JM said,

January 17, 2008 @ 2:29 pm

I think the ethnic conflict should be viewed separately from the ongoing military operations against the Tamil Tigers. The LTTE does not represent all the Tamils, and Tamils are in any case not to be the sole stakeholders and beneficiaries of a solution.

The discrimination against Tamils and enmity between the ethnic groups, are for the most part a result of the war and not the cause for its sustenance. In all likelihood, there would be no reason for mass arrests, restrictions of movement, or evictions of suspicious Tamils once the war is over. The other historical reasons put forward as the causes of the conflict, including “Sinhala Only”, standardisation, organised progroms, institutionalised discrimination etc have been rectified and are no longer valid. The reasons for initiating such discriminatory measures, including the discrimination and marginalisation of the Sinhalese by the British colonialists with Tamil assistance, are also no longer relevant. As all of us from Colombo know, Sinhalese, Tamils and others can certainly live with each other in peace without spontaneously breaking out in sporadic killing sprees, unlike what some foreigners think.

The LTTE is an obstacle to a peaceful and equitable settlement to the conflict. The war is not between the Sinhalese and the Tamils as described by many ill-informed observers, but is aimed at bringing areas illegally occupied by an ethno-fascist group into plural democratic rule. It is no different to, for example, a police crackdown on ethnic gangs in Melbourne. The war is not the main conflict, but a separate one born out of it. Many of you advocate that the government must militarily engage with the Karuna/Pillayan Group in the East to stop them from abducting and harassing civilians and recruiting children. The discarded CFA also had a clause obliging the government to disarm non-LTTE Tamil armed groups, which clearly means a “military solution” to all other groups whilst negotiating with the Tamil Tigers.

I agree that there is no military solution to the conflict, because it is not a military conflict to start with. The LTTE simply cannot be negotiated with as we have experienced time and time again. It is the sole obstacle to the resolution of the main conflict. The government has a right, nay a duty, to extend its democratic rule to all areas currently occupied by the LTTE, and to prosecute the LTTE leaders and members responsible for crimes against Sri Lankan civilians. The solution to the main conflict must be through democratic, negotiated means, and must be one that is sustainable, and fair to all stakeholders involved. A military solution to this conflict (not the sub-conflict involving LTTE) means total annihilation of either the Sinhalese or the Tamils, and this is certainly not something any of us want. Much of the opposition to the government’s military operations comes from the confusion of the two conflicts.