Sri Lankan Tamils sent to Chennai

As many as 147 Sri Lankan Tamils, who were in the custody of Tuni Rural Police for the past three days, were sent back to Chennai by the Criminal Investigation Department of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu police on Saturday.

Imagine there’s no havens

Sri Lankan Tamils in need of protection should not have to hide out for days in Bangkok safe houses, and pay $50,000 to smugglers to board a dilapidated fishing trawler to Canada

Tamil polity pushing the community out of the equation

There are today an estimated 200,000 Tamil people languishing in displaced camps in the North and the East. There are children born in those camps every day. Even if there were no displaced members who died in the camps or a single death recorded due to spread of diseases, there is little about the plight of the Tamil displaced persons that the country can be proud of.
Then there are those children who were forcibly conscripted for war by the ruthless LTTE, who have known little outside of war and killing, being rehabilitated. Their fears and sentiments are far from healed. It might take all their lives. And this is an entire generation of Tamil children we speak of. A generation denied a normal childhood; schooling and the basic love and care of a mother or father. We haven’t even begun to look at healing the wounds that must fest deep inside the heart of the LTTE cadres today in captivity. Naturally there is little or no room for integration into the rest of Sri Lankan society in these young minds either. Suffice to say they are today more than ever, vulnerable at the hands of political opportunists coming in the guise of speaking for rights.

These are certainly issues of an immediate nature. Issues that cannot be allowed to be ignored, or go un-discussed. But who is discussing them? At what forum do we see the magnanimity of the majority community coming in the form of looking at ways at removing these people from these conditions? Granted, the government seems committed and thankfully the immediate needs of the displaced are being met. It is certainly to the credit of the regime that it did not allow the situation in the Wanni to become another Dafur.

But, can the same be said of the Tamil political leadership? Today, divided as never before, the leadership has left the community at a strange political crossroad. In their grave inability to grab the golden opportunity of bringing the issues facing the community to the open in a rational and responsible manner, the so-called Tamil leaders are doing a grave injustice to its people. If there is no discussion of the issues of the Tamil people in either of the two main political campaigns for the Presidency, it is more to the failure of the Tamil leadership than anything else. It is this opportunist leadership that gained power and thrived under the bargaining power of the militancy of the LTTE that allowed the legitimate concerns of the community go into oblivion.

The sad reality of politics in Sri Lanka is such that the convictions of the majority community would allow little room for the aspirations of the Tamil people to be granted on a platter. However committed President Rajapaksa or Gen. Fonseka in their personal capacities would be to allow for such magnanimity of heart; the reality of being seen as traitors to the victory of the troops by ‘allowing’ anything for the minorities, is what keeps them from bringing the topic, in any meaningful manner to the campaign trail. In a strange twist of fate the arrogance of the Tamil leadership, which first firmly believed the LTTE was invincible and now foolishly follows the myth that the Tamil Diaspora can deliver where terror failed, let better judgment flee.

It’s arrogance in refusing to engage with the government immediately following the end of the war, created for a lacuna of a sensible platform for its issues to come under discussion. If anyone is to be blamed for allowing Tamil grievances to be ignored the foremost blame lay with the Tamil leadership. It can’t deny that it failed to disprove the theory that the cracks within the political structure were due to the lack of a legitimate cause strong enough to hold them together. There is one school of thought that believed strongly that it was the militancy and the rule of the LTTE gun than kept the Tamil political leadership on line. It is pertinent to wonder what happened to the cause now that the guns have been silenced.

And more importantly, how a boycott of the elections as pushed for by some factions within the Tamil National Alliance can provide for these needs to be met? If as is being made evident by the workings of the Sampanthan faction of the TNA, which will push for a silent vote towards the Common candidate, it must be asked if they have been successful in bargaining anything for the community in pushing for support.

It would be very sad if defeating Rajapaksa merely because he ended the militant path of gaining rights, was the only motivating factor. The question demands to be asked how they hope to ensure any rights after the polls, where the lines are so obscure.

In this lacunae, it has become more evident than ever that the peace was forcing more pressures on the Tamil political entity than did the war. In their clear inability to go before the community with one voice and call for their immediate needs to be met through the ballot, the TNA especially has proven beyond doubt that it holds little relevance without the muscle of the LTTE. In the lunacy of purpose that allows both the Sinhala and Tamil political communities to believe that its diasporas will deliver, the politicians are going to leave the communities directionless once more. It is the duty of the leadership to look at ways of working within the political culture than hanging on and allowing its diaspora to dictate terms that have so far proven futile. There is little to suggest that this will change now.

Thirty years of undue suffering by every community after the Sri Lankan polity is back to playing dangerous games with its people. And no one seems to be playing a more vigorous game than the Tamil political leadership. The end of a cruel war has offered little to any of the communities, be they political or economic freedoms. The ongoing political campaign proves beyond any doubt that the people, be they Sinhala, Tamil or Muslim have taken a backseat in their power plays. Nothing about what is being said in the campaign trail has anything to do with raising the standards of their lives, meeting their greater freedoms or allowing for a common path towards a united Sri Lankan state.

Back to their old games of dividing and ruling, there is no attempt to engage any of the communities to allow for greater integration between them. Sadly the year that has just dawned, seems to offer little hope for the post war unity and development that seemed so much a part of our big picture merely six months back.

Sri Lanka's displaced Tamils A market-based solution

Eking a living from handouts

APShow him the way to go home

SQUATTING under an umbrella bearing an EU logo, a woman in a faded sari dips into her blue UNICEF bag and pulls out two towels, some toothbrushes and toothpaste, sanitary napkins and a small bottle of disinfectant. She is soon ringed by hagglers wanting her paltry wares for even less than the pittance she asks. Another woman clambers from a bus lugging a sack of flour donated by the World Food Programme. She jostles for space among the throngs of internally displaced Tamils peddling their rations near the hospital in Vavuniya in the north of Sri Lanka. Just months ago, many of them were treated here for injuries sustained as the Sri Lankan army defeated Tamil Tiger rebels.

After the rout of the Tigers in May, nearly 300,000 Tamils who fled the fighting were fenced inside sprawling camps near Vavuniya. After concerted foreign pressure the government opened the camps on December 1st. It was also swayed by the need for Tamil votes in the hotly contested presidential election to be held on January 26th.

Almost at once dozens of displaced civilians started taking their staple dry rations to town. They sell lentils, wheat-flour, parboiled rice, curry powders, chickpeas and toiletries. There are mosquito nets and cloth nappies, tea, slippers and even a vegetable grater. Traders are arriving from other parts of the country. Prices are at wholesale levels or below, and one says she had heard she could get things cheap for her grocery shop. Some of the poorer camp inmates make money from occasional odd jobs and manual labour. But there is too little work to go around. So selling the rations seems the natural thing to do—not, one adds earnestly, that they are given too much. Rather, it is the only way to earn money to pay for other needs.Vavuniya may soon lose its pavement hawkers, however. President Mahinda Rajapaksa has promised to resettle all displaced civilians in their home villages by January 31st. His main electoral challenger is his former army commander, Sarath Fonseka. They will split the vote of the Sinhalese majority. So both need to court minorities, notably the Tamils.

U.L.M. Haldeen, of the Ministry of Resettlement, says hundreds of families have already been taken back to their villages and given tin roofing sheets, a cash grant and cooking utensils to help them rebuild their lives. He says only 101,113 of the 300,000 remain in camps, and denies allegations that the displaced are being quietly moved into other temporary housing, as the government flounders around in search of a coherent resettlement plan.

Many of the displaced show no interest in the election. One says he will vote, but only because it means he can visit his village. Another stares back blankly when asked if she knows the candidates. No idea, she says, distracted by a uniformed policeman who wants to buy a mosquito net. His small change matters more than the would-be presidents’ promises.

Epoch Making Year for Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka ushered in a new era of peace in 2009 with the annihilation of LTTE and the death of its megalomaniac chief Velupillai Prabhakaran, whose pursuit for 'Tamil Eelam' claimed the lives of over 70,000 people in three decades.

For India, it was a tight rope walk as it quickly stepped in after the end of the civil war by announcing a Rs 500 crore package to Sri Lanka for rehabilitation and resettlement of nearly 3 lakh displaced Tamil civilians.

New Delhi also told Colombo to quickly follow up the military victory with a political solution to integrate the Tamil minority into the mainstream.

The military win over LTTE came as a shot in the arm for President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who gave a free run to the Army to take on the terror group after he came to power in 2005, when one-third of Lankan land was held by the Tigers.

The victory prompted Rajapaksa to call Presidential polls nearly two years ahead of schedule apparently to cash in on the sentiments.

But, it will not be a cake walk for Rajapaksa as he is being challenged by another 'war hero' and former Army Chief Gen Sarath Fonseka, who is contesting as the common opposition candidate.

Fonseka resigned as Chief of Defence Staff, a ceremonial post to which he was appointed after the war, in November and jumped into the Presidential poll foray.

Votes of over three million Tamils and Tamil speaking Muslims are considered crucial for Rajapaksa to continue in office for another six years.

The Tamil National Alliance, which has a considerable influence among Tamils, has not yet decided on its stand in the polls.

Though Sri Lanka has resettled nearly 2 lakh people in their towns and villages in the former LTTE-held areas in the island's north, reconstruction of the areas and rehabilitation of people are yet to begin.

The year gone-by was fruitful for Sri Lanka, which was grappling with the menace of terrorism since late 70s, as the troops began the year with the capture of Kilinochchi, the de-facto capital of the Tamil Tigers, on January 2.

This was the beginning of the end of the LTTE as it lost all its strongholds in the north-east in the next few months culminating in the death of all top leaders of the outfit, including Prabhakaran on May 18.

It ended the 30-year-old civil war that claimed the lives of 70,000 people and annihilated the LTTE, which had eliminated a number of high-profile Sri Lankan Sinhala and Tamil politicians, besides Rajiv Gandhi.

Just two days after the war ended, India sent two of its top officials -- National Security Adviser M K Narayanan and the then Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon -- to Colombo to assure Sri Lanka of its support in resettlement and rehabilitation process.

New Delhi has also impressed upon Sri Lanka a number of times to quickly follow up the military victory with a political solution that is acceptable to the minority Tamil community.

India has also promised help for Sri Lanka in railway projects and reviving agriculture in the former war zones.

A high-level Sri Lankan team consisting of Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa and Presidential Adviser Basil Rajapaksa was in New Delhi twice to discuss the relief and rehabilitation process.

India also opposed a resolution in the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva demanding a probe against Sri Lanka into alleged human rights violation during the last phase of war.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa has assured that the government will make every effort to resettle all Tamil IDPS by January 31.

India has indicated more funds for rehabilitation of the IDPs. It a had sent 2.5 lakh family packs consisting of dry ration, clothing, utensils and footwear from Tamil Nadu to displaced civilians since October 2008.

India will be sending three more de-mining teams even as four such teams are already there, as per the recommendation of the parliamentary delegation from Tamil Nadu which visited Sri Lanka in October.

Tamil detainees enjoy taste of freedom - but it comes at a high price

A chance encounter behind the wire offered the cook an opportunity to serve exquisite revenge on his would-be killer. He was a prisoner, one of 280,000 Tamil civilians interned in Sri Lankan detention camps this year, when the moment came. Memories of his earlier escape from the strip of land held by the Tamil Tigers during their last stand in May were still vivid.

“The Tigers killed between 20 and 30 people in the group I was with as we tried to run,” V. Sivalingam, one of the final Tamil detainees released on Tuesday, recalled. “There were four or five of them. At first they argued with us. Then the crowd around them grew bigger. They began to panic. People started to push past them. Then they opened fire. Close range. Waist high. Directly at us. It was chaos. The military were shelling us at the same time.”

Sivalingam, a cook from Mullaittivu, had miraculously survived, and succeeded in reaching the army’s lines with his wife of 20 years and five children after an epic flight that involved wading through neck-high sea water for ten hours. Within a matter of days he and his family found themselves interned by the authorities in a Zone 2 camp of the infamous Manik Farm complex, where they remained until Tuesday. Most of his fellow detainees were strangers but on one glorious day Sivalingam had recognised a familiar face.

“It was one of the LTTE [Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam] fighters who had shot so many people that day,” he said. “He was a young man, who had managed to escape too, and now disguised himself in the camp as a civilian. I walked up to him and said, ‘Remember me? I was in that crowd you shot at. Think of what I could do to you now’. The man hung his head.However, instead of beating up the Tiger, or revealing his identity to the camp guards, Sivalingam said: “I did nothing. I told nobody of his identity. I could have had him arrested but I didn’t. The LTTE had fought long and hard for us. At the end of it all they did terrible things — we know that. But they didn’t have much choice.”

Such ambivalence towards the Tigers, even among those who suffered directly at their hands, is typical among the civilian former detainees now struggling to pick up the threads of their life since their release.

“When I first heard that Prabhakaran [leader of the LTTE] was dead I felt nothing either way,” explained Jegathees Sridtharan, 34, a teacher from Kilinochchi, released after spending six months in a Zone Zero detention camp in Manik Farm with her husband and two infant sons.

“But later, as a Tamil woman, I felt deeply worried about his death. For 30 years the LTTE had fought for our freedom, right up until disaster.”

Yet these words came from a woman who by her own account had endured a horrific battlefield ordeal in which she had waded through the sea with her husband, clutching their sons aged 2½ and 7 months, escaping a war zone in which she described seeing hundreds of bodies of civilians killed by artillery and airstrikes, simultaneously under fire from both the Tigers and the army.

“I could see the LTTE shooting at us as we entered the water with a huge crowd,” she said. “People were hit and falling into the water.”

These mixed loyalties pose a complex and time sensitive challenge that the Sri Lankan Government must surmount speedily if it is to transform its military victory of May into a lasting peace.

Detaining 280,000 civilians for six months, whom it first claimed to have liberated from the Tigers in “one of the largest hostage rescue operations in history”, was not an auspicious start to winning their support. Though life in the camps does not seem to have involved systematic physical abuse, it could nevertheless be one of hardship, overcrowding and poor sanitation.

“Our camp was particularily bad,” Sivalingam said. “People fought over water, food and space. We felt like prisoners because that’s what we were: third-class citizens.”

All returnees, including the final 130,000 released on Tuesday, are technically offered an immediate resettlement package, which includes a World Food Programme ration card, the first of two $220 (£133) handouts and essential non-food items such as blankets.

However, the plan is flawed in its application. Some people receive cash and rations, some do not. In Trincomalee not a single returnee spoken to by The Times had managed to draw the weekly ration allowance, despite being issued cards, owing to administrative errors by local authorities.

“Each time I go to the authorities they tell me that they have received no rations to give us yet,” said Rajneedevi Visavalingam, 32, the wife of a 40-year-old Tamil farmer who had been blinded in both eyes by shrapnel in April (but who nevertheless had been detained in a Zone 4 camp with his family the moment he was released from hospital).

“I took a letter to the UNHCR [United Nations Commissioner for Refugees] here, saying I have three small children, a blinded husband, no home of our own and no money. They sent me to the IOM [International organisation for Migration], who sent me back to the local divisional secretary, who sent me away with nothing. The Government has washed its hands of us.”

“The situation is crazy,” admitted Father V. Yogeswaran, the Jesuit priest who is director of the Centre for Promotion and Protection of Human Rights in Trincomalee. “There is no clear procedure for the rehabilitation or resettlement programme. We don’t know it. The returnees don’t know it. The UN hasn’t a clear plan either. Why? There’s no answer yet. It’s like the blind groping for a way out.”

The Sri Lankan Government has undermined its own ability to cope with the situation by restricting the access of NGOs to the north and east of the country, organisations that would be far better skilled at delivering resettlement aid than local authorities.

Meanwhile, even the exact freedom of movement status of the final 130,000 released detainees remains unclear. Many have no homes left to go to. Some from the Manik Farm camp complex have been told to report back within ten days, others within 15 days. The total closure of camps is not due until January 31.

Most of those released on Tuesday were happy just to savour even limited freedom after six months’ incarceration rather than brood on their more distant future, although for the cook Sivalingam, the day was one of mixed fortunes.

“I said goodbye to my wife of 20 years for good when I walked out of the camp gates,” he said. “We had been through so much together. We had escaped through the fighting knowing it could be the end of our lives. But we survived. I loved her. But in the camp she consorted with the military for extra rations. That association disgraces her. She’s gone to Jaffna. I’ll never have her back.”

Tamils freed from camps, international community responds

On Tuesday, the Sri Lankan government temporarily released thousands of Tamils and the international community is now responding to the progressive closure of the internatl displacement camps.
On December 1, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa opened the internal displacement camps that housed over 300,000 Tamils. The President also announced in the same week that the camps, that have been dubbed “concentration camps,” will be entirely closed by January 31, 2010.
As thousands of Tamils are leaving the camps, the international community has responded such as the French Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner, who recently said, according to Nidahasa, “This is a decisive step in the return to a normalized situation for the civilian populations who were victims of a bloody armed conflict.”
Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister, Rohitha Bogollagama, spoke with the BBC on Thursday to discuss the recent release of Tamils and said that they were free to leave temporarily but only if they provided details so they can be monitored by the government.
The Christian Science Monitor notes that freed Tamils may have their voice heard in the recently called early elections by Rajapaksa, which will most likely be held in January. Rajapaksa is quite popular in Sri Lanka because of the end of the 30-year civil war. The former Chief of Sri Lanka’s army, General Sarath Fonseka, announced on Sunday that he will be the main challenger against Rajapaksa.
A new poll released on Thursday, reports the United Press International, suggests that 64 per cent of Sri Lankans are optimistic about their economy but economic growth in the region slowed to 3.5 per cent in 2009, which is down from 6 per cent in 2008.
The Sri Lankan government also announced last week that they want to host the next Commonwealth Summit but the international community is strongly against such a bid. Digital Journal reported that Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper will try to block the move.
Dev Fakruddin, a Toronto Tamil demonstrator, told Digital Journal in an e-mail on Thursday evening that the entire situation is a “quagmire” and the entire world will know exactly about the situation in the next several months “most likely after the election.”
“Whenever I read or hear news about Sri Lanka, I always have a frustrated look on my face because I know it’s never the correct news or unbiased. I know that Tamils aren’t being released 100 per cent but the major news outlets are saying the chaos in Sri Lanka is over. But that is not true. I don’t like it one bit. Until Tamils worldwide tell others they can travel peacefully, live their lives and earn a living then I will not worry and believe news reports.”

Sri Lanka Tamils: freed from camps, their votes may give them new clout

Sri Lanka's government freed hundreds of thousands of Tamils from vast internment camps in the north of the island Tuesday – prompted as much by upcoming elections as concerns over human rights, say analysts.

In May, when the Army finally routed the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) from their northern stronghold, much of the population of that area – close to 300,000 people - was imprisoned in overcrowded camps. Tuesday morning, fewer than half that number were thought to remain.

As conditions deteriorated, international pressure mounted, along with warnings that continued detainment would make reconciliation between the island's Tamil minority and Sinhalese majority increasingly elusive. That ethnic conflict was the root of the LTTE's long war against the government.

But internal politics are likely to have done more to secure the freedom of the northern Tamils than foreign pressure.

"[For] the first time in a long time, the government has been forced to focus on the minorities," says Jehan Perera, executive director of the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka, a nonpartisan advocacy group.

That change was ushered in last month, when Sri Lanka's Army chief, Gen. Sarath Fonseka, stepped down as head of the military and announced he would run as the opposition candidate against President Mahindra Rajapakse in general elections in January.

President Rajapakse had called an early election to take advantage of the popularity garnered by his historic defeat of the LTTE. But analysts say General Fonseka's bid threatens to split the president's Sinhalese voter base – forcing Rajapakse to court the vote of the Tamil minority.

Fonseka, an ardent Sinhalese nationalist, has also sought to play to Tamil and moderate sentiments, voicing concern over the current situation of the refugees. In his letter of resignation as head of the Army, he criticized both the "appalling conditions" in the camps and the president's failure to reconcile Sri Lanka's Tamils and Sinhalese.

Mr. Perera says it is questionable whether minorities will back Fonseka, who led a brutal military crackdown on the LTTE in which thousands of civilian Tamils were killed, although "my own belief is that they will be prepared to back someone new," he says.

"His standing for the polls is good for the country, because he has strengthened the opposition," he adds.

FREED TAMILS: TOUGH JOURNEY HOME

Many of the newly freed Tamils face a difficult task returning to their villages hundreds of miles away from the camps in which they have lived for months.

Mr. Perera said their journeys home would not be as easy as the government had suggested, as roads were blocked and there was little public transport. He added that the government's handout of 5,000 rupees ($43) per household was entirely inadequate for people returning to homelands decimated by war, with ruined buildings and patchy sanitation.

Experts also say that with much of the north still dangerously mined, many Tamils will choose to remain in the camps for now.

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka's government still has to prove that it is serious about bringing lasting peace by giving Tamils some form of political autonomy.

Over the weekend, Sri Lanka was blocked from hosting the next meeting of Commonwealth leaders in protest of Colombo's military repression of Tamils during the last phase of fighting.

Australia and Britain united to block Sri Lanka's bid for the 2011 summit, which it had formally submitted in 2007. That meeting will now be hosted by Australia.

––

LTTE cadres fleeing Sri Lanka via India

The decimation of the LTTE in Sri Lanka has given a big push to illegal immigration involving Sri Lankan Tamils in India. There is a sudden spurt in Sri Lankan Tamils illegally crossing over to India to take a flight abroad. Agents have kept apace by doubling fees for passports and visaInvestigators believe most Sri Lankans trying to cross-over to western shores via India are LTTE cadres or sympathizers. Airport authorities have caught at least 40 Sri Lankan Tamils trying to take such flights from Indian airports.

In a latest case at the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport on November 16, Rajan Kumar was stopped from boarding an Air India flight to New York, after the US visa on his passport drew suspicion. The regional passport office in Hyderabad had purportedly issued the passport.

But close scrutiny showed the passport was fake. It would have gone down as another case of illegal immigration had Rajan not told investigators he was a Sri Lankan Tamil who had illegally crossed over to India.

His original name was Sivapalan and apart for his Indian passport, he was also carrying documents to prove his Sri Lankan identity. Sivapalan explained he planned to show his original Sri Lankan documents on reaching America. "He would have claimed to be an LTTE sympathizer and a victim of persecution by Sri Lankan forces," said a source who interrogated Sivapalan. But authorities are undecided on whether Sivapalan was really an LTTE recruit or just trying to get a toe-hold in the US.

Sivapalan had got his boarding pass before he was detained, indicating some kind of connivance with airline staff. It is also clear that Sivapalan got his Indian passport from a gang that catered to Sri Lankan Tamils.

The gang has links to an illegal immigration racket busted in Chennai. On October 22, the Chennai police arrested two agents -- Mahenthiran Kajenthiran and Vellaiyan Tharamalingan -- from Vetri Nagar and recovered 27 Indian passports of Sri Lankan Tamils from their houses. Seven Sri Lankan passports and some visa stamps of UK and other western countries too were found.

The passports were meant for Sri Lankan Tamils but the racket was busted before they could be handed over to clients. What startled the authorities was recovery of LTTE propaganda, indicating the gang was helping Sri Lankan Tamils flee India.

During interrogation, the agents gave details of a well-oiled operation in which LTTE cadres or sympathizers are sent abroad. The gang was led by a person named Kalidass, arrested later.

Kalidass used to take people to exotic European locales posing as film crew. But the crew never returned.Authorities are still clueless on the whereabouts of such Sri Lankan Tamils whose passports the gang prepared. So far, only their names are known.