Sri Lanka: State of the Nation and relations with India

We are well placed on our path towards this aim: our workforce is versatile and easily trainable, with English widely spoken and understood; having ensured that our economy withstood the 30 year conflict and the impact of the December 2004 tsunami, our workforce can also claim resilience. We have the second largest pool of UK qualified accountants in the world which helps us compete in the financial and BPO markets; and Sri Lanka’s stock market has been one of the best performing not only in Asia, but in the world.

Taking into account Sri Lanka’s strategic location on the vast-West maritime route, close to the ocean routes that link Asia to Europe and the rapidly expanding markets of the Indian sub-continent, our vision in terms of our overall economy, as laid down in the Government Policy Document ‘Mahinda Chinthana’ (Vision for the future) is to become a dynamic global hub; a shipping, aviation, commercial, energy and knowledge hub, being a key link between the East and the West.

Growing trade in the Indian sub-continent and its increasing integration with the rest of the world have created demand for enhanced port facilities, giving Sri Lanka the opportunity to increase its volumes and market-share of trans-shipment traffic. In this context, ports have been identified as one of the highest potential revenue generators for Sri Lanka.

Commercial activities

The current expansion of the Colombo Port (the Colombo South Harbour Project) and the new port in Hambantota are expected to drive economic activity and significantly boost revenues in the years ahead. The ancient and world-renowned natural harbour in Trincomalee in the East of the country is envisaged to become an industrial port, in addition to ship refuelling. The government intends setting up heavy industries in Trincomalee and the port will be used increasingly for commercial activities including power generation, cement production, flour milling and oil storage. The Indian Oil Corporation already operates out of Trincomalee. Shortly, NTPC, the giant Indian State owned Power Company, will enter into a Joint Venture with the Ceylon Electricity Board to build a 1,000MW coal power plant. In addition to these three ports there are also the ports in Galle, Oluvil and Kankesanthurai. The Galle Port in the South is being developed as a commercial and leisure port providing berthing and repair facilities for up to 80 yachts.

Fisheries activities

The Oluvil Port which is seen as a catalyst for the growth of the Eastern region which has seen slow growth due to the conflict is being developed as a commercial and fisheries harbour with Danish funding. The harbour is expected to create employment opportunities through increased trade, fisheries activities and the development of small-scale industries. The Kankesanthurai Port in the North is currently being rebuilt with Indian assistance.

With Sri Lanka’s GDP growth rate of 8 percent, it is expected that per capita income, by 2016, would reach US $ 4,000. Tourist arrivals, currently growing at 40 percent, are expected to reach 2.5 million by 2015. IT literacy is expected to increase from the current 35 percent to 75 percent.

As mentioned earlier, our focus is to capitalise on post-conflict opportunities to ensure a better future for the people of our country. Our challenges in this respect include consolidating the hard won peace after 30 years of conflict and taking our nation as a whole towards greater prosperity and social cohesion. This involves safeguarding Sri Lanka’s national interests, meeting the aspirations of its people of all communities, harmonising our multi-ethnic and multi-religious society, safeguarding our cherished and long standing democracy and projecting ourselves as a nation at peace and a venue for secure investment and good business.

Common culture

Since Independence, Sri Lanka’s foreign policy has been guided by non-alignment. The policy of staying away from great power rivalries continues to serve Sri Lanka well. This policy is in line with our national ethos and persistent desire to be an independent nation, working with friendship towards all and enmity towards none. In this context, we enjoy close and friendly relations with all Member States of the UN, now numbering 192. However, extra effort is made towards developing closer ties with countries in our immediate neighbourhood. India, in this respect, holds a very special place. In the words of our President, “India is our relation and all others are our friends”. In the words of Mahatma Gandhi, “It is, at least it should be, impossible for India and Sri Lanka to quarrel. We are the nearest neighbours. We are inheritors of a common culture.”

Relations between Sri Lanka and India, in the post-Independence era, have matured over the years and diversified with the passage of time, encompassing all areas of contemporary relevance, including trade, services and investment, development cooperation, science and technology, culture, education and security. The conclusion of the armed conflict in May 2009 created the space for new opportunities and further expansion of areas of cooperation between the two countries. The state visit by President Mahinda Rajapaksa to India in June 2010 was a landmark event that laid a strong foundation for the future development of bilateral relations, with the two leaders agreeing to harness the enormous potential available for consolidating and strengthening the bilateral partnership.

Bilateral discussions

Today, India and Sri Lanka work together on the basis of mutual respect and understanding. Our relations could be described as having reached a point of irreversible excellence. Interactions take place at every conceivable level on a regular basis and all issues are discussed and resolved amicably through direct bilateral discussions. Cooperation and interaction between our two countries also encompass all three security forces. A large number of Sri Lankan security personnel are trained in India, annually, and the Sri Lanka Navy has recently embarked on a programme of procuring OPVs from India.

India today is Sri Lanka’s largest trading partner. India is first in terms of Foreign Direct Investment. The largest number of tourists who come into Sri Lanka are from India. In all three sectors, trade, Foreign Direct Investment and tourism, India occupies a dominant position in relation to our economy.

Trade between the two countries has increased exponentially since the entry into force of the India-Sri Lanka Free Trade Agreement in the year 2000. It is now envisaged that the time has come to take this partnership further in the form of a comprehensive economic partnership. The Colombo Port and the Colombo Dockyard feed on substantial Indian business.

Many Indian corporations are investing in Sri Lanka. Indian banks and insurance companies operate in Sri Lanka as well. Physical connectivity between the two countries continues to expand. The Colombo-Tuticorin Ferry Service was launched recently and arrangements to launch the Rameshwaram-Talaimannar Ferry Service are currently underway. There are more than 100 flights a week between the two countries now and over 250,000 Sri Lankans visit India, annually, mostly on pilgrimage to Buddhist sites in North India.

India’s assistance towards the rehabilitation and reconstruction of the conflict affected areas of the North and the East of Sri Lanka is substantial and continuing. India’s contribution covers a range of areas and include: provision of clothing, medicine, shelter material, cement, agriculture implements, deployment of demining teams, rebuilding infrastructure including railways, setting up vocational training centres, repair and construction of schools, 50,000 houses, stadium and recreational facilities, rehabilitation of the Palaly Airport and Kankesanthurai Harbour, construction of a cultural centre in Jaffna and assistance towards rehabilitation of war widows.

Marine eco-system

Sri Lanka has permanent official representation in New Delhi as well as in Mumbai and Chennai. India has expanded its representation in Sri Lanka since the conclusion of the conflict. While the High Commission is based in Colombo, India has Consulates in Kandy in the Central Province, Jaffna in the North and Hambantota in the deep South.

Recognising India’s role as an emerging power in the world, Sri Lanka was one of the first countries to pledge its support for a permanent seat for India in the UN Security Council.

There is one sensitive matter which could be termed an outstanding issue, on which the two countries remain engaged to find a solution. This is the matter of fishermen from either side crossing into each other’s waters. The main issue in this regard is that of fishermen from Southern India crossing the IMBL in the Palk Bay, in large numbers, almost on a daily basis and fishing in the resource rich shallow waters off the coast of Sri Lanka. The Northern Sri Lankan fishermen who have returned to their traditional livelihood after the lifting of restrictions on fishing following the conclusion of the armed conflict, protest that their resources are being plundered by the Southern Indian fishermen. Their other concerns include the fishing methods used by the Indian fishermen which are harmful to the marine eco-system.

The problem is not something that can be solved easily as it involves livelihood concerns of fishermen of both sides. But both countries recognise and acknowledge the problem and related concerns. We remain engaged at all levels including through Fishermen’s Associations, to find practical solutions to the problem. The government of Sri Lanka, several Sri Lankan Tamil political leaders, the Tamil people, as well as several sections of the Sri Lankan Tamil emigrants abroad, have urged all sections of the Tamil communities overseas, including those in Tamil Nadu, to contribute their collective strength, in the aftermath of the defeat of the LTTE, towards rebuilding efforts in the North of the country. This includes restoration of the livelihoods of the people in the North, rehabilitation efforts and uplifting the economy of the North. While several have joined this effort, some who primarily live in Western countries and a few in Tamil Nadu as well, have rejected this call for help, ostensibly for human rights concerns but in retribution for the military defeat of the LTTE. In fact, these groups work against our efforts to bring normalcy to the Northern Province.

The inability or refusal of such groups to come to terms with the defeat of the LTTE and rejection of separatist ideology, seem to impact adversely on the politics of Tamil Nadu. This affects negatively, the efforts by both countries to restore relations between Sri Lanka and Tamil Nadu to their golden days before the conflict, and take it forward, quickly, for increased people-to-people contact, freer movement of people and goods, and increased trade and cultural links.

Since time immemorial, the Indian Ocean has been an important location in the strategic calculations of the great powers of the world. This is primarily due to the economic impact of the Indian Ocean in the East-West maritime trade. Sri Lanka, located right in the middle of the Indian Ocean at a strategic location has not been immune from these strategic calculations and speculations. Think-tanks, academia and the media engage in constant speculation over these issues. The Sri Lankan state maintains constant vigilance and remains mindful at all times to ensure preservation of its Independence. We are determined to ensure that our actions only contribute positively towards enhancing the security and stability of the region, and not damage, in any way, the interests of nations, especially in our immediate neighbourhood and in Asia. Sri Lanka is determined to ensure that our soil and our seas will not become a theatre for manifestation of great power rivalry, ever.

Strategic stability

We would certainly not allow one country to use Sri Lanka as a launching pad for hostile action against any other country. Having suffered from terrorism for 30 years, we understand well, the suffering of people and nations in times of conflict and the pain that society as a whole undergoes in such times.

We will therefore continue to make all efforts to be mindful at all times and to understand and take care of the concerns of our neighbours, especially our closest neighbour and friend, India.

We will always act in a manner that contributes to strategic stability in the region. This also serves our national interest of securing enhanced maritime security in and around the Indian Ocean as well as ensuring peace in the region. In this context, Sri Lanka presented a proposal at the UN, not so long ago, for the declaration of the Indian Ocean as a Zone of Peace.

Though this proposal still remains on the table, or rather in the back-burner, with many such meaningful and noble proposals that gather dust in the UN backburner, the ideals enunciated by Sri Lanka still remain valid and form the basis of our approach to external relations in terms of strategic stability. It is in this context that we continue to enjoy very friendly relations with all Asian powers in the region, India, China, Japan, Indonesia as well as those in the far-east, who belong to the Western group of nations at the UN, such as Australia and New Zealand. Our relations with China are special. Having had frequent cultural contacts in history and centuries of friendly exchanges with China, we promptly recognised the People’s Republic of China immediately after it was founded. Together, we have since nurtured a mutually beneficial relationship.

Colonial legacy

Our relations with the Western world, shaped and nurtured by our colonial legacy since 1505, are no less important. The US not only remains important for Sri Lanka as a superpower, but also as our biggest export market, and as a favoured destination of many Sri Lankan emigrants. With the EU, especially with UK, we enjoy fraternal ties and important social, trade, business and development cooperation links. Our ties with Eastern Europe, especially with the Russian Federation remain robust and mutually rewarding.

The Middle East is very important for us since 10 percent of our population work as expatriate labour in the region, bringing in a substantial amount of inward remittances, adding to our foreign currency reserves.

The single immediate challenge that Sri Lanka faces today is to provide a quick peace dividend to the people in the North and East of the country who were directly affected by the conflict. These are our people who were deprived of their rights for upward mobility in terms of social and economic advancement due to 30 years of conflict. Although people belonging to all communities, living everywhere in Sri Lanka, express relief and happiness that they can now live their daily lives free of terrorist violence, they are not free of grievances. The government acknowledges this and has recognised that the military gains must be invested quickly in sustainable political and socio-economic processes.

Action is already under way to respond to conflict-related grievances as well as their root causes. The process of consolidating the hard won peace through resettlement of the displaced, reconstruction and rehabilitation began immediately after the conclusion of the conflict two years ago. An independent mechanism has been established for reconciliation. This mechanism, called the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), seeks to provide restorative justice. The Commissioners have visited all the conflict affected areas and heard, first hand, the grievances of the people. The LLRC is scheduled to complete its work in November this year. In the meantime, several of the recommendations made by the LLRC in an interim Report are already being implemented through an Inter-Agency Advisory Committee (IAAC).

There are several calls from different sections of the international community, especially from the Western world, for retributive justice. Calls of this nature, at a time when the people who actually live in our country and have faced the brunt of the conflict, require time and space to heal, are unhelpful at best, if not inimical to our immediate needs. The government and the people faced a threat from within, to the sovereignty of our people and our nation. It cannot be dismissed that some of the interventions made and attempted by external actors during the three-decade long conflict, no matter how well intentioned they were, caused complications that adversely affected the lives of the innocent people, especially those in the North and the East who were trapped in the clutches of terrorists.

We realise that we need to focus, without delay, on reconciliation, confidence building and nation building. These processes, in fact, have already begun. But we firmly believe that we also require to preserve the independence of the local mechanisms that we have established for reconciliation. The people of our nation have the confidence, that, after emerging from an injurious and costly conflict, we still retain the strength of character and the will to introspect and take remedial measures on our own.

We believe that we alone can do this, and that we alone, as a nation, must do this, if such processes are to be successful, and their effects, meaningful and long lasting. In this context, I must emphasise that any action that has the potential to lacerate the healing process and cause communal disharmony will not be helpful to the process of consolidating the peace. Efforts by some sections, especially those motivated by LTTE sympathisers living overseas, to push for retributive justice, in the guise of calls for accountability, are counter-productive and inimical.

Humanitarian operation

The Defence Ministry of Sri Lanka published on August 1, its account of military operations from July 2006 to May 2009, titled ‘Factual Analysis of the Humanitarian Operation’. Copies of this document have been made available to the NDC Library. I am sure that document would be of interest to all of you. Our intention is to penetrate the fog of prejudice and to place before the world, the reality of what happened and the progress that has taken place in Sri Lanka since the conclusion of the conflict two years ago as well as the continuing efforts.

Sri Lanka takes its international responsibilities and obligations as well as its role in the international community of states, seriously. We have signed international treaties and other agreements, each of which require us to share with other countries and multilateral institutions, reports and rationale for some of our decisions. We believe in the need to be transparent, accountable, and reasonable. Accordingly we engage and work with member states of the UN according to established UN practice and international law.

We expect reciprocity from other countries and actors on the global stage.

Sri Lanka remains committed to the ideals of the United Nations as well as regional organisations such as SAARC. In SAARC, we recognise the lead role that India can and must play in taking forward regional cooperation objectives.

Sri Lanka remains fully committed to the global endeavour to eradicate terrorism worldwide and particularly in our region. We believe that terrorism and extremism have no place in the modern world.

As Sri Lanka once again takes its rightful place in South Asia, and on the world stage, both in terms of its economic potential and political profile, we want the world to take note of what is being accomplished in the country, against all odds, and the hand of friendship, support and understanding to be extended to our people.

This will enable our nation to march forward, complementing the efforts of the rest of the world and contributing towards economic, social and political advancement on the basis of our vibrant democracy and ever liberalizing economy.

Thank you very much.

Concluded