Cocktails in New York, bombing in Baghdad

Dr. John Gooneratne is a man whose tour of duty has taken him to many parts of this world. He is regarded as one of the foremost authorities on Sri Lanka’s foreign policy. He has held many diplomatic posts in foreign countries and has tackled some of the most difficult problems faced in his day. He has associated with some of the top decision makers in Sri Lanka. Reminiscences of Gold met up with Dr. Gooneratne and discussed his halcyon days.

“We lived in Mount Lavinia and I had my schooling at S.Thomas’ College right from the Kindergarten up to University Entrance. Looking back on my school days, especially in view of the current situation in the country, we never identified our friends on an ethnic basis. We didn’t think in terms of Tamil friends, Sinhalese friends, Muslim or Burgher friends. In fact we still don’t have the habit of referring to people by their ethnicity. That was something we imbibed from our school environment,” said Gooneratne.

“In 1955 I entered the University of Peradeniya and did a course majoring in Western Classics, that is Greek and Latin. After serving one year as a temporary Assistant Lecturer at the university and another year as a District Land Officer (DLO), I joined the Foreign Ministry in 1961. My first post was to Washington DC in 1965, where I spent three years. The usual practice at that time was to give you two postings and bring you back. There was a fair regularity in the system. After Washington I was posted to Burma for two years. These were all very educative and pleasant posts. Then in 1970 I came back and was posted out again in 1973 to Egypt as First Secretary. A month and half after I assumed duties there we had to face the October ‘73 war - the Ramadan War as the Egyptians called it.

Foreign policy

“It was a great learning experience for me to understand the complexities of Middle East politics. Though French was my assigned language, I started my Arabic studies and finished up doing a course in the American University in Cairo. I was fluent in speech and learnt a certain vocabulary, which was in my case political, and I was able to read the Al Ahram (the largest Middle-East Arabic paper) front page for political news. In 1977 I finished my tour of duty in Cairo, and was then posted as Counselor to our UN Mission in New York. For the first time I was exposed to multilateral diplomacy. It was a period when Sri Lanka was promoting the Indian Ocean Peace Zone proposal and we were very much involved in trying to push this through the UN committees.

“When I returned to Sri Lanka in 1979, there had been a change of government as well as a change of the style in the conduct of foreign policy. When J.R. Jayewardene came to power in 1977, he created a separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Before 1977 the Prime Minister was the Head of government as well as the Minister of External Affairs. So there was a lot of value given to foreign affairs. When we were in the Foreign Ministry, you had the sense that you were working in a ministry that was coming directly under the Prime Minister and had the ear and attention of the Prime Minister in what we did. The style of governance also had an effect on the conduct of foreign affairs.”

He recalled an incident which illustrated the nature of foreign policy-making after 1977. “I was there at an informal function in Washington for the new American ambassador who was going to take up duties in Colombo; and a senior American diplomat who had just been in Colombo was also present. He was advising the new ambassador and said: “Look, you will have to deal with four Foreign Ministers!” The new ambassador was a little bit puzzled and asked : “What is that?” and the diplomat explained: “President Jayewardene has four Foreign Ministers! He has one Foreign Minister for India, that is Mr. Gamini Dissanayake, he has another Foreign Minister for Commonwealth and European Affairs, that is Mr. Lalith Athulathmudali; then he has another Foreign Minister for North America, Canada and the United States, that is Ambassador Ernest Corea; and he has a fourth Foreign Minister, that is the nominally appointed Foreign Minister, Mr. Hameed. He is there to attend Non-Aligned meetings and state funerals. That is how the country runs.”

According to Gooneratne, the situation changed after 1994 with the new regime under President Chandrika Kumaratunga. She had Lakshman Kadirgamar as her Foreign Minister. He was the only Foreign Minister and there were no other separate Foreign Ministers for different assignments and there was no confusion, as a result.

European countries

“That was a different model where you have a single Foreign Minister who conducts foreign affairs of the country with the advice of the President. Mr. Kadirgamar was able to convince very successfully a lot of European countries that the LTTE was an organization that needed to be banned.”

In 1989 he was appointed as Ambassador to Baghdad and he had to face a crisis situation when President Sadaam Hussein decided to invade Kuwait. “I had to deal with the problem of repatriating a large number of Sri Lankans working in Kuwait and a smaller number in Iraq. In Baghdad I had one of the most painful experiences in my foreign service career. There was little or no help from the Foreign Ministry in the repatriation of workers. We got an enormous amount of help from international organizations especially the IOM (International Organization for Migration). From the start Colombo was reacting as though nothing had happened.

“On January 17 the United States started bombing Baghdad. And with the bombing whatever connection we had with Colombo was broken. So we were basically on our own. It was commendable that I had the fullest cooperation from my embassy staff. As the conditions were becoming more difficult and life-threatening, I had to take a decision on my own to abandon the embassy and go to Colombo. It was the first week of February that we set out from Baghdad in two taxi jeeps with all the staff and were proceeding towards Amman along the highway from Baghdad.

On the way there was bombing of the highway. So it was by the grace of Allah or God that we made it through. We had an honorary consul in Amman. I called Colombo for the first time and I got through to the then Secretary to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I got a terribly insulting and harsh reply in Sinhala: “Isey, thamuselawa genneganne apita salli na (We don’t have the money to bring you fellows back). It was so insulting and harsh that I immediately put the phone down, and I knew that I had to apply for evacuation as refugees. Finally it was the IOM office which gave us the tickets to me, my wife and the staff, to return to Colombo as refugees. That was humiliating because the Foreign Ministry was unable to provide for the evacuation of all its embassy staff, in a condition of war. And that hurt is still there whenever I share this story,” explained Gooneratne.

Exciting time

Talking of pleasant experiences in his career, he recalled one such experience. “Immediately after the riots of 1983, I was transferred to Washington DC. Ambassador Corea was handling the immediate aftermath of the 1983 riots where several Tamil groups were lobbying the US government to take action against the Sri Lankan government for what was happening in the country. When I reported for work in Washington and met the ambassador, he instructed me about the work I’m expected to do. He told me: ‘You will be working on one assignment. You will have to work full time on the Hill’ meaning the House of Representatives and the Senate. This was an assignment I did for three years and that was one of the most productive experiences in my career.

“It gave me an understanding of how the American government works and how lobbying and counter-lobbying works there. Ambassador Corea was a down-to-earth man, with no ‘Excellency-airs’ about him. It was a pleasure working with him.”

Gooneratne was also invited to take part in the Peace Secretariat in 2002 when the Ceasefire Agreement was signed between the LTTE and the government. Based on his experience at SCOPP, he has written a book titled: Negotiating with the Tigers (LTTE): A View from the Second Row.” Due to the lack of space, we found it difficult to include here his fascinating insights about the peace process during this period. From cocktails in New York to bombing in Baghdad, John Gooneratne has had an exciting time as a diplomat.