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| The unending war in Sri Lanka | | B. Muralidhar Reddy | |
A political initiative to resolve the grievances of all ethnic groups along with an effective strategy to take on the LTTE is the best way out.
SRI LANKA is on the boil. Apart from the daily diet of killings, bomb blasts, and targeted assassinations, the dimension of the unfolding humanitarian disaster is alarming.
Since the current phaseof violence began on July 26, after the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam shut down a waterway in the east, hundreds of people have been killed and at least one lakh, by conservative estimates, rendered homeless. The violence has taken a particularly nasty turn as evident in the execution of 17 Sri Lankan workers of a French NGO in Muttur and the murder of the deputy secretary-general of the Sri Lanka Government's Peace Secretariat, Ketheshwaran Loganathan, in Colombo.
The 2002 Ceasefire Agreement (CFA), brokered by Norway, has become a mere a piece of paper and the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), formed to oversee its implementation, irrelevant.
Blame game
Both sides are blaming each other for the violence. The LTTE appears to have a clear game plan but the question is whether the Mahinda Rajapakse Government has a strategy to thwart the Tigers' designs. Most of the Government's actions seem, at best, reactions to particular incidents.
Instead of mobilising available support to take on the LTTE and taking initiatives to resolve the ethnic conflict, the Rajapakse Government seems to be at loggerheads with well-wishers and supporters of a peaceful Sri Lanka both within and outside.
Leave alone trying to get the Opposition United National Party on board its fight against the LTTE, the ruling party has actually accommodated six UNP dissidents in the Government. And, President Rajapakse's managers do not let go of any opportunity to pin the blame for the current state of affairs on the policies of the previous Ranil Wickremesinghe Government.
The battle of wits between the SLMM and the Government is another area of concern. At least three times since July 26, the SLMM has openly clashed with the Government.
The SLMM is miffed at the Government for its aerial raids in the east to force the LTTE to lift the water blockade. This was not the right strategy, it feels. There have been at least two occasions recently when the aerial raids took place when the SLMM chief was in the battle zone. The SLMM's stand that the aerial raids failed to help in the release of water has been vindicated.
The SLMM is also angry with the Government fordenying itpermission to travel to Muslim-dominated Muttur town, the main theatre of battle in the first week of August.
The Government and the SLMM have also differed over the aerial bombing in Tiger-held areas of Mullaittivu district that killed 61 people and injured over 150. The Government says the raids targeted an LTTE training camp and not a school or an orphanage. UNICEF and the SLMM, whose teams visited the affected site, have disputed this.
Colombo is in a similar situation vis-à-vis the Lanka Co-Chairs — the United States, the European Union, Japan, and Norway. In a recent strongly-worded statement, the Co-Chairs said they were deeply concerned by the continuing violence, which was seriously unravelling the ceasefire agreement and peace process in Sri Lanka.
Their call to both the Government and the LTTE to cease hostilities immediately and return to the negotiating table has not gone down well with Colombo.
The Rajapakse Government believes it is unfair to equate a sovereign Government with a terrorist outfit. The Government's anguish may well be justified but it can ill afford to antagonise the international community and fritter away the goodwill, support and sympathies it has in its fight against the LTTE.
Virtually the whole world has repeated several times in recent weeks that there can be no military solution to the island's ethnic problem. A solid political initiative to resolve the grievances of various ethnic groups combined with an effective strategy to take on the LTTE is the best way to begin the process of isolating the outfit. If the Rajapakse Government is serious on building a consensus within and outside the country on ways to tackle the LTTE, it must heed the advice of well-wishers and supporters of Sri Lanka.
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