different parts of the state. Following the end of the Eelam war and defeat of the LTTE, there has been much apprehension among the refugees that they would be sent back home against their wish. The announcement comes as a relief, representatives of Tamil groups said.

It has been three months since Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse declared the country "liberated" from Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) after a 26-year war.

He said he wanted to settle most of the displaced Tamil civilians within 180 days.

But today, with more than half that time elapsed, nearly 300,000 are still being held in "internment camps", to which the media and humanitarian organisations have virtually no access.

One person who was able to visit some of them in May was United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.

He said: "I have travelled around the world and visited similar places, but these are by far the most appalling scenes I have seen."

In the middle of this month, the camps were flooded by downpours that, according to The New York Times, "sent rivers of muck cascading between tightly packed rows of flimsy shelters, overflowed latrines and sent hundreds of families scurrying for higher ground".

Moreover, there is no public list of those being held in the camps, and many families do not know whether their loved ones are alive or dead.

The brutal and violent methods used by the LTTE during the conflict are beyond dispute. But the government claimed to draw a distinction between LTTE fighters and the law-abiding Tamil population, whose genuine political grievances it would address once the "terrorists" had been defeated. So far, nothing like that has happened.

Although it has screened out those it believes were LTTE cadres and sent them to separate camps, the government has repeatedly extended its own deadline for releasing the civilians who are still in the main camps.

People who question this inside Sri Lanka are accused of being traitors in the pay of "the LTTE diaspora", while outsiders are accused of using humanitarian concerns as an excuse for neo-imperialist intervention.

Sri Lankan journalists who criticise the government have been arrested, beaten and in some cases murdered in broad daylight, while many more have fled the country. Foreign journalists have been kicked out, and Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are not allowed into the country.

In the last weeks of the fighting, an estimated 20,000 civilians lost their lives. Government forces were accused of shelling Tamil civilians and killing people who tried to surrender.

The LTTE was charged with using civilians as human shields, forcibly recruiting them as fighters and shooting those who tried to flee. There were rumours of mass graves but no independent observer has been able to investigate.

The government claims to have won the "war on terror" within its own frontiers, and denies the right of countries that have been less successful to question its methods.

As one of the five "Colombo Powers" that organised the historic Bandung Conference in 1955, and a leading member of the Non-Aligned Movement, Sri Lanka was, for many decades, a responsible democracy, even a model member of the international community. Surely, the people of Sri Lanka do not want to compromise that enviable status.

Friends of Sri Lanka, especially in the developing world, do not understand why President Rajapakse chose Myanmar as the first country to visit after winning the war.

They were concerned to read, on the government's own website, that one reason for this choice was that "the (Myanmar) generals are increasingly finding it difficult to contain insurgent groups in the country's northern frontier and are willing to learn some fresh lessons from President Mahinda Rajapakse on how to defeat the enemy".

That is not what the international community wishes to learn from Sri Lanka. Rather, it is expecting the country to be faithful to its democratic tradition and act on Mr Rajapakse's promises that the rights of minorities would be respected, that the displaced would be helped to return home, and that prisoners would be treated humanely.

We do not believe that most people in Sri Lanka agree with the view that developing- country governments can best deal with internal opposition by crushing it ruthlessly and treating any advice to respect human rights and humanitarian law as hypocritical. Sadly, the government's willingness to ignore these principles has met with very little international resistance.

Even the United States, which has urged the rapid release of all civilians and deplored the Sri Lankan government's slow timetable on political reform, is simultaneously encouraging US investors to "make Sri Lanka your next business stop".

This puts a heavy responsibility on Asia's key powers - India, Japan and China - which have been staunch supporters of the Rajapakse government and have channelled large sums of money to it (mainly, recently, for humanitarian purposes).

It is time for these governments to say clearly that further economic and political support will depend on the following conditions being fulfilled:

1. The UN, International Red Cross and voluntary agencies must be given full and unhindered access to care for and protect the civilians in the camps, and then help them return to wherever in their own country they choose to live.

2. A list of all those still alive and in custody should be published.

3. Those who continue to be detained as alleged LTTE combatants must be treated in accordance with the provisions of international law, and given urgent access to legal representation.

4. Accountability processes must be established to ensure that international aid is not diverted to purposes other than those for which it was given.

5. The Sri Lankan government should invite regional and international specialists in conflict reconciliation to help rebuild lives and communities.

6. Sri Lanka should request or accept a full UN investigation into war crimes committed by all parties during the war.

The government has won the war, and the world shares the feeling of relief visible among Sri Lanka's people. It remains for it to win the peace, and the rest of the world must help by insisting on the above conditions. Peace won by the brutal humiliation of a people is rarely secure.

Lakhdar Brahimi is a former Algerian foreign minister and United Nations Special Envoy. Edward Mortimer is Senior Vice-President of theSalzburg Global Seminar and was the chief speech-writer for former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan. Both are members of the Advisory Council of the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice.