Tamil Diaspora waiting to strike again:

Baseless statement on human rights violations

War is not something like a ‘sil’ campaign conducted in a village temple. It is an armed conflict between two or more warring parties. Victors and the vanquished at war will be determined by the strategy pursued by each party to the conflict, their weaponry power, and more importantly the demonstrated courage by each party at war and host of other related factors.

However, when a Government is involved in a conflict it is expected to act in a responsible manner so as to avoid any civilian casualties. In that context, one could easily say the way that the Government conducted the Northern humanitarian operation to liberate the innocent Tamil civilians from the LTTE captivity was a clear manifestation of responsible behaviour that is expected of a Government.

The whole effort of the Government was to liberate the innocent Tamil people who had nothing to do with LTTE terror. They were a helpless lot who were suffering for long period due to a protracted war. Nevertheless, amidst all the precautions taken by the Government there could have been lapses which were unavoidable unintentional but caused by the very nature of an armed conflict.

As we know the international community, human rights organizations and various other interest groups exercised extreme vigilance over the behaviour of the parties to the conflict during the last stages of the humanitarian operation and expressed divers opinions and views mostly on unverified sources of information.

The common belief was that there was certain amount of human right violations by both parties. But these conclusions were drawn mostly on gossip or by hearsay rather than on authentic information. Some of them were fabrication by the Tamil Diaspora. Not limiting to that they went to the extent of moving a resolution at the UN Human Rights Council against the Government.

Fortunately with the intervention of the friendly nation of Sri Lanka the resolution was defeated and Sri Lanka won the day. But the sinister move of the Diaspora did not stop at that. It was temporally shelved only to be taken at a later date. The Tamil Diaspora was waiting for an opportunity to strike at the right time.

They very well knew the implications of international law which protects people from extra judicial killings. No one should forget the fact that the LTTE sympathizers are still vigilant and watchful about what is happening in Sri Lanka and they are waiting for the right time.

It is in this backdrop of events that an organization named (TAG) ‘Tamil Against Genocide’ sought assistance from ‘Bruce Fem’ who was the then Attorney General of Ronald Regan to frame charges against Gotabhaya Rajapaksa and Sarath Fonseka. 850-page document was aimed at bringing both of them before the international court of justice for war crimes. But the report was rejected by the State Department as there was no substantial evidence to prove the charges. It was during this period that country celebrated the victory of war.

War heroes were felicitated and were accorded the highest national honours. Sarath Fonseka had a special felicitation at Ambalangoda. It is his hometown. He is from Ambalangoda. But at that time there were no media reports to say that he had boat rides in the ‘Madu ganga.’ Nor did he take a walk along the Ambalangoda beach. nor did he have long chats with the ordinary village folk in this hometown.

It was his speech at Ambalangoda which helped reactivating the thus dormant ‘Bruce Fem’ report. ‘His speech was like a self-confession about the charges. We now have the evidence to support the charges contain in the Bruce Fem report’, that was the outcry of the Tamil organizations. It was during this time that Sarath Fonseka decided to go to America on a private visit. It is a fact.

According to media reports he went to America to see his children and to get his green card renewed.

There are many green card holders in Sri Lanka. They are not only ordinary citizens but politicians as well. Among them there are people who claim to be patriots. It appears that holding a green card is not a disqualification for someone to be a patriot in Sri Lanka. Amidst all these what was highlighted in the local media was the controversial statement that was made by Sarath Fonseka at the New York Buddhist temple.

Michael Hardy in his column to Sunday Leader maintained that Fonseka got his green card renewed. In the meantime the news that Sarath Fonseka was to be interrogated by the American authorities spread like wild fire. While this was going on the international web sites gave more prominence to the speech made by Sarath Fonseka at Ambalangoda.

It was also reported in media that Gotabhaya was informed by Sarath Fonseka that he was to be questioned. And the advice from Gotabhaya to Sarath was not to give a statement. Sarath was able to return to the country without giving a statement. There was also the question on the authority of the ‘Internal Affairs’ Ministry of America to obtain such a statement from a person.

Probably the Ministry was inquisitive to know the veracity of a statement made by one of their green card holders as they were to take a decision on granting a further extension. What is important for the people is to know whether there was serious attempt by the American authorities to question him or was it a mere pow - wow with him.

The events that followed this incident led to more interesting political developments in the country. In his first press conference at which he declared his candidacy for the forthcoming Presidential elections, responding to a question paused by Rajpal Abeynayake as to whether he was prepared to face an inquiry if there are war crime charges, Fonseka said that if there is evidence to that effect he would not object to that. This was reported in Daily Mirror on November 30, 2009.

Unfortunately neither Rajpal’s question nor the answer of Fonseka caught the attention of media. Yet the importance of that question and the answer surfaced once again with the controversial interview that Sarath Fonseka supposed to have given to Fredricka Janze of Sunday Leader.

Although it was later denied by Fonseka, Fredricka did not correct it and maintained that she never gave a wrong interpretation to what Fonseka said at that interview.

She was firm on her stand and said that what was reported is correct. Surprisingly Fonseka did not refute Fredricka’s claim nor did he initiate any action against the paper.

Whether he will do it in the future is yet to be seen. Instead what he did was to deny Fredricka’s report at a hastily summoned press conference.

At the press conference he said that he was ready to take the responsibility for all what has happened in the battlefield. It was after this that the Government received a letter from UN seeking clarification on Fonseka’s statement. If carefully analyzed one could see that the above chain events are sequentially interconnected and interrelated. Even if it is not so I believe it is reasonable for anyone to assume so. ‘Philip Alison’ is the UN rapporteur on human rights.

His responsibility is to report to the human rights commission about extra judicial killings that are taking place in various parts of the world.

Accordingly he is now questioning the Government of Sri Lanka about Sarath Fonseka’s statement. Alistern wants to know whether such a thing really happened in Sri Lanka. He is also being pressurized by the Tamil Diaspora. They are once again up in arms. As reported in ‘Tamil net’ they now insist on UN to probe into this matter as the evidence is coming from the person non other than the former army commander himself.

Alistern cannot avoid this situation as he has to do his duty. The explanation of the Government in this regard may or may not be accepted by the Human Rights Council. If it is rejected we will be in trouble. If it is accepted we will be slightly out of danger. Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe out rightly condemning Sarath Fonseka’s statement has said that it was a treacherous act. But somebody can argue that Minister Samarasinghe was speaking on behalf of his master Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the JVP saw this as another ploy by the Western nations in support of the Government. It is the kind of impression that he was trying to create through his utterances. According to Dissanayake, Fonseka is the real patriot and the UN is supportive of Mahinda Rajapaksa. In my opinion it is reasonable for a person who carefully analyse the above sequence of events to raise the question as to why Sarath Fonseka did this?

The above is Wasantha Priya Ramanayake’s article which appeared in Lankadeepa on Friday (25) translated to English by Kumar Abeysinghe