Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse told the United Nations this week that his government's military campaign in breach of the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement was aimed at convincing the Tamil Tigers they cannot achieve a military victory.

 

Speaking in Sinhala, he called on the international community to help his government consolidate its gains in the east of the island against the LTTE, whom he repeatedly denounced as terrorists.

 

Addressing the UN General Assembly at its headquarters in New York Tuesday, Rajapakse called on the world body to conclude talks on a comprehensive convention on international terrorism.

 

His government's recent military operations had been launched only to convince the Tigers that it would not be possible for them to obtain a military victory, he said.

 

The government's recent military victory over the Tigers in the east and the clearing of the region of terrorism has opened the way to make the province "a model for development and rehabilitation," he said.

 

“There is a clear opportunity for the international community to play a vital role in breaking the cycle of conflict by focusing on development,” he said.

 

A committed Buddhist nationalist, the President’s address was heavily laced with references to Buddhism and assertions of victory over the LTTE.

 

“I am proud to inform you that despite the significant challenge posed by the ongoing conflict with a ruthless terrorist group in the North of the country, we have freed the Eastern Province from terrorism, and restored law and order there,” he said.

 

“We launched military operations only to exert pressure on terrorists in order to convince them that it will not be possible for them to obtain a military victory. Our goal remains a negotiated and honourable end to this unfortunate conflict.”

 

In a pointed rejection of widespread international criticism of rights abuses of Tamils by his military, the President declared: “Sri Lanka's ancient civilization was rooted in the Buddhist principles.”

 

Echoing an argument made a few hours earlier by Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, President Rajapakse attacked critics of his military’s rights abuses as neo-colonialists.

 

“Guided by the principles of Buddhism, We have long respected the rights of our fellow human beings,” he said.

 

“Therefore, it had not been necessary for us to experience global wars or the deaths of millions to, learn to recognize their value.”

 

“My country has no record of inflicting misery on fellow human beings for the purpose of empire building, for commercial advantage or for religious righteousness,” he said pointedly.

 

Since Rajapakse came to power in late 2005, over two thousand Tamil civilians have been killed and a thousand more have ‘disappeared’ after being taken into custody, local and international human rights groups say.

 

Some rights groups have called for strong actions, including sanctions, against Sri Lanka in a bid to halt the rampant abuses.

 

“Human rights are too important to be used as a tool to victimize States for political advantage,” he argued however.

 

“It is essential that international action to facilitate compliance with human rights standards is fair and even handed. Human rights have to be protected and advanced for their own sake, not for political gain.”

 

Meanwhile, earlier, Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Mr. Dayan Jayatilleka, lashed out at international critics of Colombo’s human rights policy, saying he saw no “moral asymmetry between Sri Lanka and those critics.”

 

Rajapakse also fell back on the customary and well worn arguments put forward by other governments accused of repression: that the need to fight ‘terrorism’ was paramount.

 

He warned representatives of the UN’s 190 odd states of the dangers they all face.

 

“Even as we gather here, State sovereignty, civil society and the rule of law are increasingly being threatened by terrorism and other illegal and illicit activities in many countries,” he said.

 

“There are many Member States represented in this Assembly today who have first hand experience of the havoc caused by brutish terrorism which has stretched out its claws to many corners of the globe to mar innocent lives,” he said.

 

“All terrorist attacks whether in New York, Mumbai, Cairo, London, or Colombo are acts that threaten the democratic way of life and must be condemned unreservedly,” he said.

 

“Terrorism anywhere is terrorism. There is nothing good in terrorism. Sri Lanka has taken an upfront position in the global community's efforts to deal with terrorism.”

 

“We think that the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism, which in our view remains a priority, is only limited to endless discussion. I emphasize that we must conclude these negotiations soon.”

 

President Rajapakse suggested that his Sinhala nationalist values, enshrined in his 2005 election manifesto ‘Mahinda Chinthana’ were, in fact, global development goals.

 

“We have reached the Development Decade declared by the General Assembly of the United Nations. My country has declared the ‘Mahinda Chinthana’ ten year vision to usher a new Sri Lanka consonant with those goals,” he said.

 

He concluded by telling the UN: “I believe that our obligation as global leaders is to commit ourselves to programs that will eradicate terrorism, establish human welfare oriented development, establish democracy and ensure there is hope for lower income groups for economic development.”

 

Recent calls, such as outlined in a International Crisis Group (ICG) report setting out the case for international intervention in Sri Lanka, couched in the language of the doctrine ‘Responsibility to Protect’ or ‘R2P’, is a far cry from its embryonic use in Serbia where the wishes of the Kosovan Albanian community have been taken up by the most powerful states.

 

As an emerging doctrine in international relations R2P defines the responsibility of states as protecting populations from grave crisis and to react to them wherever they occur.

 

R2P was formerly adopted by the United Nations (UN) in 2005 in the midst of the crisis in Darfur, following its emergence as the doctrine behind NATO’s assault on Serbia in 1999 to protect the Kosovans.

 

However since Kosovo, the architects responsible for framing the legality of the R2P doctrine have aimed to limit such intervention to “tackling the crisis by formulating responses and solutions” that work by nevertheless maintaining the territorial integrity of the offending state.

 

R2P sets out in international law the primary responsibility that states have in protecting their own populations, whilst conferring an onus on the international community to act when these governments fail to protect the most vulnerable.

 

However, though only recently invested in international law, the world is already facing a rhetoric-implementation gap on R2P.

 

Put loosely, states wishing to implement the doctrine are too often likely to do so for divergent and self-serving reasons, so whilst the theory is sound, implementation is often weak or skewed.

 

Countries like the US may cite its obligation under R2P to intervene to overthrow regimes which it cites as ‘harbouring terrorists’ or to ‘protect’ a government at threat of loosing a war to ‘terrorists’ or that has extremist views.

 

The same policy however, was not used against governments similar to the Pinochet regime in Chile which killed large numbers of people conveniently labelled as communists. The regime was warmly supported by the US and UK.

 

The US and other western states, without irony, condemn China which has until recently opposed high-level external intervention in Sudna’s Darfur where killings, which many described as genocide, are still ongoing, years after the crisis began.

 

Therefore opposition to and manipulation of international law and binding UN resolutions means that questions of intervention become more politico-legal and are not as clear cut as advocates of external intervention on behalf of human rights might hope.

 

Despite the responsibilities of states and the obligations of the international community being clearly stated in the resolutions permitting intervention under R2P this still occurs.

Consequently intervention by the UN or other UN authorized forces often becomes bogged down in the political dynamics of the offending state.

 

In other words, it depends on what current international paradigm the state in question invokes as its defence. These days it is usually the ‘War on Terror’ – during the Cold War it used to be ‘fighting communism’’

 

It also depends on the state’s allies - if particularly influential or UN veto holding states are friendly with the accused government- and how long the state resists pressure to consent to a UN presence in their country.

 

Under most aspects of international law the UN may not enter the country unless the recognized government grants permission. Which is why action without the state’s consent is termed ‘intervention.’

 

Therefore, if as some are arguing, the time has come for R2P to be used in

Sri Lanka, the question becomes which organization or nation(s) would intervene; what are their motivations, and what would the outcome be?

 

It is well known and documented that successive Sri Lankan Governments have and continue to undertake acts of violence against the Tamil community. Most manifestly the state not only failed to protect Tamil civilians from Sinhalese mobs in ‘Black’ July 1983, it actively supported the pogrom.

 

It did so whilst receiving undisturbed political and financial support from the international community.

 

Contrast this to Pakistan which was promptly expelled from the Commonwealth when President Musharraf overthrew the elected government of the day – whatever effect that had.

 

In the Sri Lankan context, the rhetoric-implementation gap is clear.

 

With the mountain of evidence strongly showing the extra-judicial violence undertaken by Sri Lankan security forces; the proliferation of paramilitaries, ethnic cleansing and colonisation, etc, intervention can be argued under international law as necessary.

 

Take instances such as the denial of food for three months to the people of Vaharai during the Army’s siege of the region last year, reminiscent of tactics from the Balkans in the 1990s. It took massive international pressure to get one convoy in – and only half the trucks got through then.

 

Therefore, it should be theoretically possible to gain a UN resolution backing intervention to protect Tamil civilians.

 

However, there have not been any serious follow up by the international community with credible explorations as to the implementation of R2P.

 

Instead international support for Sri Lanka is continually extended under the rubric of the ‘War on Terror’, not least through new proscriptions of the LTTE and the arrest of Diaspora Tamils as ‘terrorist supporters.’

 

By contrast, NATO, even without a UN mandate in Kosovo, was willing to bomb Serbia to stop the genocide, in effect supporting the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) in its fight against the Serbian military.

 

On the whole though, given in the current international climate around the ‘war on terror’, the containment policy of the US and others towards the LTTE specifically, obtaining any UN Security Council approved intervention to safeguard the Tamil people is an impossibility.

 

In any case, what we are seeing is a strong resistance to external pressure on human rights by the Rajapakse regime and indeed other Sinhala parties, such as the UNP, who are either seeking to delay foreign intervention for as long as possible or restricting it to minor ‘reforms of the state’.

 

This is clearly evident in Sri Lankan ministers’ confident attacks on leading UN officials, including denouncing them as ‘terrorists’, whenever they protest human rights or humanitarian breaches by the government.

 

The stark difference between rhetoric and implementation of R2P and opposition to intervention by key states is not uncommon - UN intervention in Kosovo was vetoed by Russia, citing opposition to UN interference in the ‘internal affairs’ of its friend and long time ally, Serbia. This continues to today with Serbian-Russian opposition to an independent Kosovo.

 

Rather than coming to champion the rights of the Tamil people to self-determination, as with Kosovo, the most generous international intervention will be the imposition of a minimal solution that will maintain the territorial integrity of Sri Lanka, whilst militarily defeating the LTTE.

 

This can be seen with the suggestion by the European Union that, despite the Rajapakse regime’s unabashed rejection of a negotiation process, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) should come up with its own proposal for a solution to the conflict.

 

This is nothing more than another attempt to isolate the LTTE from any future peace process or settlement and further weaken the Tamil polity.

 

In any case, if the Sinhalese establishment is sincere about undertaking the type of reforms the international community envisages, would it not have done so by now?

 

If the international community sincerely wanted an inclusive peace process and a federal solution that, whilst maintaining the territorial integrity of Sri Lanka also gives Tamils a genuine stake in and ownership of the political process, why did they continue to aid the state despite its refusal to honour the PTOMS agreement or continue negotiations on the interim administration for the Northeast?

 

Sri Lanka’s post-independence history shows that Tamils have no stake in the Sinhala project that is the Sri Lankan state. This is why the Tamil struggle came about.

 

Amid the multi-faceted brutality being visited on our people, the time has come to realise our right to rule ourselves in an independent state.

 

If international intervention is to take place in Sri Lanka it should mirror the Kosovo intervention, recognizing the crimes being committed against our people and accepting that independence from Sinhala rule is the only solution for the Tamil question.

 

Aid workers, like the Red Cross staffer being buried in this file photo, are at high risk. Photo TamilNet

Sri Lanka is fast gaining notoriety as "one of the world's worst places" both for journalists and humanitarian aid workers - due primarily to a rising death toll and veiled threats from government and paramilitary forces in the country.

 

At least four international non-governmental organisations monitoring the media - the Committee to Protect Journalists, the International Press Institute, Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF) and the International Federation of Journalists - have singled out Sri Lanka as "deadly" for journalists.

 

"Journalists have been victims of murders, threats, kidnappings and censorship," said RSF in a report released at the end of August.

 

An RSF fact-finding team specifically zeroed in on "the isolated, Tamil-populated Jaffna peninsula" where there have been "grave press freedom violations".

 

In 2006, described as "the most savage year for journalists and news media workers", the most dangerous place was Iraq where 46 newsmen were killed, followed by the Philippines (10), Mexico (seven), Sri Lanka (five) and Pakistan (four).

 

Last week, the consulting editor at the Sri Lanka Sunday Times, Iqbal Athas, was threatened and harassed for a series of articles he wrote detailing a corruption-ridden multi-million-dollar government deal involving the purchase of fighter planes from Ukraine.

 

Recounting the latest incident, Athas told IPS that a person purporting to be a retired Air Force officer walked into the Wijeya Newspapers Ltd., the publishers of the Sunday Times and several other publications in the native language Sinhala, and threatened the staff.

 

The visitor met the English-to-Sinhala translator, W.D. Gunaratne, and warned him not to translate any of Athas's articles into the local language newspaper (which has a larger readership than English language newspapers in Sri Lanka).

 

"He warned Gunaratne he would have to face the consequences if that happened," said Athas, who is also a military correspondent for the London-based Jane's Defence Weekly.

 

The visitor also warned that if Athas "does not give up his job and leave Sri Lanka within three months", he would meet the same fate that befell Tamil journalists, most of whom were killed by "unknown gunmen".

 

The Committee to Protect Journalists' Abi Wright told IPS that her organisation "is alarmed by the grave threats facing veteran journalist Iqbal Athas, who has come under extraordinary pressures following his investigations into irregularities surrounding a 2006 deal to purchase MiG-27 fighter jets from Ukraine".

 

She said Athas has already told CPJ that over the past two weeks - when his security detail was abruptly withdrawn by the government after the publication of his articles about the deal - he has been harassed and followed by unknown persons. She said Athas fears for his life and for the safety of his family.

 

"CPJ calls on the Sri Lankan government to act immediately to provide adequate security and ensure the safety of Iqbal Athas," Wright added.

 

She said that Athas is well-known as the defence columnist for the Sunday Times of Sri Lanka and a frequent contributor to international media outlets, including Cable News Network, Jane's Defence Weekly and the Times of London. He also received CPJs International Press Freedom Award in 1994.

 

Wright said CPJ will be sending a letter of protest to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse later this week.

 

The Colombo-based Free Media Movement (FMM) has already expressed its "grave concern regarding the safety and security of senior English language journalist Mr. Iqbal Athas."

 

"As senior Defence columnist for the Sunday Times, in the past months, Mr. Athas has been responsible for a series of articles on the irregularities in procurement of MIG aircraft for the security forces, from a company based in Ukraine," FMM said in a statement released Monday.

 

Referring to the continued threats to Athas and his family, FMM said: "In a context in which there have been repeated attacks and harassment of journalists and media persons in Sri Lanka in the past months, the Free Media Movement is convinced that there is a very real basis for Mr. Athas fears regarding his security."

 

"We call on the president, as minister of defence, to take all steps necessary to provide Mr. Athas with adequate security immediately. Failure to do so will only provide yet another indication of the lack of concern on the part of the government for the safety and security of media personnel in Sri Lanka."

 

Meanwhile, after a recent visit to Sri Lanka, the U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs described the Indian Ocean island nation as "one of the most dangerous places" for aid workers, second only to Afghanistan.

 

Addressing a meeting of the Security Council in June, John Holmes said that in 2006, 24 aid workers were killed in Sri Lanka, including 17 from Action Contre Le Faim, "in a single horrifying act."

 

The perpetrators of these and similar attacks - including the killing of two Red Cross workers in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon and the murder of a Caritas International aid worker in Darfur, Sudan - "are yet to be brought to account," Holmes said.

 

He said that civilians are too often deliberately targeted to create a climate of fear and to destabilise populations.

 

Holmes also pointed out that countries as far apart as Sri Lanka and Colombia were experiencing assassinations, disappearances and other violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law.

 

"In Sri Lanka, over 600,000 inhabitants of the Jaffna peninsula have faced shortages of basic necessities since August of last year when the government and the LTTE restricted access to the peninsula by road and by sea respectively," Holmes continued.

 

Implying Sri Lanka was virtually culpable of war crimes, he added: "Killing humanitarian staff and arbitrarily denying access violates international humanitarian law."

 

Ambassador John McNee of Canada placed Sri Lanka in the company of Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, northern Uganda, Lebanon and Somalia as countries that have failed to provide protection to civilians in war zones.

 

"Girls and boys are recruited as combatants; civilians become unwitting targets of suicide bombers; families are displaced from their homes; sexual violence is a deliberate weapon of war; and civilian infrastructure and economies are often shattered," McNee said.

 

The consequences of these actions play themselves out daily, he pointed out, in countries ranging from Sudan and Afghanistan to Somalia and Sri Lanka.

 

Aid workers might see themselves as neutral providers of relief but in heavily polarised conflicts they are almost inevitably accused of bias, putting their operations and staff at risk.

 

In conflicts such as Iraq and Afghanistan, Western aid workers are at risk because of perceived alignment with coalition forces, while elsewhere in the world, from Ethiopia to Sri Lanka, governments accuse them of backing insurgents.

 

Some professionals say Christian relief groups are suspected in many Islamic countries of proselytising under the guise of aid work, further complicating the job of relief workers.

 

"Because of the so-called war on terror, aid tends to be more politicised -- or considered to be more politicised," said Overseas Development Institute research officer Samir Elhawary.

 

"I think there has been a shift in which aid organisations are realising they have to be more aware."

 

Aid workers say it has always been difficult to prove neutrality and avoid accusations of bias. But the stakes today are higher with the cost of perceived bias measured in kidnapped and killed staff, compounds overrun or bombed, and access to needy populations denied.

 

Iraq has been left almost entirely off-limits to foreign aid staff after high-profile attacks on the Red Cross and U.N. compounds, while parts of Afghanistan are no better. A number of foreigners - many relief workers - have been abducted.

 

Some, such as most of the South Korean Christians taken by the Taliban, have been released. But the bullet ridden corpses of others have been left by the side of the road.

 

In 2006, 85 aid workers - almost all of them local staff - were killed worldwide, the highest since 2003 when numbers were swollen by the bomb attack on the U.N. compound in Baghdad that killed 22.

 

Aid workers complain that the involvement of coalition forces in rebuilding efforts causes confusion and means Western aid groups are no longer seen as neutral.

 

In May, Norway's army agreed to stop using white four-wheel-drive vehicles for their military reconstruction teams in Afghanistan after aid groups feared insurgents might mistake their own vehicles for those of NATO forces.

 

But more broadly, with Western aid groups mainly funded by Western governments who are themselves combatants in Afghanistan, perceived bias may always be a risk.

 

In war zones where Western states are not so directly involved - and even occasionally where they are - though operating on both sides of the lines aid workers are just as likely to be accused of backing rebels.

 

In July, Ethiopia expelled the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) from its Ogaden region, accusing it of consorting with ethnic Somali insurgents. The Red Cross says it was acting well inside its neutral remit.

 

Rights workers say Ethiopia is fighting a brutal counterinsurgency campaign in the region and restricting food deliveries, while the rebels accuse the government of trying to create "man-made famine". Aside from a handful of aid workers, there are few outside observers.

 

Analysts and aid workers say sometimes governments and insurgents simply do not want outside relief groups interfering - or witnessing what might be going on.

 

Aid agencies in the world's largest humanitarian operation in Sudan's Darfur region say they are no longer able to talk publicly about the situation, leaving campaigning to advocacy groups without staff on the ground.

 

Even then, the Sudanese government can be sensitive. At the weekend, it kicked out CARE International's country director after an internal CARE report became public.

 

Experts say governments almost invariably suspect aid groups that feed populations amongst which rebels move.

 

Governments fear relief groups are legitimising rebels by working with them and some say that through providing the sort of health, social and relief services government would normally provide in rebel areas they effectively help insurgent groups.

 

In Sri Lanka, government officials frequently accuse aid agencies of either deliberately or accidentally supporting the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

 

Nordic ceasefire monitors blamed the government for the massacre of 17 local aid workers last year - a charge the government denies. Several senior officials accuse aid workers of being bribed by the LTTE.

 

In an ethnic war such as Sri Lanka, governments tend to suspect aid workers from the same ethnic group as rebels. Almost all aid workers killed in Sri Lanka have been Tamil.

 

Relief group security officers say tracking the loyalties of local staff is difficult, and some may inevitably be drawn into a conflict. But they say they try to guard against it.

 

Ultimately, humanitarian workers say dealing with groups or governments whose purposes and methods they might disagree with is necessary if the needy are to be helped.

 

The Red Cross - one of the few aid groups that talks to normally ostracised groups such as the Taliban or Colombia's FARC - says there is no one they would not talk to.

 

"If you are going to reach people and give them aid and relief, you have to deal with the groups that control access," said ODI's Elhawary.

 

"It's about being really aware and understanding what the different dynamics are."

 

Over 250,000 Tamil civilians were displaced by Sri Lankan military offensives across the eastern province since mid-2006. The humanitarian crisis continues. Photo TamilNet

Reporter, Juliana Ruhfus, Director, Dom Rotheroe and Researcher, Aloke Devichand, have two films scheduled for broadcast on the al-Jazeera network which will be of interest to all those with an abiding interest in Sri Lanka both within and without the country.

 

The first, “How the East Was Won” deals with the contemporary context and consequences of claimed military victory over the Eastern Province and the second, “Monks of War”, focuses on the political ascendancy of the JHU and the resurgence of the Sinhala Buddhist nationalism which has been the central ideological legitimation for the return to a military solution to the ethnic conflict.

 

In that sense both documentaries are mutually illuminating of the political crossroads that Sri Lanka currently finds itself in but which is unfortunately also exemplary of the tragic and endless recurrence of attempts to pursue the same policies in the past albeit within the changed historical circumstances of the post-9/11 global dystopia.

 

Despite the constraints of the brevity of the documentary, Ruhfus in ‘How the East was Won’ successfully counter-poses the justifications and claims of Sri Lankan governmental and military spokespeople she interviews with the realities facing those on the ground in the East.

 

Realities, which clearly raises some fundamental questions as to the consequences and potential outcome of the present direction of governmental policy which has not only militarized Sri Lankan social space to an extent that the country did not even witness in the bishane period of 1987-1990 but has also securitised ‘development’ to levels witnessed in other contexts of militarised interventions in the former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq.

 

For example, Ruhfus presents the claims of senior military commanders, who claim that the security forces have now reoccupied 95% of the land mass of the Eastern Province and that as a result, 178,000 civilians who were formerly in LTTE areas are “now with the government” and that the armed services are actively engaged in a programme to win the ‘hearts and minds’ of the people through redevelopment as a means of demonstrating the superiority and commitment of the government in comparison to the LTTE.

 

She then contrasts this with the humanitarian “fall-out” that the pursuit of the military solution has created. Months of MBRL and aerial bombardment, 140,000 displaced, civilian killings, disappearances, abductions, ongoing child recruitment, fears of governmental surveillance in registration processes, forced and/or inadequate resettlement aid are all on-the ground experiences which Ruhfus uncovers in her investigative foray into the situation in the Eastern Province.

 

All this is compounded by civilians’ memories of the suffering that has accompanied past experience of military control, of the destruction of villages and eviction as well as the inevitability that the LTTE, having engaged in a strategic withdrawal from overt control over territory, have merely returned to low-intensity warfare through cadres that have infiltrated the East in the course of recent cycles of conflict, forced migration, encampment and resettlement.

 

Finally, Ruhfus poses the question that the greatest obstacle to the government claims to be asserting a new found legitimacy through territorial control is to be found in the political ascendancy of Karuna’s TMVP which effectively controls many areas of the Eastern province and is extremely powerful in the Batticaloa District through what she describes as a regime of “intimidation, extortion and murder”.

 

This development evidently gives the lie to the claims by Sri Lankan Army commander, Prasad Samarasinghe, that the Sri Lankan military is not collaborating with the TMVP and, due to its superior strength, has no intention or need to permit the activities of a paramilitary group.

 

Whilst, this clearly spurious claim might betray the long-term dilemmas of the Sri Lankan government vis a vis its paramilitary proxies in the East, it does not ring true to the current unchecked reign of the TMVP which the government is more than happy to use in the short term as an attempted surrogate for the political legitimacy that the military clearly lacks amongst the Tamil community.

 

Yet this is a strategy that, evidently, will not only continue to foment divides between pro-LTTE and pro-Karuna factions amongst Eastern Tamils but will also alienate the sizeable Muslim populations in areas of TMVP activity and dominance as some Muslim spokespeople argue that the current context is one where the TMVP and government are also actively cooperating in the combined economic expropriation of Muslims in the East.

 

As a result, we are left with a profound questioning of the extent to which peace and development can really be achieved in the NorthEast for as long as meaningful devolution and federalism remain a taboo subject in government circles, a myopia rather farcically borne out by the smokescreen of the APRC on constitutional reform and its recent abrupt euthanasia.

 

The only alternatives to a devolved settlement acceptable to ‘minority’ interests are surely the continuing spectre of civil war of multi-polar dimensions and the balkanisation of the country. As such, the Rajapakses must surely be mistaking night for day when beholding their vision of the New Dawn in the East.

 

The second of the documentaries, ‘Monks of War’, is the more ambitious of the two reports and, as such, does suffer more heavily due to brevity.

 

Yet, despite the fact that an in-depth understanding of something as complex as Sinhala Buddhist nationalist ideology deserves more than a 21 minute time frame, the focus benefits from its willingness to engage across a broad spectrum from the more extreme proponents of Sinhala nationalism in the JHU, to secular critics and with those Buddhists who contest the right of the JHU and ‘just war’ monks to define the contours of the Buddhist tradition in Sri Lanka.

 

It might be argued that allowing the JHU to voice their exclusivist nationalist platform is unwelcome when what was considered a fringe ideological chauvinism just a few years ago in the context of the CFA has now assumed hegemonic status. For, it has acted as one of the central legitimating motors to the current regime’s rise to power and in their pursuit of a military solution to the ethnic conflict.

 

Political and ideological loyalty to the Rajapakses on the part of the JHU has also been rewarded by a fulfilment of many of their nationalist projects as well as the staple ministerial portfolio and, more significantly, powerful influence in the inner circles of the Rajapakse regime.

 

Yet understandings of the Sinhala nationalist position in the English language visual media that have not resorted to external didactic critiques rather than from-the-horse’s-mouth perspectives are few and far between and it is therefore refreshing that the likes of Champika Ranawaka and Narendra Gunatillaka are allowed free reign to indulge in the enjoyment of nationalist fantasies however galling that may be to cosmopolitan sensibilities.

 

I use the term fantasy not so much to disqualify the nationalist project as irrational but rather to point to the manner in which, as both the JHU as well as their detractors, notably, Professor Uyangoda demonstrate, nationalism to differing degrees is grounded in a politics of fear, distrust and, of course, at some level, exclusion and in the Sinhala nationalist case the political ascendancy of Sinhala nationalism has always thrived on the exclusionary othering of internal ‘minorities’, particularly Tamil and Muslim.

 

The documentary goes on to examine how Buddhism has come to be the moral core of the Sinhalese and their identity and how this identity has come to dominate the postcolonial majoritarian state and the way in which the sangha act as the guardians of just kingship (which must protect Buddhism and the Sinhala Buddhist identity), facets of nationalist identity which achieve potent articulation in the politics of the JHU.

 

Ruhfus achieves this through a series of interviews in which the talking heads of academics, monks, lay activists as well as political posters attest to the potency of the relationship between religion, the sangha and governance in Sri Lankan political culture.

 

Consequently, Ruhfus manages to distil, in crude terms, some of the anthropological perspectives that have stressed the need to understand the cultural significance of the interplay between religion, identity, statehood, political leadership, patronage and centre-oriented political culture in Sri Lanka, including the work of Tambiah, Kapferer and Roberts; perspectives which have been criticised by detractors as excessively structuralist or culturalist but which are achieving a new-found relevance in the current resurgence of Sinhala Buddhist nationalism.

 

The report also achieves its central strength from the presentation of the fervent faith of the JHU leadership in the success of the military defeat of the LTTE, in their conspiracy theories that the LTTE’s ultimate aim is to capture the whole of Sri Lanka by linking up the North, East, the Hill Country and Western Province or that Tamil Nadu is intent upon invading Sri Lanka and the destruction of the Sinhala people and their civilizational ‘heritage’.

 

The documentary also reflects upon the way in which such nationalist yearnings also reflect an intrinsic fear about the impact and spread of globalization and the hegemony of western culture, politics, philosophy, ethics and economics.

 

A retreat in the storm of modernity to the anchor and safety of Sinhala Buddhist nationalism which is nothing other than the attempted reterritorialisation of sovereign control over culture and the political in the face of a world increasingly subject to deterritorialising dynamics including the role of the dominant donor states, global economics, IFIs and INGOs.

 

That is why Sinhala nationalism so frequently falls into a discourse of loss, of the desperate aim to recapture or reinvent a past that is irrevocably displaced by the fluid mobility and contaminations of modernity but which at the same time reproduces these reactive tendencies towards territorialisation, fixity and purity.

 

Yet it is exactly this desperation which also drives the desire to preserve the unitary boundaries of the Sinhala nation and state and hence the recurrent dynamics towards the eradication of any Tamil movement that threatens this unitarism and, which, is at work in the legitimation of the current military strategy, a desperation which is repeated in the JHU discourse of necessary blood sacrifice that must accompany victory in national preservation.

 

Hence, the inter-significance of both these documentaries and in a sense, it is a shame that they were not woven together but again, presumably, the end-product is constrained by the schedule frameworks.

 

Additionally, whether it was a matter of time constraints or access, whilst the documentary recognises that many of these aspects of Sinhala nationalist ideology are also shared by the JVP, which evidently has a much larger grass-roots constituency base, the documentary misses the opportunity to explore the dynamics of the JVP at greater length including the social and economic differences and rivalry that exist between this party and the JHU.

 

Such a focus would have demonstrated the extent to which nationalism is obviously riven by heterogeneous social, cultural, economic and hence political differences and demands which the process of the production of nationalist subjectivity is constantly attempting to meld together but which are also persistently ruptured, revealing the very constructed and fragile nature of the claims to national coherence and unity.

 

Yet, if there is one thread of hope that the documentary leaves the viewer with, it is that social heterogeneity and difference is also expressed in the resistance to the complete capture and definition of socio-cultural and political tradition that nationalist movements such as the JHU attempt to establish.

 

This is seen in the testimony of those members of the sangha and the laity Ruhfus interviews who are attempting to articulate a Buddhism free of the will to war.

 

What should also perhaps have been expressed in the documentary is the still dire need to separate Buddhism from State as the latter continues to use the former to legitimate its political, social and developmental policies and practices and this continues to feed the distrust and fear that inhibits dialogue and drives conflict and the delusions of a military solution despite the lessons of history.

 

Indian HERMES Class Aircraft Carrier INS VIRAAT underway in the Indian Ocean as part of Exercise MALABAR 2005. File photo

The United States hopes to build an alliance with friendly navies such as India's to form a global force of 1,000 ships and boost maritime security, a top U.S. naval commander said on Friday.

 

But Washington's naval cooperation with New Delhi is not intended to send a signal to Beijing and the U.S. navy was not looking to build a base in the Indian Ocean region, Vice-Admiral Doug Crowder said.

 

The comments by Crowder, commander of the Seventh Fleet, came midway through wargames involving five nations, led by the United States and India, in the Bay of Bengal, one of the biggest such peacetime exercises which has raised the hackles of China.

 

"We all have common interests in keeping the oceans of the world open, free for commerce," Crowder told reporters on board the U.S. aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk. "But the United States navy just isn't large enough to do that."

 

"We have to find common cause and every nation's sovereignty is protected. They join us for those missions they have a common interest in ... anti-piracy, humanitarian relief, security of the sea lanes."

 

The six-day wargames which began Tuesday last week, involving nearly 30 ships and over 100 aircraft, is the latest in a series called the "Malabar Exercise", first held in the mid-1990s between Indian and U.S. forces.

 

India's navy now has around 140 ships, compared with about 280 in the U.S. navy.

 

This year the drill has been expanded to include a few ships from Australia, Japan and Singapore in what some analysts see as a new alliance of democracies ranged against the growing military might of China.

 

Although top officials from countries involved in the wargames have assured Beijing that it is not the focus of the exercise, China remains concerned by what it sees as a new security alliance that aims to encircle it.

 

Crowder sought to once again underplay the strategic significance of the wargames, held not far from a Myanmar island where China is believed to have a military listening post.

 

"This was not put together as a signal against anyone," Crowder said.

 

Relations between Washington and New Delhi, on opposite sides of the Cold War, have blossomed since the turn of the last century.

 

As India's military, the world's fourth largest, goes on a modernising spree, it stood to gain from the United States, Indian officers said.

 

"We cannot be like frogs in the well and think that we know everything," said Indian Vice-Admiral Raman Prem Suthan. "It's a changing world and we are looking at professional interaction."

 

While Suthan also tried to sidestep the political undertones of the wargames, analysts said there was no mistaking their strategic underpinning.

 

The drill coincides with a summit of Asia-Pacific leaders in Sydney this week and a trilateral security dialogue on its sidelines between U.S. President George W. Bush, Australian Prime Minister John Howard and Japanese premier Shinzo Abe.

 

All three countries have in recent months expressed concern at what they say is China's soaring military spending and a lack of transparency about its defence strategy.

 

Although India-China ties have warmed significantly over the back of booming trade since a border war in 1962, they are yet to settle their frontier dispute and continue to eye each other with some mutual suspicion.

 

China in March said it would boost defence spending by 17.8 percent to about $45 billion this year, but a Pentagon report in May said Beijing's total military-related spending could be more than double that.

 

"This is a major coalescing of Asian powers, indicating greater cooperation," said Walter Andersen, a former U.S. State Department analyst who is now at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

 

He said both New Delhi and Washington were being careful not to portray the wargames as being anti-Chinese.

 

"But it provides leverage to keep them concerned about what can happen, that is, 'if you get too nasty with us, we always have friends elsewhere'," he said.

 

Sri Lanka’s government has long harassed the TRO. Seven of the charity’s workers (above) were abducted and murdered by Army backed gunmen in January 2006.

Freezing the Colombo bank accounts of the Tamils Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) for more than one year without any charges being filed, and denying the TRO its "day in court" to defend against the "false allegations," are violations of Declaration on the "Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly's Resolution 36/55 of 25 November 1981," said TRO officials in a media release issued Tuesday last week.

 

The media release said the Article 6 of the UN declaration reserved "the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief shall include the right to establish and maintain appropriate charitable or humanitarian institutions."

 

The TRO's bank accounts in Sri Lanka have now been frozen for one year and none of the "investigations" by the Central Bank's Financial Investigation Unit (FIU), the Attorney General's Office and the Police's Criminal Investigation Division (CID) has resulted in any charges against the TRO, the release added.

 

"The frozen accounts contain approximately Rs. 80,000,000 (US$ 707,000; £350,000) and were targeted for Tsunami related projects which would benefit the Tamil, Muslim and Sinhala communities of the NorthEast. Eighty percent (80%) of the funds frozen were project funds provided by international NGOs, UN Agencies (UNICEF, Save the Children, Operation USA, the Nippon Foundation) and the GoSL for projects that TRO is implementing to rehabilitate tsunami and war affected populations.

 

"The remaining twenty percent (20%) of the funds were donated by the Tamil Diaspora. TRO has thus far implemented over US$ 20 million in tsunami related projects which have benefited all three communities," the release said.

 

"TRO has met or exceeded local and international standards of accountability and transparency and has consistently met all the legal requirements of an NGO or charity operating in Sri Lanka. Since registering with the GoSL as a Charity in 2002, TRO has responded to all requests for financial and project information from the Ministry of Social Services, the Ministry of Foreign Resources, and the Parliamentary Select Committee on NGOs promptly and exhaustively," the release said, adding that the several petitions filed by TRO's legal team to "vary or vacate" the original judgement [freezing of account] have been rejected.

 

Text of the press release follows:

 

On 4 September 2006 the Central Bank of Sri Lanka filed a petition in the High Court of Colombo to “freeze” all Sri Lanka based bank accounts of the Tamils Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) “for 6 months for investigation”.

 

TRO’s bank accounts in Sri Lanka have now been frozen for one (1) year and none of the “investigations” by the Central Bank’s Financial Investigation Unit (FIU), the Attorney General’s Office and the Police’s Criminal Investigation Division (CID) have resulted in any charges being filed in any court of law. TRO has thus far been denied its “day in court” and the opportunity to defend itself against the false allegations perpetrated by the representatives of the government and state sponsored media.

 

The freezing of the TRO bank accounts for the past year without any charges being filled is a violation of the Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly’s Resolution 36/55 of 25 November 1981, which states in Article 6 that “the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief shall include…” the right “…to establish and maintain appropriate charitable or humanitarian institutions.” The Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) is bound to observe the spirit of this Declaration and permit TRO to operate without hindrance or harassment.

 

TRO has met or exceeded local and international standards of accountability and transparency and has consistently met all the legal requirements of an NGO or charity operating in Sri Lanka.

 

Since registering with the GoSL as a Charity in 2002, TRO has responded to all requests for financial and project information from the Ministry of Social Services, the Ministry of Foreign Resources, and the Parliamentary Select Committee on NGOs promptly and exhaustively. All annual reports, progress reports, and financial reports have been submitted to the relevant authorities and TRO has had its projects and accounts audited and certified each year by an independent Colombo based auditor.

 

Additionally, many of TRO’s numerous donors such as the European Union (ECHO), United Nations (UN) agencies, international NGOs and foreign governments have performed exhaustive audits of the projects and programs that they have funded.

 

The frozen accounts contain approximately Rs. 80,000,000 (US$ 707,000; £350,000) and were targeted for Tsunami related projects which would benefit the Tamil, Muslim and Sinhala communities of the NorthEast.

 

Eighty percent (80%) of the funds frozen were project funds provided by international NGOs, UN Agencies (UNICEF, Save the Children, Operation USA, the Nippon Foundation) and the GoSL for projects that TRO is implementing to rehabilitate tsunami and war affected populations.

 

The remaining twenty percent (20%) of the funds were donated by the Tamil Diaspora. TRO has thus far implemented over US$ 20 million in tsunami related projects which have benefited all three communities

 

TRO continues to be a registered charity in Sri Lanka and is not banned or proscribed in any other country in the world. All of the independently registered and operated international TRO offices continue to maintain and operate their bank accounts without any restrictions.

 

In the months after the initial freeze TRO’s legal team filed numerous petitions in the High Court in Colombo requesting that the Judge “vary or vacate” his original judgment. These requests were rejected by the court.

 

Due to TRO’s inability to access its bank accounts and the resulting lack of available funds in Colombo it became impossible for TRO to continue its legal challenge of the freeze. The TRO Colombo office remains open but is unable to operate due to a lack of accessible funds and the Sri Lanka Police having removed all computers and files on 8 January 2007.

 

As a result of the freezing of the TRO bank accounts by the Government of Sri Lanka, humanitarian assistance and emergency relief to the 350,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) displaced in 2006 and 2007 was severely hampered.

 

TRO has an extensive grassroots network and in some parts of the NorthEast is the only organization delivering vital humanitarian assistance. Throughout the post-Ceasefire Agreement and post-tsunami period TRO has been recognized by the International Humanitarian Community, the beneficiaries and the Government of Sri Lanka (the previous President honoured TRO with an award for building over 9,000 tsunami temporary shelters) as being one of the most effective and efficient aid organizations in the NorthEast.

 

The humanitarian situation in the NorthEast has reached a critical level and the human suffering has reach crisis levels. The freezing of the TRO bank accounts and other actions by the GoSL has severely limited the amount of humanitarian relief and emergency aid reaching the war and tsunami affected communities.

 

As a result of the extraordinary levels of need and the continuous displacement of the civilian population due to GoSL military operations and despite the freezing of the TRO bank accounts, TRO has continued to implement projects in the LTTE controlled areas of the NorthEast via local NGOs (LNGOs) and Community Based Organizations (CBOs).

 

In the East, due to the lack of a secure environment in GoSL controlled areas, and the freezing of the TRO bank accounts, TRO has handed over its tsunami rehabilitation projects to CBOs, LNGOs, and international NGOs to continue to implement.

 

The GoSL over the past 20 months has pursued a premeditated and deliberate policy of restricting and denying humanitarian aid and relief to the Tamil people of the NorthEast. The freezing of the TRO bank accounts in Sri Lanka is a major part of the GoSL’s policy to restrict access, aid and relief to the affected populations.

 

Other obstacles and impediments faced by humanitarian organizations:

 

• The abduction, rape, and execution of 7 TRO humanitarian workers in January 2006 by paramilitary forces affiliated to the GoSL;

• Execution of 17 ACF humanitarian workers by GoSL armed forces (as alleged by the independent Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission);

• Harassment of aid workers via physical attacks, including the killing of 57 humanitarian workers, almost all of whom are Tamils, without any investigation, arrests, prosecution or convictions which has reinforced the prevailing culture of impunity that exists in Sri Lanka;

• The imposition of excessive and restrictive permit procedures & processes imposed by the GoSL on all humanitarian organizations operating in the NorthEast;

• The restrictions on the transportation of building materials for projects to benefit tsunami and war affected IDPs;

• Denial of permission by the GoSL for international agencies and the United Nations to access affected populations;

• Restrictions and impediment imposed by the GoSL on access by local and international humanitarian organizations to areas controlled by the LTTE;

• The use by the GoSL of food and medicine as a weapon of war, an example of which is the starving of the civilian population of Vaharai for four months (only the ICRC & the UN were allowed limited access);

• The deliberate and indiscriminate bombardment and shelling of Tamil villages and civilians designed to “get them moving” out of LTTE controlled areas;

• The shelling of TRO IDP camps in the Vaharai area – which resulted in the deaths of over 80 IDPs;

• Denial of visas and renewal of visa of international staff;

• Attacks on the humanitarian community in general and specific organizations in particular via the state media, government representatives and Members of Parliament.

 

The Sri Lankan government announced significant tax rises as the turmoil in the global credit markets cast a shadow over its plans to raise large sums of money through a bond issue to tackle spiraling costs and inflation.

 

According to leading global fund managers, the slump in the global credit markets and escalation of conflict between government forces and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) may force Sri Lanka’s to delay its first overseas debt offering.

 

"All bets are off in a situation where investors are generally looking to decrease risk in their portfolios," said Joel Kim, who manages the equivalent of $10 billion at ING Investment Management in Hong Kong, the International Herald Tribune reported. "They need to wait for better market conditions."

 

Another fund manager, Clifford Lau, who manages $7.6 billion of debt at Pramerica Fixed Income in Singapore, said ‘the timing of the sale is tricky for Sri Lanka. "When there's a conflict, it is always unfavorable."

 

A series of rate increases to curb the inflation which has pushed the interest rate to 8.25% and escalation in fighting between government forces and LTTE have slowed expansion in the $26 billion economy.

 

On August 2, Sri Lanka announced it had hired Barclays Capital, HSBC Holdings and JPMorgan to help raise $ 500 million to revive the economy and to upgrade the country's infrastructure.

 

However analysts believe Sri Lanka was raising funds to sustain its war efforts and continue government subsidies to keep the cost of living down.

 

According to Fitch Ratings, which rates Sri Lanka's long-term foreign-currency debt at BB-, three levels below investment grade, a delay would worsen the government finances.

 

"The security situation remains a cause for concern and the macroeconomic environment is not encouraging, particularly in the light of the current global financial market turmoil," said Paul Rawkins, the London-based senior director of Fitch.

 

The central bank of Sri Lanka had said it would hold road shows in early September, but has yet to announced venues and dates.

In addition to unfavorable global Markets the bond issuance is also facing political obstacles with the main parliamentary opposition, the United National Party (UNP), protesting against it.

 

The UNP, which organized a protest in front of the HSBC Bank offices in Colombo last week, said that if it were to come to power it would revoke the HSBC’s local licence for helping the government with a planned $500 million bond.

Last month the UNP leader Ranil Wickramasinghe wrote to HSBC, Barclays Capital and JP Morgan stating the borrowing would jeopardise servicing of existing debt and threatening not to honour repayments on coming to power.

“This ... raises the very real prospect of a future default in the servicing of repayments to investors in this bond issue,” Wickremesinghe said in the letter.

 

“Therefore a future government formed by the UNP will not be able to honour the repayment obligations,” he added.

Tax Rise

 

Following the uncertainty over raising funds through a debt issuance, the cash-strapped Sri Lankan state has announced plans to increase the cost of mobile phones, vehicles and other items such as washing machines.

 

According to local media, the new taxes would raise billions of rupees for the government, ahead of the budget.

 

“The government is desperate for cash, so these are the various forms of ‘subtle’ taxes that come before the (November) budget,” one tax expert told the Sunday Times newspaper in Sri Lanka.

 

According to the paper, under the pre-budget bill which was passed in the parliament by 25 votes, mobile phone users will have to pay a new monthly tax of Rs 50 in addition to the ‘Cellular Mobile Telephone Subscriber Levy’ going up sharply to 7.5 percent from a current 2.5 percent. The Rs. 50 tax alone is expected to raise at least Rs, 2 billion annually.

 

The paper further reported that vehicle prices will rise with increased import duties being levied in terms of the Regional Infrastructure Development Levy of the Excise (Special Provisions) Act.

 

Under this, the current scheme of a flat rate of 2.5 percent for all vehicles will be replaced with a 2.5 percent tax on vehicles with engine capacity not exceeding 1,600 cc, 5 percent for engine capacity of between 1,600 and 2,000 cc and 7.5 percent for vehicles more than that.

 

The bill also introduces a 5% increase to import taxes, pushing it to 15%. Although, the bill doesn’t specify the items that will be affected, tax experts told the Sunday Times it will apply to a whole list of items like washing machines, air conditioners and paints. However it is not expected to apply to tobacco, cigarettes or beverages which come under the normal Excise Act.

 

A new levy called the Special Commodity Levy is also being introduced to “provide for the composite levy on certain specified commodity items in lieu of the amount chargeable on such commodity items like a tax, duty, levy, cess or any other charge.

 

“Invariably the price of the item will rise.”

 

As always, consumers and not companies will bear the brunt of these taxes as in the case of mobile phone companies which enjoy tax holidays and merely pass on these extra payments to the end user, the tax expert told the Sunday Times.

 

 

As an indication of further deterioration of its financial woes, Sri Lanka's rupee weakened to its second consecutive life closing low on Thursday.

 

The Sri Lankan rupee is steadily depreciating largely due to trade-related moves in an economy that runs a hefty trade deficit because of costly fuel imports and the impact of inflation.

 

The Colombo All Share index (CASI) closed 0.04 percent weaker at 2,531.93 points, a fall of 1.11 points, reported Reuters.

 

The CASI index has fallen around 16 percent since life highs in mid-February amid escalating war between the state and LTTE and high interest rates, which have prompted some investors to turn to fixed deposits and bonds, Reuters further added.

 

"The market ended slightly weaker on retail selling," said Susil Fernando, investment advisor at DFCC stockbrokers in Colombo.

 

The bourse is also down around 7 percent so far this year, with renewed war between the state and LTTE hurting sentiment.

 

Tourist arrivals fell 20 percent to 44,142 in July after the LTTE launched an air attacks on oil and gas facilities near the capital, Colombo.

 

The writer analyses the intervention of two Asian superpowers in Sri Lanka, namely China and India, in a bid to gain supremacy in the case of the former, and a proxy-battle to maintain it’s natural defense-perimeter in the case of latter. Chinese involvement in a harbour project (Hambantota) in the down-south of the island has given this battle a renewed intensity. This Article further examines the geopolitical background that led to this battle, and looks how “energy security” becomes the core for geopolitical change in the South Asian landscape.  

 

1. Background

Art of War - Niccolò Machiavelli

 

In Machiavellian sense the Chinese presence in Sri Lanka became weak when ruling UNP (United National party) was ousted by political maneuver by President Chandrika Kumaratunge by taking over three Ministries in 2003. Why did it happen? Did anyone predict it? Is there an oil-factor in it? How would all this have a say in Hambantota Harbour? So far, no one has given a detailed account on the underlying geopolitical waves.

 

Sri Lanka is small island placed in the tip of the Indian Peninsular just 32 miles off the South Indian coast of India, to the southwest of the Bay of Bengal and to the southeast of the Arabian Sea; and affectionately known as the “pearl of the Indain Ocean”.

 

Prime Minster Wickremesinghe of UNP who was on an official visit to Washington at time of the maneuver realized that his wings were clipped, yet he was spared as the Prime Minister. (Prime Minster and President are from two parties who had formed a ruling alliance). The background to this remains complex and at best speculative. Some speculate the hand of India. Wickremesinghe Administration played their cards wrong when they tried to get China involved in the petroleum sector. Not for the first time, South Asian geopolitics played a decisive role in the domestic power balance. 

How did this problem start? The Indian Oil Corporation entered the petroleum retail sector in Sri Lanka. Out of nearly 360 Government petroleum retail outlets in Sri Lanka, 100 now belong to the Indian Oil Corporation. In the meanwhile, Sinopec (Hong Kong) Ltd, a Chinese owned company, sought entry to the petroleum retail sector but failed.

 

At the time of President Kumaratunge – Wickremesinghe clash, the Chinese involvement in petrochemical industry was growing. Delhi knew if they loose their petroleum foothold in Sri Lanka, it would bring the energy hungry Beijing dragon close to Indian shores. This is perhaps what Washington wanted – to balance the geopolitical scales in the region through Beijing.

 

What was the petrochemical-climax? The then Pro-Chinese UNP regime lost substantial political ground when the then President took over three ministries belonging to UNP. This virtually marked the way out for China. Then came the rise of Indian petrochemical dinosaurs in Lankan landscape. The Hindustan Petroleum, meanwhile, was eyeing the petroleum retail sector in the island despite assertive opposition of some Lankan quarters. Had these initiatives succeeded, India would have ended up as Sri Lanka’s petrochemical emperor, controlling the entire retail and wholesale sector; and finally monopolizing the exploration and development of oil reserves off Jaffna/Mannar.

 

Writer would give two reasons for the later diminishing role of China in Sri Lanka:

1.      US$ 3 Billion post-tsunami reconstruction grants and pledges – we could see no assertive Chinese role. (No post-tsunami politics for them!)

2.      India’s involvement in the clearing/mapping of the Trincomalee and Colombo harbours after the tsunami.      

Was this the geopolitical anti-climax? Yes. China-factor, by this time, was a distant memory.

 

Did the exile come back? Yes. Recollect what Kissinger said:

“By geopolitical, I mean an approach that pays attention to the requirements of equilibrium. Henry Kissinger in Colin S Gray, G R Sloan. Geopolitics, Geography, and Strategy. Portland: Frank Cass Publishers, 1999. 

 

2. Hambantota and the Geopolitical Net   

A silver-line appeared in the Chinese sky with President Rajapakse’s visit to China in late February. China and Sri Lanka signed an agreement on an "establishment of friendship city relationship" centering Hambantota district. The agreed Hambantota Development Zone includes developing a harbour in Hambantota with a tank farm and a bunkering system.  

 

The small town of Hambantota is located in the far down-south of the island. In 2 A.D. it was part of the Kingdom of Ruhuna, and was home to a busy harbour called “Godapavata Pattana” just few miles west of Hambantota. Ships sailing from west/east and vice versa used Godapavata Pattana as a commercial maritime hub. It formed part of the maritime silk-route and continues to unearth its past wonders today thanks to a collaborative German-Lankan archeological research team. 

 

At present, this small town has lost its former political glory and economic vibrancy. The present President whose political epicenter is this small town is determined to bring back the lost glory to his native village. Hambantota, in addition, is the geographic margin between the East and the South, and the last stronghold Sinhala city of the South with several military bases including the Weeravilla Airport; and further serves as a strategic logistical-military base to Sri Lankan East – say like centrally situated town of Anuradhapura to Jaffna Peninsular.  

 

Back in 2005, attempts were made by then President Chandrika to implement the construction of Hambantota Bunkering and a Tank Farm Project by the Chinese government during the visit of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao to Sri Lanka. The project was to be undertaken by Chinese Harbour Engineering Company and an estimated sum of Rs.1.5 billion (US $ 15m) was to be then invested. In 2007, the present incumbent, Mahinda Rajapakse, took a renewed interest in carrying the project forward.

 

The US$360 million contract agreement was signed on March 12^th, 2007 for the construction of the Hambantota Harbour between the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) and the Consortium of China Harbour Engineering Company Limited (CHEC) and Sino Hydro Corporation Limited. During the first phrase of the project is the construction of a jetty and an oil terminal. Later the Port would be developed to handle 20 million containers annually. The first phase would be completed in 3 years and the whole project would be completed in 15 years. Many question the economic wisdom of this project, especially attracting new generation vessels with draft exceeding 18 m. China may not see any economic advantage from this project. Yet she has decided to grant 85% of the total amount under a special subsidized loan scheme.

 

Delhi has taken the role of China rather nonchalantly. An account in the Hindustan Times in 2005 said that "India feels that it is unnecessary to bid for it [Hambantota] given the fact that it is already refurbishing the World War II-vintage oil-tank farm at Trincomalee with 99 giant tanks. Out of these, only 35 can be put to use in the near future." It was further noted "There isn't enough business in Sri Lanka to make expansion worthwhile even in Trincomalee. India also does not consider the Hambantota project to be of a great strategic value, either. For India, a presence in Trincomalee makes much more strategic sense." (Trincomalee (Trinco) is situated towards north of the island) 

 

Asia Times Online quoting a Delhi official said “that while the Hambantota project gives the Chinese a foothold in Sri Lanka, this cannot be interpreted as a decline in India's role on the island. Geographic proximity, ethnic links and close ties between India and Sri Lanka cannot be eroded by a few projects and agreements with other countries.” Seemly, it is a benign neglect on the Indian part.  

 

The Port deal inked would bring China to the doorstep of India. Though China has no grip on Trincomalee, they have quite swiftly moved much closer to Trinco and Rameshwaram.

 

3. The “H’ factor – The New Pearl  

Titled "Energy Futures in Asia" by Booz Allen Hamilton (defense contractor) for the Pentagon in an “internal report” mentions about the "pearls" in a string. These pearls could be seen in Chinese naval presence. It starts from Gwadar in Pakistan, at Chittagong in Bangladesh, in Myanmar, Cambodia and Thailand, pulling to South China Sea. Add to all this, “Hambantota” – the “H” factor – the new pearl in the necklace – which is “Made in China”.

 

Dubbed as Burma Rama – B. Raman – a RAW officer, in an excellent write-up, in “Gwadar, Hambantota & Sitwe: China's Strategic Triangle”, relates how “H” factor forms a strategic triangle checkmating India. First take Deep Sea Hub Port developed by China in Gwadar in Pakistan. Gwadar is just 72km from the Iranian border and 400 km east of the Strait of Hormuz, a major channel of world oil supplies.

 

This would serve as a western outlet for Chinese exports and energy supplies. Thus it would reduce the dependence on choke points like Malacca Straits vulnerable to disruptions and pirate attacks. Oil/gas tankers to China from the Gulf and Africa could be discharged in Gwadar, then pumped by a pipeline through Kashmiri territory to Xinjiang. Pakistan further agreed with China to set up a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Gwadar. This Zone is entirely for Chinese use to produce goods for export in Africa. The cost advantage is immense.

 

The political and economic apron of China would be nicely laid to reach Gulf and Africa. Further, tank farms in Gwadar would be a vantage for Chinese Navy. As B. Raman points out;

 

 

The other point in the triangle is Sitwe in Myanmar. China mainly intends to lay pipelines to Yunnan – province in the far southwestern corner of China – from Sitwe. The third point is Hambantota in the strategic triangle. This means in the game of China Vs India played in Sri Lankan grass – it is now “advantage China”.

 

4. Compromising Energy Security  

Perhaps impending consequences of the Indian blunder is not military – at least in short term. It is the energy security that is compromised. As we are aware, “energy security dynamics” is relatively a new field in this region, especially big nations invest large political capital to gain strides. India grows at over 8% of the GDP and consumption accounts for 60% of GDP and consumes nearly 3% of the world's total energy. And this consumption is expected to double in the next 15 years. Yet India has only invested a sum less than US$ 4 billion in the energy sector as opposed to China where their total investment accounts for US$ 40 billion.  

 

West's energy watchdog “International Energy Agency” said in a recent monthly Oil Market Report that India's oil demand in 2007 is expected to rise by 3.4 per cent from last year to 2.7 million barrels per day. Given the seriousness of this, India could never compromise on energy security. In April 2007 Indian Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia said in Tokyo that the demand for energy is expected to grow, but would grow below the rate of economic growth due to increased energy efficiency. Still, India could not afford to ignore the energy resources scattered within the vast Indian Ocean basin.  

 

Being conscious of the above challenges that laid ahead, Indian legislature realized the importance of a strong national policy on energy. This gave birth to government’s 2000 proposals of Hydrocarbon Vision 2025. This serves as a blueprint for Indian petrochemical businesses. State-owned companies like the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Oil India Limited (OIL) which explores and exploit, and the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), which secures oil from abroad, would to shape the direction of energy national policy under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas through the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) and the Oil Coordination Committee. Knowing that, 50% of the Indian Ocean basin lies within a 1,000 mile radius of India, the challenges that lie ahead for India are vast.

 

The commercial challenges that India face in the entire Ocean Continent would be determined by the presence of other superpowers in neighbouring countries located in the Indian Ocean. For now, Chinese presence in Hambantota has altered the Sri Lankan geopolitical equation; and the writer notes the following spillover effects on Sri Lankan policies;

 

1.      Sri Lankan government would not hesitate to cooperate more with China in Off-shore oil exploration, thinking less of India: – This is already seen in Mannar basin adjoining Indian Cauvery basin where China, like India, was offered an oil block for exploration without bidding.

 

2.      Dual presence of “China and India” would give leverage to the Sri Lankan government to bring other energy explorers to the shore without being intimidated by India (perhaps for a better deal!): – The opening of 6 oil drilling blocks for competitive bidding in Mannar is a case in point. Sri Lanka could now afford to send delegations to Washington, London, Dubai or Singapore for bidding invitations. This promotes the Indian Ocean to be truly international waters open to the world.

 

3.      The possibility of internationalizing domestic issues like LTTE, in the long term (like Nigeria), which could affect the Dravidian sensitivities of South India. One writer said (referring to US in Mannar oil exploration); “It will be very hard for US Texaco to make progress in Tamil Eelam sea without removing LTTE from U.S banned list; directly or indirectly they have to deal with LTTE than GOSL for positive outcome!” 

 

5. Unfolding Geopolitical Drama    

Geo-strategically, Indian responses to Sri Lankan issues have been impulsive and erratic. Resultantly, loosing the Lankan geo-political grip means they have allowed China to creep into the Indian security perimeter – and it is right to say they are inside India. Indian Experts said, time and over, that the Indian security perimeter extends from the Strait of Hormuz to the Strait of Malacca, from Africa's east coast to the western shores of Australia. India may implement the setting up of a high-tech monitoring post in northern Madagascar under the cover of combating piracy/terrorism. Else markedly increase the aerial superiority in their scientific base in Antarctica. But yet it is undeniable that China and Diego Garcia of US has already come under her wingspan.  

 

But now one thing is clear – and that’s for sure. Writer believes that Indians are still stuck with the classical naval doctrine of K.M Panikkar, the architect of India's naval doctrine. Modern brown-water naval strategy (naval expansion in their own ocean), leave aside blue-water (trans-oceanic naval expansion), means that it not a bareboat naval expansion (like in Panikkar’s days) but an apron cover of aerial, communication, and logistical forward-press. Quintessentially, regional aerial dominance is vital, as the naval crafts in battle could be “sitting ducks”, if aerial protection is lacking. Seeing that Weeravilla Airport which is few miles from Hambantota, the dragon needs only one step to move close!     

 

At time of writing, IOC is further proposing US$ 20 million investment in the aviation fuel market by 2008. But should they stop from that? Sources state that IOC is also looking to open up the East in a positive manner. (Do not forget the above-mentioned Weeravilla Airport).

From ACSA to Texaco – you name it – all this is added weight to Indian geopolitical paraphernalia.

 

For the moment, the ONGC wants to explore petroleum reserves in the Palk Straits i.e. the Sethusamudram. Yet on Sri Lankan side the involvement of Norwegians through TGS-NOPEC to collect 2D seismic data, starting from the east coast of Sri Lanka, could not be lightly presumed, perhaps with a 3D eye on petroleum prospects. Certainly the involvement of this Norwegian company has raised eyebrows of some in Colombo. Perhaps given the possibilities of energy exploration in the Sri Lankan ocean basin - and Mannar plus Weeravilla-Air factor – it is a wise move for China to have come through the backdoor – Hambantota.  

 

How would India take all this? For India, geopolitical equation in Sri Lanka is getting complex – and the “H” factor is another added variable. With UAE sensing for an oil refinery in Hambantota, Sri Lanka is fast becoming a feeding plate for too many.  

 

Cometh the hour, cometh the dragon. Only time would tell what the final episodes of an unfolding geopolitical drama. Let the writer leave the reader with few words of Chinese wisdom.

 

“When opponents present openings, you should penetrate them immediately. Get to what they want first, subtly anticipate them. Maintain discipline and adapt to the enemy in order to determine the outcome of the war. Thus, at first you are like a maiden, so the enemy opens his door, then you are like a rabbit on the loose, so the enemy cannot keep you out.”- Art of War - Sun Tzu.

 

 

 

The Office of the LTTE Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs, in a detailed report released September 8 before the UN Human Rights Council session, drew attention to the human rights violations committed by the Sri Lanka State on the Tamil people.

 

More than 1974 Tamil civilians have been killed and 842 Tamil civilians were either arrested or abducted in the 21 months from November 2005, after Sri Lanka's President Rajapakse came to power, the report said.

 

The LTTE called upon the "international and UN representatives who visit Colombo, to also pay a visit to the Tamil homeland and to find out first hand the ground situation."

 

Over 69 of those who were killed during the study period were children under the age of 16, the report said listing the details of each of the child killed.

 

The report gave details of "more than 45 humanitarian aid workers, 11 media workers, and 4 Tamil members of parliament" killed by the Sri Lankan Armed forces and its paramilitaries.

 

"Military offensives are being launched on the Tamil homeland and hundreds of thousands of Tamil people are forced to flee their homes. The displacement, in addition to the hardships caused by large scale forced movement, denies the children their education, causes loss of property, and loss of the produce from their farms which they suddenly have to leave behind. The Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in almost all cases languish in welfare centers without basic facilities.

 

"In the east, the IDPs were forced by the Sri Lankan State to resettle in areas chosen by them Sri Lankan State. The IDPs were not allowed to go back to their own houses. They are in fact resettled in plastic tents without drinking water and sanitation facilities. The IDPs of Mutur east and Sampur areas are denied access to go to their own habitats and these areas have been defined by the GoSL as High Security Zones," the report said.

 

The LTTE Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs Spokesperson, Ms N Selvy said that she hopes "Ms Louise Arbour, UN Human Rights Commissioner, Mr. Manfred Novak, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Mr. Walter Kalin, Representative of UN Secretary-General on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced People who are scheduled to visit Sri Lanka in October, November and December will not sideline the Tamil areas under our [LTTE's] administration."

 

This child was among 13 people killed by Sri Lankan commandos who triggered a mine at a vehicle carrying civilians fleeing the offensive towards their villages. The Army said LTTE cadres were killed.

Sri Lankan military’s claim of seizing a coastal territory held by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in the northwest of the island was dismissed by the organisation’s military spokesperson as a ploy by the government to deceive the Sinhala people.

 

On Saturday September 1, the Sri Lankan army announced it was launching a ‘humanitarian’ operation with the aim of ‘liberating’ six thousand civilians in LTTE held territory south of Mannar.

 

On Sunday, a day after announcing the launch of the operation, Sri Lankan military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe told the Associated Press that the military had ousted the LTTE from a key coastal area in Mannar district.

 

"The army has Chilaavaththurai and Arippu areas (in Mannar) under control," Samarasinghe told the Associated Press.

 

According to Samarasinghe the army also captured a camp belonging to the Sea Tigers in the village of Chilaavaththurai and seized three boats and a large number of anti-personnel mines and detonators.

 

Sri Lankan military top brass and the state news agencies projected the military operation as a major success and gave wide publicity to it.

 

Army Commander Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka claimed it as a significant victory for the military as the LTTE used the base to transport arms and ammunition.

 

However the LTTE military spokesperson Irasiah Ilanthirayan dismissed the claims as ‘yet another political stunt’ by the government and said there were no LTTE military units stationed in the areas the army claims to have captured.

 

Ilanthirayan speaking to the Morning Leader newspaper accused the Sri Lankan state of staging another political stunt aimed at fooling the people in the south and challenged the military to launch an offensive into areas where there are Tiger cadres in the Wanni.

 

"The government is beating around the bush without looking into the core issues. It is not targeting our main areas at all. It is just another eyewash," said Ilanthirayan.

 

Chilaavaththurai is south of the Medawachahiya-Mannar Road, which is controlled by the government and there were no armed Tiger cadres in the region, he added.

 

Labelling the operation as ‘political stunt -2 of the government’, after Thoppigala, Ilanthirayan said there was no fighting in Chilaavaththurai and there were only the Tigers’ humanitarian workers stationed in the area.

 

The LTTE military spokesperson cited the numerous failed attempts by the Sri Lankan army to capture LTTE controlled territory in Mannar district and said government was capable of doing anything to mislead the people to gain political advantage.

 

"They have already tried to attack our areas and did not taste success. The government will hoist its national flag in Wilpattu, Sinharaja or some nearby jungle and show the people they have captured key areas of the LTTE," he said.

 

Following the operation the Sri Lankan military said it had intercepted radio communications that indicated 11 LTTE cadres were killed in the fighting but Ilanthirayan denied any LTTE casualty due to the army offensive.

 

However 13 civilians fleeing the Sri Lanka Army offensive towards Chilaavaththurai were killed in a claymore attack carried out by a Sri Lankan Deep Penetration Unit (DPU) on Saturday.

 

Two ambulances sent from Mannaar hospital to transport the wounded were blocked at Chirukkandal SLA camp and it took more than six hours to transport the wounded to Mannaar hospital, TamilNet reported.

 

The LTTE last week charged that the government’s move to capture Silavathurai in Mannar was yet another political stunt aimed at fooling the people in the south and challenged the security forces to launch an offensive into areas where there are Tiger cadres in the Wanni.

 

LTTE Military Spokesperson I. Ilanthirayan told The Morning Leader the government forces were only targeting areas where their humanitarian work was carried out instead of targeting its main areas.

 

He said only the humanitarian workers were stationed in the area and no armed cadres were there.

 

"The government is beating around the bush without looking into the core issues. It is not targeting our main areas at all. It is just another eyewash," he said.

 

He said there was no fighting in Silavathurai and added only the Tigers’ humanitarian workers were stationed in the area. "This is Political Stunt-2 of the government," he said.

 

Silavathurai is south of the Medawachahiya-Mannar Road, which is controlled by the government and there were no armed Tiger cadres in the region, Ilanthirayan said.

 

Speaking further Ilanthirayan added the government was capable of doing anything to mislead the people to gain political advantage.

 

Ilanthirayan also said the previous efforts of the government forces to attack the LTTE stronghold in Vanni had failed.

 

"They have already tried to attack our areas and did not taste success. The government will hoist its national flag in Wilpattu, Sinharaja or some nearby jungle and show the people they have captured key areas of the LTTE," he said.

 

Speaking on the closure of the Uyilankulam Road, Ilanthirayan said the ICRC was forced to withdraw due to shelling by the government forces.

 

"They were on their way taking the mortal remains of SLA personnel. The military started shelling at the time and the ICRC crew was forced to take cover in our bunkers," he said.

 

Both the United National Party (UNP) and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) say that they voted for the Emergency Regulations in support of war.

 

To support the government's "war against terrorism", the UNP did not oppose the parliament extending the Emergency Regulations by another month, UNP parliamentarian John Ameratunge told the BBC’s Sinhala service.

 

The UNP had reservations earlier over a clause of the gazette notification and wanted to oppose, the MP said. But after the government agreed to remove the clause in the gazette notification of the Emergency, the UNP abstained from Tuesday's voting.

 

"The clause in the gazette notification is undemocratic and can be used as a weapon to suppress opposition," Ameratunge told the BBC Sinhala service.

 

The JVP (or People's Liberation Front), which voted in support of the regulations, said they would vote against four finance bills that the government also tabled.

 

JVP MP Anura Kumara Dissanayaka said that the government is planning to impose new taxes on vehicles and mobile phones by which small-scale businessmen will be affected. He said mobile phone is not a luxury and over 500,000 are in use in the country.

 

Also, Dissanayake said, by imposing tax to vehicles less than 1600 cc, government is putting the three -wheeler drivers in difficulties.

 

"The government should stop wasteful expenses and utilize that money for the war," Dissanayake added.