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Douglas Devananda, the leader of the EPDP, a government-aligned paramilitary group, recently took in an event to distribute rice that China donated to Mullaitivu. Following the event, Devananda also initiated development work on a kilometer-long stretch of road in the Semmalai area. The road is being constructed at Rs.12 million through the Fisheries Ministry.
Ironically China has been one of the most loyal supporters of the Rajapaksa regime and supported Sri Lankan authorities financially and military in the armed conflict which saw the massacre of tens of thousands of Tamils in the North and East.
No sooner had the United States ended direct military aid to Sri Lanka in 2008, over its deteriorating human rights record than China stepped in to fill the breach. Beijing sold large quantities of arms and dramatically boosted its aid fivefold to emerge as Sri Lanka's largest donor. Chinese Jian-7 fighter jets, antiaircraft guns, JY-11 3D air surveillance radars, and other supplied weapons have played a central role in the Sri Lankan military successes against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam seeking to carve out an independent homeland for the ethnic Tamils in the island's north and east. China has become an enabler of repression in some developing nations as it seeks to gain access to oil and mineral resources, market its goods, and step up investment. Still officially a communist state, its support for brutal regimes is driven by capitalist considerations. But while exploiting commercial opportunities, it also tries to make strategic inroads.
Recently Eelam fishermen also rejected funding from the Chinese government to build homes, adding that they were unsuitable and vulnerable to natural disasters.
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